We have been blessed with some magnificent churches
GLOUCESTER’S magnificent cathedral outshines all other churches in the city, but many of them have interesting stories to tell. One even served as a jail.
In March 1643, St Mary de Lode church became a temporary prison for some of the 1,500 royalist soldiers captured at Highnam by Sir William Waller and Colonel Massey. Looking after the prisoners placed a strain on the city’s resources and all they were given to eat was turnip tops and cabbage.
After ten days the royalists were released on promise that they wouldn’t fight against Parliament again.
St Mary de Lode is Gloucester’s oldest parish church. The chancel of the present building dates from the 13th century, although if you look inside you’ll find a perfect example of a Norman arch, which reveals that the origins of the fabric are earlier.
In fact there was a church on this site in Saxon times and probably a Roman temple before that.
The de Lode part of the name refers to a ferry that operated from the west side of the church in centuries gone by, which crossed the now vanished third course of the Severn.
In the middle ages the church was called St Mary before the Abbey Gate, and in the 16th century the name St Mary Broadgate was in use.
Until the 18th century a spire rose from the chunky, square tower, but it was blown down in a hurricane.
If you’ve pondered St Mary de Crypt church when strolling along Southgate Street and thought the tower has an unfinished look, you’re right. In its original condition the tower was topped by tall, ornate pinnacles at each corner, with castellated battlements running between them.
But by about 1900, the instability of these embellishments had become a cause of concern, so they were removed in 1908. St Mary de Crypt, incidentally, was where George Whitfield, the 18th century Gloucestrian forerunner of Billy Graham, preached his first sermon.
Another city centre church with a truncated spire is St Nicholas. This 13th century structure was built on marshy ground and was probably never stable, so the spire, like the rest of the building, soon developed a tilt to the north.
To make matters worse, the spire suffered damage in the civil war with the result that by the end of the 18th century the structure was unsafe. St Nic’s tip was topped in 1783.
St Paul’s church in Park End Road was never given the tower its architect Capel N Trigg, the son of a Gloucester timber merchant intended. Built in 1880, St Paul’s was consecrated as a memorial to Robert Raikes, founder of Sunday schools.
It was to have a bold, square tower, but funds didn’t permit. So what was supposed to be the tower has been the entrance porch ever since.
St Michael’s church on the Cross in Eastgate Street was founded by Osbern, Bishop of Exeter in about 1100 and sold to St Peter’s Abbey in 1285.
In the mid 15th century the tower, which served as the tourist information office until a few years ago, was built. Then in 1849 the original nave was enlarged, only to be demolished completely in 1955.
Back in the late 1930s when St Oswald’s church was built, it was scheduled to be named St Thomas’s. The consecration date was, in fact, set for St Thomas’s day, December 29.
Then the Bishop of Gloucester, Bishop Headlam, suggested the new church might be named after St Oswald. The bishop was a north countryman, as was St Oswald and as Headlam had been instrumental in providing the people at the new housing estate of Coney Hill with their own church, his suggestion was accepted.
The land on which the church was built, by the way, was known by locals as the old woman’s orchard.
On March 25, 1950 an open air service was held to celebrate the opening of the new Elim Church in Millbrook Street. Built by the congregation, this was located next door to the original premises, which had been destroyed nine years earlier in a wartime bombing raid.
In June 1964, the city gained a striking new landmark when St Aldate’s church in Finlay Road was consecrated by the Bishop of Gloucester, the Rt Rev Basil Guy.
Called “Gloucester’s church in the round” in Citizen reports of the time, the arrestingly modern structure was one of the first in the region to have seats that spread around the three sides of its sanctuary, rather than the conventional plan of aisles either side of the nave.
A symbol of continuity in the new St Aldate’s was the font from the previous church to bear the name, which stood in what is now King’s Square (then St Aldate’s Square). Restored and cleaned, the ancient font was gift from St Barnabas’ church, Tuffley and the Deanery of Gloucester clergy.