Theophilus Lindsey established the first avowedly Unitarian church in England in 1774 at Essex Street Chapel.Chapter 2. Mortimer Rowe, B.A., D.D. The History of Essex Hall. London: Lindsey Press, 1959. Full text reproduced here .} Nontrinitarianism was against the law until the Doctrine of the Trinity Act 1813, but legal difficulties with the authorities were overcome with the help of barrister John Lee, who later became Attorney General. Unitarians of this time continued to consider their teachings as "Biblical", though increasingly questioning the inspiration of the Bible and the accounts of the miraculous.Gerald Parsons Religion in Victorian Britain Vol 3- 1988 p80 " two theologically incompatible strands (one Bible-based, orthodox and distinguished from the rest of evangelical dissent only by its conviction that the doctrine of the Trinity was unscriptural; the other heir to the rationalism and deism of the Enlightenment and possessed of a calm and intellectual rather than fervent and ethos, Unitarianism was always destined to be firmly middle class." (See Rational Dissenters for more.) Divergence in the Unitarian Church was increasingly evident after 1800 with the majority following the rationalist views of writers such as Thomas Belsham and Richard Wright, who wrote against the miraculous conception, while a minority held to the views of traditionalists.R. K. Webb "Miracles in English Unitarian Thought" Essay, chapter 6 in ed. Mark S. Micale, Robert L. Dietle, Peter Gay Enlightenment, passion, modernity: historical essays in European Thought and Culture 2007 p120 cf ref 22 p423 "Compare Richard Wright, the celebrated Unitarian missionary, An Essay on the Miraculous Conception of Jesus Christ (London, 1808)."Wright A review of the missionary life and labors of Richard Wright p68 "After they were excited to think freely, some gave up the doctrine of the miraculous conception, from reading the scriptures only, and observing certain things there with which it could not be reconciled."Robert Spears The Unitarian handbook of scriptural illustrations & expositions 1883 "The prophet uses not the Hebrew word which properly signifies a virgin, but which denotes a girl, a young woman. ... Originally and literally this seems applicable only to the birth of a child, a sign to Ahaz,"
