Henry Sulley

Henry Sulley (1845–1940) was an English architect and writer on the temples of Jerusalem.

Sulley was born to English parents in Brooklyn, Long Island,[1] USA, 30 January 1845, but relocated back to Nottingham when still young.

As an architect, Sulley is noted for several buildings in Nottingham,[2] among them 2 Hamilton Road, 'a fine Victorian dwelling' designed for James White the lace manufacturer in 1883.[1][3][4][5]

Although he had no formal training in archaeology, Sulley's background in architecture allowed him to develop various ideas about Solomon's Temple and the City of David. His primary area of activity was in writing concerning the temples in Jerusalem: Solomon's Temple,[6] Herod's Temple and Ezekiel's Temple.[7] In 1929 Sulley was the first to propose that the watercourse of Siloam tunnel was following a natural crack,[8][9][10][11] a theory developed by Ruth Amiran (1968),[12] and Dan Gill (1994).[13]

Sulley had been baptised as a Christadelphian in October 1871 at the age of 26 following lectures by Robert Roberts and reading Elpis Israel.[14] When he was only 28 the bulk of the Nottingham Ecclesia left following Edward Turney into the Nazarene Fellowship for six years until Turney's death in 1879, after which most of those who had left returned.[15]

As a Christadelphian Sulley toured Australia,[16] New Zealand,[16][17][18] America and Canada, showing his large illustrated architectural designs for Ezekiel's temple, in lecture halls and museums, typically over two or three nights. These public lectures followed a regular pattern: archaeology, architecture, prophecy, and then preaching.[19] On his journeys he would write articles for publication in England giving impressions on the buildings he saw: for example, noting that the Washington Monument was a marvel, but that the corner-towers of Ezekiel's temple would be two-and-a-half times taller.[20] During the period from 1898 onwards he was a regular assistant to the second editor of The Christadelphian, Charles Curwen Walker.

Buildings

• Upnah House, 22 Balmoral Road, Nottingham 1873
• Malvern House, 41 Mapperley Road, Nottingham 1874
• 2 Hamilton Road, Nottingham 1873
• Oakfield, Cyprus Road, Mapperley Park, Nottingham 1882
• Elmsleigh, Hamilton Road, Mapperley Park, Nottingham 1883
• Addison Street Congregational Church 1884
• Warehouse, Peachey Street, Nottingham 1887-88[21] (Now YMCA)

Publications

One of Henry Sulley's images of Ezekiel's Temple.

• Temple of Ezekiel's prophecy (1887)[22]
• A Handbook to the Temple of Ezekiel's Prophecy[23]
• Pentaletheia: Five writings on the Truth[24]
• The Sign of the Coming of the Son of Man (1906)
• What is the Substance of Faith? A Reply to Sir Oliver Lodge (1908)[25]
• Is It Armageddon? (1915; formerly Britain in prophecy)
• A House of Prayer for All People
• Where are our dead friends?
• Divine worship in the age to come
• Spiritlism

References

1. Country life – Volume 197, No.32-35 – 2003 Page 135 "Elmsleigh (pictured, above, in The British Architect magazine in 1883) was designed by Henry Sulley (1845–1940), who was born on Long Island but practised in Nottingham, creating a series of grand villas for the rich lace manufacturers of the ..."
2. Brodie, Antonia (20 December 2001). Directory of British Architects 1834-1914: Vol 2 (L-Z). Royal Institute of British Architects. p. 730. ISBN 082645514X.
3. Nottingham City Council Development Control Committee, Report of Assistant Director of Development and Environmental Services (Planning and Transportation), Application No: 03/01042/PFUL3 Archived 4 September 2014 at the Wayback Machine for planning permission, 23 July 2003 (191 KB Word doc)
4. Pevsner, N. Nottinghamshire: Second Edition 1979 p.264
5. The British Architect Volume 19 1883 Page 55 "The illustration of a gentleman's residence which appears in our journal this week is from a design by Mr. Henry Sulley"
6. Quarterly Statement - Palestine Exploration Fund 1893 p.179
7. Sulley, H. The temple of Ezekiel's prophecy. Nottingham 1887
8. New studies on Jerusalem: – Page 230 Eyal Baruch, מרכז אינגבורג ללימודי ירושלים – 1998 "In 1929, quite out of the blue, a Nottingham architect, Henry Sulley, sent a note to the Palestine Exploration Quarterly suggesting that the engineers had followed a fracture in the rock which led them from the spring in the north to the collection ..."
9. Sulley. H. in Quarterly Statement - Palestine Exploration Fund 1929 p123
10. Jerusalem's water supply: from the 18th century BCE to the present 1993 Page 14
11. Zvi Abells, Asher Arbit The City of David water supply 1995 p15 "As long ago as 1929 an architect, Henry Sulley, wrote from England on page 124 of PEFQSt: "Since those who have inspected the tunnel mention a cleft in the rock at the point where the excavators met, it seems to me that this cleft is the explanation of the course taken by the excavators in forming this tunnel. Probably the cleft extended from the Virgin's Fountain (Gihon Spring) to the Pool of Siloam, and a small quan- tity of water would at times trickle through"
12. Ruth Amiran, Qadmoniot 1 (1968), p. 13 (Hebrew)
13. Dan Gill. Source: BAR. Waterworks underlying the City of David
14. The Christadelphian, 1871
15. Wilson B Sects and Society Page 243.
16. "Entertainment in the Opera House". Wanganui Herald. Whanganui: John Ballance. 2 November 1901. p. 3. Retrieved 12 January 2013.
17. "Museum Hall. Free Public Lectures". Wanganui Herald. Whanganui: John Ballance. 30 October 1901. p. 3. Retrieved 12 January 2013.
18. "Mr Henry Sulley's Lectures". Wanganui Herald. Whanganui: John Ballance. 1901. p. 3. Retrieved 12 January 2013.
19. e.g. Wanganui Herald 1901 MR HENRY SULLEY'S LECTURES.
20. The Christadelphian 1889 p15
21. Harwood, Elain (2008). Pevsner Architectural Guides. Nottingham. Yale University Press. p. 138. ISBN 9780300126662.
22. Automatic download (113MB PDF)
23. Entry on Trove (National Library of Australia's online database)
24. Automatic download (26MB PDF)
25. Full title: What is the Substance of Faith? A Criticism of Sir Oliver Lodge's Catechism and a Response to the New Theology Challenge Against Revealed Religion (London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co., 1908)