Location: 28 Chapel Street, Garnerville

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This site is a privately owned house of worship.

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The first Episcopal services in Haverstraw were conducted by the Reverend W. F. Walker in 1846 and held in the Methodist house of worship in the village then known as Warren. As the congregation grew, it moved to a room over a dry goods store on Main Street and later leased a building from the Methodist church. In 1847, the church was received in union with the Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church of the Dioceses of New York. For years, the Trinity congregation had occasional services as a mission served by the pastor of what is now Christ Episcopal Church in Piermont.

 

In 1854, the Reverend J. Breckinridge Gibson held his first service for a congregation of four people in what is now West Haverstraw. By 1855, the cornerstone of the parish’s first building was laid. It was a wood-frame structure at the intersection of today’s Route 9W and Railroad Avenue. The Episcopal mission continued to grow, and in 1876 the church built a rectory, at a cost of $2,250, on land donated by Mr. and Mrs. A. B. Gurnee; a few years later, Mrs. Amelia Garner West and Mrs. Catharine Wattles donated $900 to enlarge the rectory. The Manse, as the rectory is known, is located at 100 Chapel Street, within the grounds of Helen Hayes Rehabilitation Hospital. It has been renovated and is now rented out to tenants to generate income for the parish.

 

As the mill and dye works in Garnerville prospered in the nineteenth century, so did Trinity Episcopal Church. In 1898, the pres-ent church building was erected on Chapel Street. It opened for services in 1899. The first person baptized in the new church was Catherine Canuchard Dickon (on September 24, 1899), and the first wedding was celebrated in April 1901 between William Stevens and Maude Peck.

 

Among the many notable features of the church are its beautiful memorial stained glass windows. In particular, the Bishop’s Window, on the south wall at the rear of the church, is dedicated to the Right Reverend J. M. Wainwright, Provisional Bishop of the Diocese of New York, who performed the first confirmation of Trinity members on August 1854 in the First Presbyterian Church in Haverstraw. It was the last service he ever performed, and he died shortly thereafter.

 

Trinity Episcopal Church has weathered many ups and downs in its nearly 150 years of history. The Depression years of the 1930s were particularly difficult; however, the parish survived to become self-supporting in 1943. In 1961, the facilities were expanded to include the Sunday School building and office.

 

Today, Trinity is fortunate to have its sturdy, Saxon-style Haverstraw brick church building, classrooms, and good location with which to meet the needs of the parish and the community in the future.