THE ESSEX CHURCHES SITE

home - index - latest - e-mail
links - small print - about this site
Norfolk churches - Suffolk churches
www.simonknott.co.uk

St Michael, Woodham Walter

Follow these journeys as they happen at Last Of England Twitter.

Between Chelmsford and Maldon sits this small, interesting church in a county not short of small, interesting churches. Built in 1563, St Michael was the first parish church in England constructed for the newly reformed Church of England and looks entirely Tudor late Gothic, as if it was a bit fallen off a Cambridge college. Entirely red-brick, both ends have crow-stepped gables, with the addition of an awkward north aisle in the same style. You step inside to a tightly-packed interior under half-timbered roofs. The current building replaced an earlier church on a nearby site of which a few remains survive here, including the font and a couple of angel heads in stained glass. There was obviously a fairly High Church reordering at the turn of the 20th Century, and the Ward & Hughes glass of the three archangels is surprisingly good. Good too in their quiet way are a number of memorials that tell us something about the life of the parish in the early years of last century, most notably one in beaten and pressed copper to Henry Ayrton Chaplin, who was of the West African Medical Staff. Born August 1876, died July 1905 at Salaga, West Africa while engaged in scientific research on behalf of the Government of the Gold Coast Colony. The memorial depicts Chaplin looking into a microscope, and was designed and made by the celebrated sculptor and goldsmith Herbert Maryon, best known today for his conservation work on the Sutton Hoo treasure. Memorably and unusually, the memorial includes a passage from Rudyard Kipling's 1899 poem 'The White Man's Burden': Take up the White Man's burden, The savage wars of peace, Fill full the mouth of Famine And bid the sickness cease. Almost a century earlier in 1838, another stirring tale of Empire is remembered by the memorial to Henry Guy Bryan, who when accompanying Govr Gawlor on his perilous expedition into the unknown regions of South Australia, his generous endeavours to secure the Governor's personal safety were accomplished by the painful sacrifice of his own life. Bryan was just 18 years old. Simon Knott, May 2020 Follow these journeys as they happen at Last Of England Twitter.

Amazon commission helps cover the running costs of this site

 

home - index - latest - e-mail
links - small print - about this site
Norfolk churches - Suffolk churches
www.simonknott.co.uk