Notes: 1. The original organ opened in 1922 was incomplete. It cost £1,119 10s. “In January 1927 the Choir had installed a horn stop, and also various improvements made which cost £43. The Choir in November 1932, offered the church to have the instrument cleaned, overhauled, completed and modernized at a cost of £200. To attain this amount £39 is now needed. When the full amount is obtained, the Choir will have subscribed £500 towards the total cost of £1,362 10s. To all who are helping the Choir to realize their object, they tender their appreciation and thanks”.
2. A Form of Service used at the dedication of the completed war memorial organ on 11th November 1936 gives a lot of detail about the organ itself.
3. The original Tabernacle at Laygate was demolished in 1971 under a Town Council development scheme. They paid £12,750 compensation and a new church was built Marsden Road. The church started with open air mission in South Shields Market Place. Meetings started to be held in Wapping Street in a room in the house of Bella Booth. It proved to be too small and they used the Union British Schools for services. The next move was to High Shields where a long room in Holborn called The Drunkery was used. They then moved to the old NER Station in Commercial Road. A piece of land then was secured in Cuthbert Street. The ‘Old Durham’ was built here in 1842, and was later used by the Salvation Army. The costs were too high, and the premises were seized. there were other temporary moves until the premises in Cambridge Street were built and called the Ebenezer Church. But this became too small and premises in Johnson’ s Hill were used. The foundations for the Laygate Church were laid in 1870.
4. Additional pipes and stops were added and rededicated November 11th 1936.
5. According to the Shields Daily Gazette the plaque was unveiled by Rev. G. Dickson Black, who was minister of the church in 1922. Rev. Edward Smith seems to have been the minister during the war years, and also seems to have been Mayor in 1922
6. “The organ is one of the most up-to-date organs in the town, because the organ is enclosed. Incidentally, the organ of the Queen’s Theatre and that of the Tabernacle are the only two organs in the town with independent swell boxes. The Regal Theatre organ is entirely enclosed in one swell box.”
7. “Ever since the in-completed organ was established on Wednesday, September 27, 1922, efforts have been made continuously by Mr. John Ward, the choir and church to raise sufficient money to complete the bring the organ work up-to-date. Most of the work for this affair has been done by Mr. John Ward himself, the Baptist Tabernacle Church organist and choir-master, and when he sees the result of his good work he can feel well satisfied.”
8. There is some confusion regarding the dates of the rededication. According to the South Shields Gazette 19/10/1934 the organ was to be rededicated on Sunday, two years earlier.
9. Alderman Smith, who was presented with the key to open the full organ in November 1936 said that he “performed the ceremony with pleasant and sad memories as it was September, 1922, when his wife, the late Mrs. Edward Smith, as Mayoress of the town, opened the then incomplete organ.
