Paper:
There are more Anglican churches in England than there are banks or petrol stations. Of the 16,300
churches, more than 12,000 are listed with 4,200 classified at Grade I or A, representing 45% of all
buildings (secular and religious) listed at this grade.1 A report on Places of Worship and the Tourism
Destination Experience (2006), has commented upon the significance of these sacred structures which
make up ‘the largest estate of listed buildings in the country:’2
Churches and cathedrals are such a familiar part of our landscape that it is possible to take them
for granted. For many visitors they remain a mystery, merely a part of the quintessential
picture-postcard view. They do, however, make a vital contribution to Britain’s heritage,
attractiveness and economy. Moreover, these sacred spaces are integral to the story of the
places and communities within which they have evolved. They are signposts of our heritage,
points where you can touch history, as well as places of visual and spiritual wonder.3
As ‘signposts of heritage’ or ‘markers of history’ churches have relevance for the themes of this
conference: as architectural historian and theorist Thomas Markus suggests every building and its
interiors can be understood as ‘an unfolding serial event, a building as narrative’: [S]
From the moment it is conceived, through its design, production, use, continuous reconstruction
in response to changing use, until it final demolition, the building is a developing story, traces of
which are always present. 4
[S] In the case of St. Michael’s Church in Cropthorne, Worcestershire, many traces of that story remain:
functioning as a palimpsest, this Church’s ongoing narrative can quite literally be read from its walls.
However, Markus also highlights the importance of texts in ‘making, using and understanding buildings’;
through language, he suggests ‘a community is able to articulate its feelings and thoughts about
buildings’ and ‘to share its experience of meanings.’ 5
[S] First recorded in the Domesday Survey for Worcestershire, Cropthorne Church is an ancient building
with a rich history, which can be constructed from a range of surviving manuscript and visual evidence
including ecclesiastical and legal documents; vestry minutes and Church Wardens’ accounts; parish
correspondence and family papers; newspaper reports, maps and guidebooks; architects’ plans and
designs; [S] watercolours, photographs and picture-postcards.6 This paper, itself another text, adds to
that narrative, highlighting an eventful episode in its ‘developing story’. It is a chapter that describes the
1
rebuilding of the chancel of St. Michael’s which began in 1892, in an attempt to investigate how far
these physical changes reflected a more profound social and cultural transformation.7 Here, more than
gratuitous alliteration, the three themes of this paper, ‘modernity’, ‘medievalism’ and ‘memory’ can be
interpreted as competing narratives, while the concerns surrounding ownership, responsibility and
community that have emerged during my research, suggest that this building is also a multi-authored
text.
So if you are sitting comfortably … then I’ll begin.
Concerns about the conditions of the chancel were first raised in 1863 when the Reverend Robert
Sanders, the Vicar of St. Michael’s, wrote to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners begging ‘most respectfully
to call their immediate attention to the dilapidated, or more properly, dangerous state of the Chancel of
Cropthorne Church.’8 The Commissioners informed the worried incumbent that they were no longer
liable for repairs having transferred the responsibility for the chancel to Francis Dermot Holland to
whom they had sold the Cropthorne Estate in 1861. Holland, however, did nothing to remedy the
‘dangerous state of the Chancel’ until the arrival of a new Vicar, the Reverend Herbert Wilkinson, almost
thirty years later in 1892.9
Surviving evidence suggests that in September 1892, Mr. Wilkinson consulted Jethro Cossins, an
architect who practiced in Birmingham, ‘on the subject of repairing his church.’10 Cossins was a member
of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings and his letters to Thackeray Turner, Secretary of
the SPAB, indicate his concerns about the planned restoration of the St. Michael’s; they also describe
the sorry condition of the building and refer to the requirements of his client.11 He wrote ‘I am sorry to
have written to such a length but my anxiety to do the best for an interesting old chancel will I hope be
enough excuse.’ 12 Besides the Vicar’s intentions to re-roof the nave, remove the clerestory, rebuild the
porch and reposition a memorial tomb, Cossins’ main concern was the north-east wall of the chancel,
which bowed outwards ‘to a great extent’13. [S] Having considered Cossins’ letter and examined plans
and photographs of the Church, the specific advice and more general aims of the Committee of the SPAB
were explained in Thackeray Turner’s lengthy reply, which also commented:
[…] opinions upon the question of beauty are constantly changing so that our views as to
beauty are an unsafe guide. And again it is generally wisest to make no change unless quite
certain it will be to an improvement.14
2
While the clerestory was to remain untouched, the condition of the chancel meant that drastic change
was necessary and despite Turner’s advice that: ‘if it can be made safe [...] Don’t rebuild’,15 in the event
the chancel was demolished ‘with the exception of some eight or nine feet’16 during the famously dry
summer of 189317.
