In the early part of the 19th century, there was a change in the character of Newington Green. After a patient struggle of 150 years, the English Dissenters were finally freed from their civil disabilities with the passage of the Doctrine of the Trinity Act 1813. With, it seemed, nothing left to fight for on that front, Nonconformists no longer needed the security of the Newington Green, and the area lost some of its intellectual cohesiveness. The church touched a low point. The nature of Newington Green had changed—the fresh bucolic village had been swallowed up by London's relentless growth, and had become a "thriving and expanding suburb". With this growth of prosperity also came a tide of poverty, and this was to prove the mission for the Victorian era. A hundred years before, the ethos had been one of almost Puritan self-reliance, but now the Dickensian poverty, evident in cholera epidemics and rampant malnutrition, made social responsibility an urgent necessity. The minister who guided the first 25 years of this (1839–1864) was Thomas Cromwell, FSA (1792–1870). (Like many Anglican vicars, one of his hobbies was local history.) In 1840, a Sunday school was set up for poor children, and soon thereafter a Domestic Mission Society, to visit the poor in their homes. A library and a savings club emphasised self-help. A regular day school ran from 1860 for ten years, until primary education became the responsibility of the state with the passing of the Elementary Education Act 1870.