Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Pendlebury, Henry
PENDLEBURY, HENRY (1626–1695), dissenting divine, born at Jowkin in the parish of Bury, Lancashire, on 6 May 1626, was son of Henry Pendlebury of Bury. The Pendleburys were a family long settled at West Houghton (see Earwaker, Local Gleanings, ii. 632, 740). From Bury grammar school Henry passed to Christ's College, Cambridge, on 1 May 1645, where he became a sizar, and graduated B.A. on 26 April 1648, finally proceeding M.A. Taking holy orders, he was made minister at Ashworth, near Middleton, in 1648. In the following January he preached before the Bury classis, and was approved. In the Commonwealth church survey of 1650 he is noted as ‘lately minister at Ashworth, but hath ceased to officiate for want of maintenance’ (Lanc. and Cheshire Record Soc. Publ. i. 26).
Before July 1650 he had contracted ‘a clandestine and irregular marriage’ with Sarah Smith. But, after inquiry into the matter, the classis was satisfied (September 1650), and ordered him to be ordained at Turton, on 23 Oct. 1650, to Horwich chapel in Dean parish (ib. i. 32). Towards the end of the year (16 Oct. 1651, according to Chorlton's memoir, infra) he removed to Holcome chapel in Bury parish, with the assent of the classis (Hunter, Life of Oliver Heywood; Fishwick, Vicars of Rochdale, Chetham Soc. i. 101). He was ejected from Holcome in 1662, but found occasional opportunities of preaching.
On the Declaration of Indulgence in 1672, Pendlebury returned to Holcome, where a temporary place of worship was built for him in Bass Lane (Fishwick, Hist. of Rochdale, p. 252; Nightingale, Lanc. Nonc. ii. 157). He also officiated at Rochdale (cf. Nightingale, iii. 241 n.); but his ministrations were mainly devoted to Holcome. He died on 18 June 1695 in his seventieth year, and was buried in Bury church. In 1865 his bones were removed to a common receptacle on the occasion of the building of the new parish church. Newcome notes his death in his ‘Autobiography’ (p. 308) with the words ‘a great loss.’ His will was proved at Chester in 1695. His widow, his second wife, Jane Wolstenholme, died near Turton in Lancashire on 18 Nov. 1713 (Northowram Register). His son William Pendlebury, M.A., was for many years minister of Mill Hill Chapel, Leeds (see Heywood, Diaries, iv. 319; Booker, Hist. of Birch Chapel, p. 86, Chetham Soc.)
Pendlebury was one of the most learned nonconformists of his day. Most of his works were published posthumously. The titles are: 1. ‘A plain Representation of the Transubstantiation as it is received in the Church of Rome, by a Country Divine, London, 1687, sm. 4to, pp. 68. There is a questionable tradition that the work ‘was carried by a friend of his privately to Archbishop Tillotson, who caused it to be printed, he so much approved of it’ (Calamy, Account, p. 400), but Tillotson was not archbishop till 1691. 2. ‘Invisible Realities: the Real Christian's greatest Concernment, in several [i.e. six] sermons on 2 Cor. iv. 18,’ London, 1696, dedicated to Hugh, lord Willoughby of Parham, by John Chorlton, with brief memoir of the author by Chorlton; reprinted at Bury, in 1816, with ‘The Book Opened.’ 3. ‘The Book Opened, being [the substance of] several Discourses on Rev. xx. 14,’ London, 1696; reprinted Bury, 1816, with No. 2. 4. ‘The Barren Fig Tree, or a practical Exposition of the Parable, Luke xiii. 6–9,’ London, 1700; Rochdale, 1700; Leeds, 1793. 5. ‘Sermons by Henry Pendlebury of Rochdale,’ with preface and dedication by Chorlton and Cunningham of Manchester; 2nd edit. Manchester, 1711. 6. ‘Sacrificium missalicum mysterium iniquitatis, or a treatise concerning the Sacrifice of the Mass’ (never before printed), London, 1768. Several sermons preached at the Bolton lecture were reprinted in Slate's ‘Select Nonconformist Remains’ (pp. 349–89).
[Authorities quoted; Fishwick's Lanc. Library, pp. 411–12; Scholes's Bolton Bibliogr. p. 201; Halley's Lanc. Nonconformity, p. 372; J. E. Bailey in Manchester Guardian, ‘Local Notes and Queries,’ 4 Jan. and 29 April 1874; notice by W. Hewitson in the Bury Times, June and July 1895; Lanc. and Chesh. Record Soc. Publ. i. 26, 37, xii. 66, xviii. 194; Manchester Minutes (Chetham Soc.); Heywood's whole Works, i. 130, 441; Oliver Heywood's Diaries; Northowram Register; Calamy's Continuation and Account of Nonc. Mem.; Thoresby's Ducatus Leodiensis, App. p. 122; Raines MSS. i.291 (Chetham Libr.); Newcome's Autobiogr. (Chetham Soc.); Thorburn's Valedictory Address, Bury, 1874; Minutes of the Bury Classis (MS. in the writer's possession); information kindly sent by J. Peile, master of Christ's College; The Surey Demoniac, pp. 36, 73; Jolly's Vindication of the Surey Demoniac, pp. 40, 62; Long's Life of Matthew Henry, p. 57; Thoresby's Corresp. i. 339, 404; Zachary Grey's Examin. of Neal, iv. 429; Jones's Popish Tracts, pp. 367, 463; Notitia Cestriensis, ii. 26, 41–2, 103 (Chetham Soc.)]