[S] Several ‘archaeological’ recoveries and discoveries were made during the restoration of the chancel.
The cross-head, which Pevsner describes as the ‘best piece of Anglo-Saxon art in the county’18, was
removed from the external south wall of the chancel19 and a pre-Reformation altar slab was found
under the flooring of the south aisle.20 Other more gruesomely fascinating remains were also
discovered during the work. According to the antiquary and historian of Worcestershire, Dr Treadway
Nash, who described St. Michael’s Church in 1781, ‘under the communion table is a large vault for the
Dineley family, in which, as it is very dry, the bodies do not putrefy, but wither and retain their original
form’.21 An article published by Worcestershire’s Archaeological Society in 1926, commented that
‘investigations made in 1893 verified both these statements, for the vault was entered and […], through
glass panels let into the coffins, the faces of the corpses were seen still covered with parchmentcoloured skin.’ 22 [S] Miss Louisa Holland of Cropthorne Court, one of Francis Holland’s daughters,
entered the vault and made the following notes:
The stone work under the east window had a large crack in it and the paving above the vault
and steps to the altar gave way, leaving the vault exposed, and the architect (Mr. Jethro Cossins)
thought it better to see if it were dry and intact. It was only open for about an hour or less. I
went in and made notes of what I could decipher on five of the seven lead coffins lying there. 23
Cossins involvement in the restoration suggests that Wilkinson was a forward-thinking parish priest: this
is certainly a fairly early example of the SPAB’s involvement.24 It seems likely that his influence was to
save St. Michael’s church from the type of restoration that was to cause so much criticism from
contemporary authorities, such as J. W. Willis Bund, who in 1908 published a paper titled ‘The Restored
Churches of Worcestershire.’25 The paper had originally been presented to the Worcestershire
Architectural and Archaeological Society, but was printed and distributed privately by Willis Bund who
refused to ‘omit certain things’ which had ‘provoked a storm’.26 This was largely because his explicit
intentions were to show ‘how much of interest in the County had perished from the restoring zeal of
well-meaning enthusiasts; what fragment their zeal had left us and some suggestions how to secure
those fragments’. 27 The result is a damning critique of church restoration within the county:
3
It remained for our own day and our own time, for the 19th century of which we were so proud,
to destroy as much, if not more than the Reformer or Puritan had done of ancient churches and
ancient church furniture. What makes it worse is the fact that the 19th century destruction was
done under the name of “restoration”. Bishops blessed it, societies like the Worcestershire
Architectural and Archaeological Society spoke very favourably of it and urged on the work of
destruction, or as they called it, “the good work”, until it is difficult to find in the County an
unrestored church or one that does not in some way or other bear the marks of the fangs of the
restorer. 28
The alterations and additions carried out to the exteriors, interiors, fittings, furnishings and sacred
objects of Worcestershire’s churches are described in detail and the incumbents and patrons named and
shamed. The Dean and Chapter of Worcester bore the brunt of the criticism, particularly for their
restoration of Worcester Cathedral carried out by Scott in 1873, in which Willis Bund suggests they ‘tried
to realize the apocalyptic vision and “made all things new.”’ 29 Cropthorne Church is not among those
commented upon, perhaps due to the intervention of Cossins, who noted [S]:
I constantly find that, with the best intentions, to preserve, clergymen , almost beyond all other
men, have the most unsound views as to reparation, but that they generally come around to a
surprising extent when they understand more fully what ‘restoration’ is not.30
Nonetheless, many of the alterations carried out at St. Michaels’ are similar to those denounced by
Willis Bund, in particular the moving of ancient memorials to the dead. He wrote:
It may be said with truth that restoration almost always lead to the removal of some “frail
memorial” usually on the ground of the convenience of the incumbent at the time of the
restoration. It can never be too often repeated that, whatever his legal rights may be, an
incumbent should not be allowed to treat with contumely the memorials of past parishioners. 31
