Welsh Newton is said to be haunted
by several restless spirits, including the headless coachman who has been seen
many times on the lane from St. Wulfstan’s Farm to the village. In the First
week of December a ceremony is held in the ruins of St Faith’s church to still
said spirits.
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The Church below, on the other hand, is no ruin, and bears witness to some fabulous spirits of its own.
St Mary The Virgin
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St Mary The Virgin is a C13th
church with a C14th porch and a roof renovated in the C16th. Up until 1312 it belonged to the Knights
Templar and then to the Knights Hospitallers when the Knights Templar was
dissolved. The Hospitallers were, in turn, dissolved when Henry VIII destroyed
the power of Brussels – sorry – the Church of Rome, and St Mary The Virgin
became an Anglican church—and a centre of pilgrimage.
Here is the grave of St John
Kemble, the 80 year old priest who was strapped backwards on a horse like a
sack of potatoes and taken Newgate prison in London. There he was questioned
over his ‘involvement’ in a fabricated plot to assassinate Charles II. After questioning, he was forced to walk the 135 miles to Hereford Gaol, there to be executed on August 22 1679. Before leaving his cell, he was allowed to say
his prayers, smoke his pipe for the very last time, and drink a cup of sherry
to steady his nerves.
Legend has it that when the under
sheriff, Mr. Digges arrived to take John Kemble to his execution, Kemble asked
for a little time to say his prayers, and to smoke a pipe. Mr Digges granted
the request and took out his own pipe. When John Kemble had finished, he
declared himself ready, but Digges hadn’t finished his and asked him to wait.
This story gave rise to a once common custom in Herefordshire of calling the
parting smoke ‘a Kemble Pipe.
A nice story, but brutal end.
After his smoke, the 80 year old Kemble was dragged on a hurdle two
miles out of Hereford to Widemarsh Common,
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The hanging was horribly botched
and Kemble took over half an hour to die. So great was the popular sympathy he
was spared the butchery of drawing and quartering. Instead his corpse was
beheaded and his left hand cut off. It survives to this day as a relic in a
local church.
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And above is the grave of the great
Jake Thackray. Idiosyncratic, perhaps out of his time, he evaded the zeitgeist
of the Sixties and Seventies and carved out his own, unique career. Towards the
end he struggled with alcohol and died a devout Catholic, singing
at Mass in St Mary’s Monmouth. This can’t do him justice. The link will do a
far better job.
So, graveyard and spirits. What about the Church?
A rare stone Rood framing the high altar.
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In front of the altar is a stone
slab bearing an elaborate wheel cross with a long slender stem, thought to be
the resting place of a Knight Templar – perhaps the one that sat on that chair.
A Templar's chair for observing Mass. circa 1250
A more modern but striking stained glass window.
I loved this for the depth of its walls and the peace it frames.
A Norman Baptismal font.
The priests and vicars of St Mary's The Virgin
Note the vicar of 1892
The mystery
And this is the mystery. Pieter
Wilhelm Merkus. The dedication is so detailed and at the same time provokes
questions for which there may never be an answer. Why was he born in St Helier
Jersey?(and don’t say we all have to be born somewhere) and what route took him
from there to the Royal Prussian Field Artillery? And why did he join the Congo
Free Army and die at the age of twenty at Nywangwe? And final question, what
was his relationship with William Armstrong Willis, Vicar of
St Mary The
Virgin, to have provoked such fulsome and heartfelt praise?
Always end a story with a question,
as they say.
Whatever the case, I imagine, on long winter nights, ghosts abound, John Kemble with his sherry and pipe, Jake Thackray singing his irreverent songs, a grumpy Knight Templar and poor Pieter Wilhelm Merkus finding solace in an adventurous but largely unknown life.
