St. Mary's

Because it’s Easter, I thought that we could look at our parish church and its place in the community

Behind the stone wall on the traffic lights, just north of the shops is our parish church St Mary’s. Glimpsed through the lych-gate, the church and bell tower with its crowded churchyard and yew trees has an almost ageless look

The sketch below shows St Mary’s from a viewpoint just inside the lych-gate, looking towards the tower, just as a bride would see on her way into church as an Easter bride

St Mary’s (designed by the Llandaff architect John Prichard), was built in 1883-4 at a cost of £3,559, and opened in May, the next year. It was built because the old church was too small and was becoming derelict

The churchyard was already there, it was opened in 1876. The old graveyard in Old Church Road was far too full and there were constant squabbles about fitting in any more graves. The first stone of the 2-acre graveyard wall was laid (without ceremony) in November of that year by Mrs TW Booker

The vicarage, a little further north along Penlline Road (also designed by John Prichard) had been built even earlier and is shown on the OS map of 1880

By 1908, the parish hall opposite was built

Whitchurch was only created as an independent parish from Llandaff in 1845. It’s fascinating to discover that 16 years later, in the census of 1861, Evan Price Thomas, the vicar of Whitchurch was a lodger at the Hollybush Inn!

When the church was first opened, the tower hadn’t been completed (it would be interesting to see how much had been built), and it wasn’t until 24 years later that the tower was completed and a new peal of bells provided, courtesy of Capt. and Mrs James Chappell of Greenhill

The enthusiastic group of bell-ringers (campanologists) still ring the church bells in the traditional way on high days and holidays. I wonder if we’ll hear the bells next month for the Coronation?

The lych-gate wasn’t always on the corner. When the churchyard was first opened, Church Road hadn’t been constructed, and the lych-gate was a little further up the main road. The well-known photograph of the Plough taken from the top of the tower shows the original lych-gate location! After 1902, when Church Road opened, the lych-gate was moved to the corner

Following WW1, vestries were added to the north, but the construction of the north aisle was deferred due to a shortage of funds, only to be built quite a while later

The church has a series of wonderful stained glass windows, and the striking east window with its crucifixion scene was installed in 1936 in memory of Mr WR Davies, managing director of the Melingriffith Tinplate Works

Originally, the church interior had bands of polychromatic brickwork, but it was later whitewashed over to make it a little lighter

AWEN have been given a set of booklets listing the graves in St Mary’s. Perhaps we could arrange for a library event later in the year, exploring family histories

2022 saw the centenary of the burial of Charles Burley Ward VC, and AWEN with the rector Father Jon Davis helped plan the successful commemoration

The churchyard holds a number of Commonwealth Graves, each with a simple white headstone. Ceri has been recording the stories of these fallen heroes, and in November last year curated a memorial talk, and a guided walk to the war memorial outside the library

Geoff Foot has written a lovely book about the history of St Mary’s and in particular to the stained-glass windows. Geoff also writes about the history of the church and the chronology. If you can find a copy of the book, it’s well worth reading. I’m grateful for Geoff and his book as an invaluable source for chunks of this article

 

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