The authoritative source on
  early churches of New Jersey

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We've created a database and photographic inventory on more than half the 18th & 19th century churches in the state and add to it each month. We welcome and solicit all contributions and suggestions from our visitors.

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   Photographic Inventory

FirstPresbyterian Church
Branchville, Sussex County

Branchville has only two old churches today, both fine wood frame buildings. The Presbyterian church is unusual because of its façade, which features the two doors and substantial staircases leading to them. Although I examined the foundation, I could not tell whether the entry vestibule is a later addition, which I suspect. The belfry suggests an 1850s date, but the details of the entrances are more typical of a later period.
     Today the congregation is known as the First Presbyterian Church of Branchville but when it was organized in 1820 it was known as the First Presbyterian Church of Frankford. For several years it shared a union church, built for any and all religious services which the neighborhood might obtain. In 1827 a church was built in Augusta, but in the late1840s a movement got started to change the place of meeting to Branchville, which was done by 1856 when the present building was erected. It was enlarged in the 1870s.