Gravestones and bells

It has occurred to me that the blog is coming up to its 10th anniversary in a couple of months' time, so I had a quick look back at what has already appeared here. In so doing, I found a few posts that were still lurking in draft, never actually published. One was completely blank, so I've deleted that! Another was simply a list of topics I thought I'd like to write about, which is obviously for my own use, so fine to keep the draft - and maybe add to it! The final post was a half-started affair entitled 'Gravestones', created in August 2017. It looks as though I'd been travelling around Cheltenham and Malvern and discovered an interesting Loughborough connection with a little place in Gloucestershire, called Hartpury. So ...  

Hartpury church

Over in Hartpury, having walked around the church and churchyard of Saint Mary the Virgin, I spotted a small sandstone gravestone, quite unlike many of the gravestones I'd seen in the Loughborough area, which tended to be - although weren't exclusively - slate. I took a photo of the gravestone because there was a beautifully carved skull on the top, and the person commemorated had been the parish blacksmith. It wasn't until I got home and came to look at the pictures that I read the detail on the headstone:

In Memory of John Hale of this Parish, Blacksmith, who deceased September 9th 1692, Aged 25 years 4 months.

 

Loe, here's interred the muses passive friend; 

their noblest science (ringing) was his end. 

His actions just a martyr of that skill, 

crushed by a bell twas Heaven's sacred will. 

Melodious bells delighting him on earth, 

Exchanged terrestrial for celestial mirth. 

This fatal stroke (in haste) did stop his breath, 

lamented was his unexpected death.

What a very sad ending for the local blacksmith.

Accidents that are recorded on gravestones in our own parish churchyard included the death of Thomas Bombroffe, William Peck, and William Smith, who were all drowned in the River Soar, on 9th July 1767:

HERE LIE

in the same grave

THOMAS BOMBROFFE aged 46

WILLIAM PECK aged 20

WILLIAM SMITH aged 18

Who were unfortunately drowned together

in the River Soar on the ninth day of July 1767

It is presumed that T. BoMBROFFE lost his life by endeavouring

To save his two companions, for he only was found in his clothes.

Some of the principal inhabitants of this parish

Tenderly concerned for the sudden fate of these their

Fellow Christians, and for a perpetual warning to all others

Caused this stone to be erected by voluntary subscription

READER

be thou constantly prepared for Death

to which though art exposed every hour

by Accident

The gravestone has been moved and is now sited upright along a raised bank, thus, the final lines "by carelessness ..." are no longer visible.    

  

Again, a very sad end to three lives.

The other, perhaps more cheerful connection with Loughborough is, of course, bells! The bells at Hartpury had been made in various years, and they certainly had a least one bell around 1544. What's happened with the bells since then is that in 1550 a further bell was cast by a Bristol founder called Henry Jeffries and this bell is still part of the peal. Then, in 1626 and 1628, three bells were cast by John Pennington. By 1850, Hartpury had five bells, which were rehung by Isaac Gose, and in 1926, a further bell was added, which was cast by Gillett and Johnston of Croydon. No bells by our very own Taylors ... or is there?

In my efforts to ensure I'd reported accurate information about Hartpury, I had a quick journey around the internet. Imagine my surprise when I read that there were plans afoot to repair and rehang the bells - work that would be done by none other than Taylors! In fact, Taylors will be working on bells for Hartpury and two other churches in the diocese, those at Corse and at Staunton. AND, visitors from Hartpury have been up to Loughborough this week to see the work being done for them by Taylors! How wonderful for all involved!

I was lucky enough to actually be down at the bellfoundry when the folk from Hartpury visited, so I was able to take a few photographs. I believe this is one of the original Hartpury bells:

These are two pictures of the visitors from behind, as they are watching the casting of their bells:

and this is what they would have been watching at the time I took the photographs:

I wasn't able to see their bells actually being cast, but the process is always the same, so this is a photograph of the recent casting of Loughborough's Hope Bell, which is exactly the process the visitors saw.

Casting of Loughborough's Hope Bell April 2023 

One exceptional thing in Hartpury churchyard which even I can't connect with Loughborough is the bee shelter! A truly beautiful home for bees!

_______________________________________________

posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

_______________________________________________

Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

The copyright © of all content on this blog rests with me, however, you are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follows:

Dyer, Lynne (2023). Gravestones and bells. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2023/04/gravestones-and-bells.html [Accessed 30 April 2023]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

Blog archive and tags:

If you are viewing this blog in mobile format, you will not be able to easily access the blog archive, or the clickable links to various topics. These can be accessed if you scroll to the bottom of the page, and click 'View Web Version'. Alternatively, there is also a complete list of posts, which when clicked will take you to the page you are interested in.

Searching the blog:

You can search the blog using the dedicated search box that appears near the top of the blog when viewed in the web version. Alternatively, you can search using your usual search engine (e.g. Bing, Google, DuckDuckGo etc.) by following this example:

site: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/ “Radmoor House”

NOTE – the words you’re actually looking for must be in “” and the first of these must be preceded by a space

Thank you for reading this blog.

Lynne