[S] Two notable memorials of past parishioners in Cropthorne Church include the tombs of the Dineley
(or Dingley) family, who held the Manor of Charlton from the 14th to the end of the 18th century.32 On
the north wall of the north aisle is a tomb showing the recumbent figures of Francis Dineley (d.1624)
and his wife Elizabeth: their nineteen children are depicted around the base, which Pevsner at his most
Pevsnerian comments ‘is a poor job’33. [S] The second Dineley tomb is a memorial to Francis Dineley’s
grandson and heir, Edward Dineley (d. 1646) and his family. Standing ‘obliquely in the first bay of the
north arcade’, this tomb is not in its original position and ‘was probably removed from the chancel’34. Its
position presented serious problems for the restoration. Unsurprisingly Turner and the Committee of
the SPAB suggested that ‘those who put it there considered it a satisfactory place’ and noted:
4
that it is just such features as this which mark the difference between ancient buildings and
modern ones. The Committee then begs you not to countenance its removal.35
Echoing this advice Willis Bund also commented that ‘Each tomb was placed in its original position for a
definite reason, and certain associations grew up around it which removal has dissipated.’36 However,
the cut made to the arch to accommodate the full height of the Dineley memorial eventually ‘caused a
settlement on the east side, threatening serious results both to the structure of the Church and the
tomb’ the canopy of which ‘had become cracked by the subsidence of the arch.’ 37 As a result the
memorial was lower by eight inches and repaired during the second phase of restoration works in
1906.38
[S] A photograph of the Dineley tomb before its repositioning appears in Josephine Tozier’s guide book,
Among English Inns published in 1904 for American tourists. There are several photographs of the
church in The Cropthorne Camera of Minnie Holland 1892-1905 (1985), which show the tombs and the
chancel before the restoration at important festivals: [S] one is titled ‘Interior of Church at Harvest
Time’; 39 [S] a second of the interior of the church at Easter also shows the huge pipe which led to the
church’s stove that stood before the font;40 and, [S] a third shows the chancel decorated for
Christmas.41 [S] Two more photographs show the chancel immediately after the rebuilding in 1894: [S]
here the oak-beamed ceiling42, hand-carved choir stalls and brass oil lamps have transformed its
appearance. The most striking alteration is the insertion of new stained glass in the east window, which
depicts the Ascension and includes the appropriate Biblical quote from Luke 24:51 in Gothic script.43 [S]
Willis Bund was particularly enraged by modern glass which he claimed was ‘really too bad for
description’ and ‘beneath contempt’44. Repeating scurrilous rumour he explained the political
machinations that the modern painted glass obscured:
Many of the windows were given by a gentleman who was a large landowner and represented a
division of the county in Parliament. He was, as a matter of course, asked to contribute to all
church restorations. Being somewhat a vain man, and also for election purposes, he liked his
gifts to be seen of men, so they usually took the form of a stained-glass window, which was
presumed to represent a cash donation of from £200 to £300. His generosity was greatly
appreciated. It, however, leaked out that all his windows came from the same firm and that this
“liberal” (I am not using the word politically) member had an arrangement with the firm to take
all the windows of which they could not other wise dispose at a very large discount, between 30
5
and 40 per cent. Bearing this in mind, one is not surprised to see the very miscellaneous
assortment of windows with which the Worcestershire churches are defiled. 45
There is no evidence to suggest that anyone other than Mr Holland contributed to the cost of rebuilding
the chancel: the figure given by the local newspapers is £484 with an additional £65 for ‘new oak stalls
and seats in the chancel’46 the upper panels of which were carved by the Misses Holland47.
[S] A small wooden plaque records their efforts and a similar dedication plaque notes the gift of altar
rails in 1963 provided by Mrs Slaughter, a grand-daughter of Mr Holland, ‘in grateful memory of the
Holland Family of Cropthorne Court 1855 to 1920’.48 [S] Memorials to the Hollands, who were resident
in the village for only 65 years, dominate the chancel, the largest and most obvious being the carved
stone reredos behind the altar.
