The first Nonconformist congregation began in 1662 when the vicar of Cullompton, Revd William Crompton, was ejected from the established church. He continued to preach and a Protestant Dissenters meeting house was built in 1698 which became the Unitarian Chapel. In the eighteenth century there was a prevalence of Dissent with the local vicar recording in 1736 that of a population of 3358 there were 508 Presbyterians, 133 Anabaptists and 87 Quakers. By 1743 the first Baptist Chapel had been built. John Wesley's journal records preaching near the town in 1748 and on numerous occasions until 1789.