Cathedral’s bells peal 100 years on for ringer killed at the Somme

A FULL peal of the bells in Ripon Cathedral will sound for three hours next week, to mark the centenary of the death, at the second battle of the Somme, of one of the town’s ringers.

William Thorpe, a private in the 3rd Battalion, Grenadier Guards, was killed in action during the campaign, one of more than 1,400 bell ringers to die during the First World War. He is remembered on the war memorial next to the cathedral’s high altar.

The peal, which will begin at 12 noon next Thursday, will involve more than 5,000 “changes” to 10 of the 12 bells in the cathedral, producing variations in their striking sequences.

A video link will let visitors to the cathedral see the process.

Robert Wood, of the Yorkshire Association of Change Ringers, whose members will orchestrate the event, said: “Ripon, like most other communities, lost many of its finest young men in the Great War and it is important that we all remember and honour them.

“As William Thorpe was a bellringer, it seemed appropriate to ring on the centenary of his death.”

During the peal, a standardbearer from the Ripon branch of the Royal British Legion will march back and forth on the forecourt of the cathedral.

Similar events have been taking place across the country in memory of other ringers.

Alan Regin, steward of the Rolls of Honour for the Central Council of Church Bell ringers, said: “Their sacrifice is being commemorated in the towers in which they rang.”