[S] On 3rd August 1907 ‘the death of Mr. F. D. Holland, J. P., of Cropthorne Court’ was reported in the
Berrow’s Worcester Journal. The article described him as:
[…] a good type of the old-fashioned country squire. He was a considerable landowner, a good
agriculturalist, keen sportsman, staunch Churchman and Conservative, and he had a kind heart
as the poor in the district often had reason to know, though no man was more unostentatious in
his charitable acts.49
[S] In October 1909 a Vestry Meeting considered proposals from the Holland family for a reredos to the
memory of F. D. Holland and his youngest daughter Alice (who had died in 1908). Having examined the
design, the Vestry agreed that ‘no impediment be offered to the erection of the proposed memorial
reredos’ […] as they were ‘of the opinion that it will add considerably to the beauty of the edifice.’50
[S] Noting that ‘The Reredos was erected by his Children’, it also records that ‘The Chancel was rebuilt
by Francis D. Holland of Cropthorne Court, Lay Rector 1893’: interestingly the Reverend Wilkinson is also
named. [S] The stone reredos, with its elaborate carving and inscriptions forms another part of the
memorial narrative, which was to continue in October 1924 when another Petition was made by Minnie
Holland, one of the last surviving members of the family. [S] Miss Holland ‘desired to place two figures
in Alabaster in the centre panel’ of the reredos as a memorial to her mother, the late Ann Fletcher
Holland.51 This design for the alabaster figures, representing Christ and an Angel were duly approved
and later installed: at the same time inscriptions were added to the reredos to record the deaths of Miss
Holland’s siblings. [S]
6
The use of memorials to appropriate space within St. Michael’s was a strategy employed by others with
far less right to a place in the Parish church. In 1927, the widowed Mrs Dineley applied for a Faculty to
place a stone tablet designed by the architect, Frederick Etchells, in the church in memory of her latehusband, Francis Goodyere Dineley (d. 1908). [S] Commander Dineley, who claimed descent from
Edward Dineley, had borne the costs of moving and repairing the Dineley tomb in 1906, nonetheless the
surviving correspondence suggests that the Vicar and his Churchwardens were less than enthusiastic
about this addition to their church: the Dineleys lived in Shaftesbury and their historical connection with
the Parish of Cropthorne seemed tenuous at best. A note in the Diocesan records comments:
The faculty case herewith is one in which I should want to say: a fine old church is not an
advertisement hoarding. If it is desired to perpetuate a particular name it can be done through
a gift.52
After much negotiating, the memorial tablet was installed, reclaiming a small space on the north wall of
the north aisle for the Dineley family; its proximity to the recumbent tomb of Francis Dineley and the
use of heraldry reinforcing the genealogy. 53
The chancel was part of the church which provoked more discussion than any other in the heated
liturgical, ecclesiological and architectural debates surrounding the rebuilding and decoration of the
Anglican Church throughout the nineteenth century: its restoration often denoted ‘a High Church
programme.’54 At Cropthorne, the rebuilding was less concerned with liturgy than asserting authority
with the responsibility for the prestigious parts of the building, once seen as an irksome burden later
being claimed as an ancestral right. It may have begun as a demonstration of paternalist power, but the
restoration of the chancel at St. Michael’s was to end as an ‘elegy, a dynastic chapel that could only
function retrospectively.’55
7
Endnotes:
1
Cooper, T., How Do We Keep Our Churches? London: Ecclesiological Society, 2004, p. 16. Table 2.1 shows figures
for 1999 shows 16,300 churches, 14,400 banks and building societies, and 13,700 petrol stations. Table 2.2 shows
estimated figures of Church of England buildings at each Grade.
2
Cooper, T., How Do We Keep Our Churches? London: Ecclesiological Society, 2004, p. 3
3
Bembridge, P., ‘Foreword’ in Sacred Britain Working Group, Sacred Britain: Places of Worship and the Tourism
Destination Experience, London: The Churches Conservation Trust ,The Churches Tourism Association and
VisitBritain, 2006, p.3
4
Markus, T. A., Buildings and Power: Freedom and Control in the Origin of Modern Building Types, London:
Routledge, 1993, p. 5
5
Markus, T., Buildings and Power: Freedom and Control in the Origin of Modern Building Types, London:
Routledge, 1993, p. 4
6
Domesday Book: A Complete Translation, [1086], London: Penguin Classics Edition, 2003, p.480. Other published
sources that mention Cropthorne and the Church include: Barnard, A. E., ‘The Dingleys of Charlton, Co.
Worcester’, Transactions of the Worcestershire Archaeological Society ,Volume IV, 1926-7, pp. 49-90; Barnard, A.
E., ‘Some Old Worcestershire Churches and Parochial Chapels as noted and illustrated in the Prattinton Collection’,
Transactions of the Worcestershire Archaeological Society, Volume VII, 1930, pp. 83-9; Cathcart Davies, J., A Brief
Description of the Church of St. Michael, Cropthorne, 1950; Ditchfield, P. H., The Cottages and the Village Life of
Rural England, London: Dent, 1912; Houghton, F. T. S., The Low Side Windows of Worcestershire Churches,
Evesham: n. p., 1917; Houghton, F. T. S., Worcestershire: The Little Guides, London: Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1922
3rd edition revised by Matley Moore, 1952; Mance, L., The Church of St. Michael, Cropthorne, Evesham: Sharp
Brothers (printers), 1964; Nash, T., Collections for the History of Worcestershire, 2 volumes, Printed by John
Nichols, London, 1781; Noake, J, Rambler in Worcestershire: or stray notes on churches and congregations,
London: Longman, 1851; Pakington, H., English Villages and Hamlets, London: Batsford, 1934; Pevsner, N.,
Worcestershire, London: Penguin, 1968; Tozier, J., Among English Inns: the Story of a Pilgrimage to Characteristic
Spots of Rural England, Boston: L. C. Page & Company, 1904; ‘A History of the County of Worcester’, Victoria
County History: Volume III, 1913, pp. 322-9
7
Brooks, C., ‘Building the rural church: money, power and the country parish’ in Brooks, C., and Saint, A., (eds.),
The Victorian Church: Architecture and Society, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995, pp. 51-81. These
are the very question that Chris Brooks sets himself: they are excellent questions that explore ‘the nature and
purpose of cultural production – here taking ‘cultural’ to include religious expression and practice – that created
and recreated the country church’ and I have ‘borrowed’ them shamelessly.
8
Ecclesiastical Commissioners Estate Records: ECE/7/1/30030: Letter from the Reverend Robert Sanders to the
Ecclesiastical Commissioners, dated 17th December 1863
9
Crockford’s Clerical Directory for 1893, 25th edition, London: Horace Cox, 1893, p. 1438, notes that Herbert
Wilkinson (b. 1852) of Cropthorne Vicarage, Pershore had trained at King’s College London (1877) and had been
made a Deacon in 1880 and a Priest in 1881. Before becoming Vicar of Cropthorne in 1892, he had been Curate of
Tysoe, Warwickshire (1880-83) and then Vicar of Dassett Magna (or Burton-Dassett), Warwickshire, (1883-92).
10
Society for Protection of Ancient Buildings, London: Cropthorne Church, Worcestershire: Letter from Jethro A.
Cossins to Thackeray Turner dated 22nd Sep. 1892. Jethro Anstice Cossins (1830-1917) was articled to Frederick
William Fiddian of London in 1847 and moved to Birmingham in 1850. Cossins was in partnership with John George
Bland in 1880 and with Peacock and Bewlay ca.1900. A member of SPAB, he was also president of the Birmingham
Architectural Association. See Colvin, H., Dictionary of British Architects 1600-1840, London: Yale University Press,
1993. See also Birmingham Archives and Heritage Centre, Central Library, Birmingham: Jethro Anstice Cossins
(1830-1917) Nos. 395707-11 [1882-90: MS notes and Church drawings] and Royal Institute of British Architects,
London: Jethro Anstice Cossins (1830-1917), Biographical File. Cossins is one of several Birmingham architects who
are discussed in the forthcoming book Nineteenth Century Architects written by members of the Birmingham and
West Midland Group of the Victorian Society and edited by Phillada Ballard. Cossins other churches include St.
Michael at Alkerton, Oxfordshire (1889-1890); St. Agnes at Cotteridge, Birmingham (1902-1903) Worcestershire;
8
All Saints at Burton Dassett in Warwickshire (1888-1889); St. Peter & St. Paul at Long Compton in Warwickshire
(1899-1900; and St. Peter at Maney in Sutton Coldfield, (1903-1905)
11
The SPAB was founded by William Morris in 1877. See Morris, W., ‘Anti-Scrape’: A letter published in the
Athenaeum, 10th March, 1877, [reprinted in News from Nowhere and Other Writings, London: Penguin Classics,
1998, pp.399-402. See also Ferriday, P. , ‘The Church Restorers’, Architectural Review, 136:810, 1964, pp. 87-95;
Tschudi-Madsen, S., Restoration and Anti-Restoration: A study in English restoration philosophy, Oslo:
Universitetsforlaget, 1976, chapter 5 ‘The Anti-scrape Society’, pp. 63-78; Pevsner, N., ‘Scrape and Anti-scrape’ in
Fawcett, J., (ed.), The Future of the Past: Attitudes to Conservation, London: Thames and Hudson, 1976, pp.34-53;
Dellheim, C., The Face of the Past: The Preservation of the Medieval Inheritance in Victorian England, Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1982; Miele, C., ‘The Conservationist’ in Parry, L., (ed.), William Morris, London: Philip
Wilson/V&A, 1996, pp. 72-87 and Miele, C., ‘“Their interest and habit”: professionalism and the restoration of
medieval churches, 1837-77’ in Brooks, C., and Saint, A., (eds.), The Victorian Church: Architecture and Society,
Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995, pp. 151-172
12
Society for Protection of Ancient Buildings, London: Cropthorne Church, Worcestershire: Letter from Jethro A.
Cossins to Thackeray Turner dated 22nd Sep. 1892. The letter includes pencilled comments (presumably by Turner)
13
Society for Protection of Ancient Buildings, London: Cropthorne Church, Worcestershire: Letter from Jethro A.
Cossins to Thackeray Turner dated 22nd Sep. 1892.
14
Society for Protection of Ancient Buildings, London: Cropthorne Church, Worcestershire: Letter from Thackeray
Turner to Jethro A. Cossins dated 1st October 1892
15
Society for Protection of Ancient Buildings, London: Cropthorne Church, Worcestershire: Letter from Jethro A.
Cossins to Thackeray Turner dated 14th October 1892
16
Barnard, A. E., ‘The Dineleys of Charlton co. Worcester’, Transactions of the Worcestershire Archaeological
Society, volume IV, 1926-7, p. 69
17
The work was carried out by Alfred Groves & Son of Milton-under-Wychwood in Oxfordshire, a firm which traces
its history to 1660 and the master-mason William Groves. Alfred Groves (1826-1914) ‘developed the firm from a
local builder to one of national repute amongst Architects’. See the firm’s web-site at:
http://www.alfredgroves.com/history/ [last accessed 4th May 2009]
18
Pevsner, N., Worcestershire, London: Penguin, 1968, pp. 128-9: – CROSS HEAD. The arms are double-cusped or
lobed. On front and back are animated birds and beasts in bold trails, and on the side is, surprisingly enough, all
close in Greek key. The head is supposed to be of c. 825-50.
19
Kelly’s Directory for Worcestershire (1916), p. 68 notes that the ‘runic cross was discovered built in the south
wall’ during the restoration but the Petition submitted in June 1893 for a faculty proposes ‘to place the ancient
Cross, proposed to be removed from the external wall of the Chancel at the West end of the South Aisle.’ See
Worcestershire County Record Office: Diocese of Worcester Parochial Box for Cropthorne with Charlton: 728
Cropthorne BA 3008: Petition dated 3rd June 1893. A cross can be seen in the south wall of the chancel in the
watercolour from the Prattinton Collection. Royal Society of Antiquaries, Piccadilly, London: Prattinton
Collection: ‘Cropthorn,[sic] Worcs’, Watercolour, c. 1815 Artist: Thomas Richards, Cartwright Aquat Published June
1815, 344 Strand, London
20
Cole, T. W., ‘In Worcestershire Churches’, Transactions of the Worcestershire Archaeological Society , Volume
X, 1933, pp. 69-73 notes that at ‘CROPTHORNE. A mensa is now in use as an altar in the south aisle. Size about 5ft
9in by 2ft 5ins by 6 ¼ ins with consecration crosses, the slab being chamfered at lower edge.’
21
Nash, T., Collections for the History of Worcestershire, 2 volumes, Printed by John Nichols, London, 1781, pp.
273-4 This volume includes illustrations of the two Dineley memorials and transcriptions of the wall tablets and
notable tombstones in the Churchyard
22
Barnard, A. E., ‘The Dineleys of Charlton co. Worcester’, Transactions of the Worcestershire Archaeological
Society, volume IV, 1926-7, p. 69
23
Barnard, A. E., ‘The Dineleys of Charlton co. Worcester’, Transactions of the Worcestershire Archaeological
Society, volume IV, 1926-7, p. 69
24
For example, Chris Brooks’ case study of forty parishes in South-East Devon notes that the ‘first repair
programme in South-east Devon to be conducted according to the principles of the Society for the Protection of
Ancient Buildings was that carried out in Plymtree in 1910.’ See Brooks, C., ‘Building the rural church: money,
9
power and the country parish’ in Brooks, C., and Saint, A., (eds.), The Victorian Church: Architecture and Society,
Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995, p. 73
25
Willis Bund, J. W., The Restored Churches of Worcestershire, A paper read to the Worcestershire Architectural
and Archaeological Society, 27th January, 1908, but omitted from the published Papers of the Society, Worcester:
printed by Ebenezer Baylis & Son, 1908
26
Willis Bund, J. W., The Restored Churches of Worcestershire, A paper read to the Worcestershire Architectural
and Archaeological Society, 27th January, 1908, but omitted from the published Papers of the Society, Worcester:
printed by Ebenezer Baylis & Son, 1908, Preface dated 23rd December 1908.
27
Willis Bund, J. W., The Restored Churches of Worcestershire, A paper read to the Worcestershire Architectural
and Archaeological Society, 27th January, 1908, but omitted from the published Papers of the Society, Worcester:
printed by Ebenezer Baylis & Son, 1908, Preface dated 23rd December 1908.
28
Willis Bund, J. W., The Restored Churches of Worcestershire, A paper read to the Worcestershire Architectural
and Archaeological Society, 27th January, 1908, but omitted from the published Papers of the Society, Worcester:
printed by Ebenezer Baylis & Son, 1908, p. 5
29
Willis Bund, J. W., The Restored Churches of Worcestershire, A paper read to the Worcestershire Architectural
and Archaeological Society, 27th January, 1908, but omitted from the published Papers of the Society, Worcester:
printed by Ebenezer Baylis & Son, 1908, p.18
30
Society for Protection of Ancient Buildings, London: Cropthorne Church, Worcestershire: Letter from Jethro A.
Cossins to Thackeray Turner dated 7th October 1892
31
Willis Bund, J. W., The Restored Churches of Worcestershire, A paper read to the Worcestershire Architectural
and Archaeological Society, 27th January, 1908, but omitted from the published Papers of the Society, Worcester:
printed by Ebenezer Baylis & Son, 1908, p.17
32
Several of the guide books and more scholarly articles detail the scandalous decline and fratricidal tendencies of
the Dineley’s. See Noake, J, The Rambler in Worcestershire: or stray notes on churches and congregations,
London: Longman, 1851, pp. 334 – 343; Barnard, A. E., ‘The Dineleys of Charlton, Co. Worcester’, Transactions of
the Worcestershire Archaeological Society, Volume IV, 1926-7, pp. 49-90; Cathcart Davies, J., A Brief Description
of the Church of St. Michael, Cropthorne, 1950; and Mance, L., The Church of St. Michael, Cropthorne, Evesham:
Sharp Brothers (printers), 1964
33
Pevsner, N., Worcestershire, London: Penguin, 1968, pp. 128-9
34
Barnard, A. E., ‘The Dineleys of Charlton co. Worcester’, Transactions of the Worcestershire Archaeological
Society, volume IV, 1926-7, p. 67
35
Society for Protection of Ancient Buildings, London: Cropthorne Church, Worcestershire: Letter from Thackeray
Turner to Jethro A. Cossins dated 1st October 1892
36
Willis Bund, J. W., The Restored Churches of Worcestershire, A paper read to the Worcestershire Architectural
and Archaeological Society, 27th January, 1908, but omitted from the published Papers of the Society, Worcester:
printed by Ebenezer Baylis & Son, 1908, p.17
37
Barnard, A. E., ‘The Dineleys of Charlton co. Worcester’, Transactions of the Worcestershire Archaeological
Society, volume IV, 1926-7, p. 67
38
Willis Bund, J. W., The Restored Churches of Worcestershire, A paper read to the Worcestershire Architectural
and Archaeological Society, 27th January, 1908, but omitted from the published Papers of the Society, Worcester:
printed by Ebenezer Baylis & Son, 1908, p.17 notes Restoration nearly always means moving tombs and
considering the frequent moves it is wonderful how little damage some have received. […] Frequent removals not
only damage the tombs but also lead them to regarded as a nuisance, and so at east disposed of as rubbish. Some
Worcester tombs have certainly met this fate.
39
Cornell, E. R., Keating, G. H. and Webb, C. D., The Cropthorne Camera of Minnie Holland 1892-1905, Torpoint:
Kawabata Press, 1985, p.85. See Obelkevich, J., Religion and Rural Society: South Lindsey 1825-1875, Oxford:
Clarendon, 1976, pp. 158-161 on the Harvest Thanksgiving as an example of pseudo-gemeinschaft.
40
Cornell, E. R., Keating, G. H. and Webb, C. D., The Cropthorne Camera of Minnie Holland 1892-1905, Torpoint:
Kawabata Press, 1985, p.87
10
41
Cornell, E. R., Keating, G. H. and Webb, C. D., The Cropthorne Camera of Minnie Holland 1892-1905, Torpoint:
Kawabata Press, 1985, p.89. See Anson, P., Fashions in Church Furnishings, London: Faith Press, 1960, Chapter 18,
pp. 198-205for a discussion of ‘The Art of Garnishing Churches’
42
Society for Protection of Ancient Buildings, London: Cropthorne Church, Worcestershire: Letter from Thackeray
Turner to Jethro A. Cossins dated 1st October 1892 recommends ‘that English oak only should be used and that all
the timber chancel be oak and large as the circumstances will allow’. The Committee also advised that if
chamfering the beams was necessary then ‘an adze only should be used for this purpose’.
43
King James Bible, Luke Chapter 24, Verse 51: ‘And it came to pass while He blessed them He was parted from
them and carried up into Heaven’. See Cathedral and Church Building Library: NADFAS Record of Church
Furnishings for the Church of St. Michael, Cropthorne, Worcestershire, 2 Volumes, 1999-2000: Windows: 700
44
Willis Bund, J. W., The Restored Churches of Worcestershire, A paper read to the Worcestershire Architectural
and Archaeological Society, 27th January, 1908, but omitted from the published Papers of the Society, Worcester:
printed by Ebenezer Baylis & Son, 1908, p.12.
45
Willis Bund, J. W., The Restored Churches of Worcestershire, A paper read to the Worcestershire Architectural
and Archaeological Society, 27th January, 1908, but omitted from the published Papers of the Society, Worcester:
printed by Ebenezer Baylis & Son, 1908, pp.12-13.
46
‘Cropthorne Fete: Church Improvements’, Berrow’s Worcester Journal, Saturday, July 16th, 1910, p.2
47
Cathedral and Church Building Library: NADFAS Record of Church Furnishings for the Church of St. Michael,
Cropthorne, Worcestershire, 2 Volumes, 1999-2000: Woodwork: 347
48
Cathedral and Church Building Library: NADFAS Record of Church Furnishings for the Church of St. Michael,
Cropthorne, Worcestershire, 2 Volumes, 1999-2000: Woodwork: 346
49
‘Death of Mr. F. D. Holland of Cropthorne’, Berrow’s Worcester Journal, Saturday, August 3rd, 1907, p. 2
50
Worcestershire County Record Office: Diocese of Worcester Parochial Box for Cropthorne with Charlton: 728
Cropthorne BA 3008: Petition of the Vicar and Churchwardens of Cropthorne Church for Faculty for placing a
Reredos, dated 21st October 1909
51
Worcestershire County Record Office: Diocese of Worcester Cropthorne Church – Chancel Repairs: 850
Cropthorne BA 9085/5 (iv) 3: Cropthorne Church Faculty for placing two Alabaster Figures in the centre panel of
the Reredos dated 15th November 1924
52
Worcestershire County Record Office: Diocese of Worcester Parochial Box for Cropthorne with Charlton: 728
Cropthorne BA 3008: handwritten note with the Commander Dineley Tablet correspondence c. 1927 signed G W
53
Weaver, L., Memorials and Monuments, London: Country Life, 1915, chapter 9 ‘The Use of Heraldry’, p. 298
comments ‘Coats of arms no longer have fro us the vital significance which they presented to people in medieval
times, but their historical and decorative interest abundantly justify their continued use. This is especially true in
the case of monuments, on which it is very proper to indicate the family origins of the person commemorated’.
54
Brooks, C., ‘Building the rural church: money, power and the country parish’ in Brooks, C., and Saint, A., (eds.),
The Victorian Church: Architecture and Society, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995, p. 64
55
Brooks, C., ‘Building the rural church: money, power and the country parish’ in Brooks, C., and Saint, A., (eds.),
The Victorian Church: Architecture and Society, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995, p. 70
11