Five hundred years ago, in 1510, at least one of the six bells of St Lawrence Church, Brentford was installed, but sadly they are not there anymore. Carolyn Hammond (editor of the Brentford and Chiswick Local History Society) says they were taken down in 1971, sent to a bell foundry for repair, and then rehung in the church of St Giles, South Mimms, to complete their church’s peal.
The bell(s) was cast by by William Culverden, who was the master founder of the famous Whitechapel Bell Foundry 1506-1522, which was in Aldgate and moved to Whitechapel, East London in 1670 and is still in business. Traditionally, the foundry has been known by the name of the Master Founder and owner, operating from the 19th Century to 1968 as Mears & Stainbank. It has since operated under the name of Whitechapel Bell Foundry.
William Culverden apears in the list of master founders.
Bells that pre-date 1574 are identified by shields rather than their founder's name. Apparently on William Culverden bells, he stamped his rebus or mark, showing the culver or pigeon with the letters 'den'. The inscription and rebus he used on a bell he cast at Boughton, Aluph was:
“Sancte Paule Ora Pro Nobis”
The latin translates to “Saint Paul pray for us” and the mark contains his rebus, the culver or pigeon in the bottom right. He used this phrase on his bells in other churches, with different saint names.
See and Listen to the ringing of our old St Lawrence bells in this video of a documentary ‘Bell Ringing -The Science of Church Bells’ from the children’s programme ‘Newsround’ (the presentation is slightly annoying!). They are ringing in the Church of St Giles, South Mymms.
Bell-metal is a mixture of three parts copper and one part tin by weight. There are usually eight bells in a peal, beginning with the smallest called the Treble, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, and Tenor. They differ in size and weight and the total weight is about 5 times the weight of the Tenor bell.
The "change ringing" of Church Bells, as distinguished from simply "chiming," is a custom that has grown up in the UK during the last two centuries or more. St Lawrence Church, tower was built in the 15th century, long before the invention of Change ringing in the 17th century, so the bells would probably have been just for chiming. Does anybody remember the chiming of the St Lawrence Bells?
The Quarter Chimes of the Clock are struck on the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 7th Bells in a peal of eight, and the Hour on the Tenor.
It is instructive to see the prices today from the Whitechapel Bell Foundry for tower bells, range from £1,777 for a C note, 10 5/8” diameter, 39 lbs weight; to £48,986 for a C note, 60” diameter, 4,480 lbs weight.
There is a description of this ancient art, which still thrives today on the website of All Saints Church, Campton, which also has two William Culverden bells.
“Campanology is an art, several centuries old, which continues to thrive, with about 40,000 active ringers across the 5000-odd churches in the UK.”
It is sad that the six bells of St Lawrence are now gone, and so recent as well, but it’s pleasing to know they are still chiming in the Church of St Giles, South Mimms.
Just listen to the William Culverden bells of All Saints Church, Campton which are still ringing today.
If only our St Lawrence bells were still ringing around Brentford!
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Last year, a group of ringers came to St Giles Church, South Mymms to ring. One of them wanted to ring on a bell that he had once rung at St Lawrence Church. He was disappointed when he found that the bell, Number 3 was now rung dead (fixed directly onto a beam with the clapper swung to hit the inside of the bell) and he couldn’t ring it for ‘change ringing’.
Joan kindly obtained information from Geoffrey Dodds who rang the bells at St Lawrence Church, Brentford and later when he moved arranged for the bells to be acquired for their St Giles Church, South Mymms. See details in the following Geoffrey Dodds update.
Thanks to Geoffrey Dodds (now 84 years old) for providing us with this invaluable information about the bells of St Lawrence Church. Geoffrey is author of ‘The Church Bells Of Hertfordshire’, (1994) Extract from Geoffrey’s wartime diary as a bell ringer at All Saints Church, Isleworth
I was Tower Captain from June 1950 - April 1952. I learned to ring at All Saints, Isleworth, where I became acting Captain through most of the war. After gaining a BA in Natural Science at Cambridge, during which I was Master of the C.U. Guild of Change Ringers. I took up a two year Graduate Engineering Apprenticeship (1950-1952) with D. Napier & Son, The Vale, Acton, a firm later absorbed into British Aerospace. I lived in Isleworth and I found Brentford belfry in a very neglected state, there having been no ringers there for many years. After a good clean up, I taught a band of local youngsters, the activity declined in 1952. In the end, I and a brother and sister, aged 14 and 16, each learned to ring two bells, which kept all six bells going until I moved away.
The bells were hung in a steel frame for eight and were of fairly good tone, but Nos. 1 & 2 ropes fell against an elevated clock case. I made rope guides for these in the Apprentice School. During this period the bells were rehung on ball bearings from Gillett & Johnson Bellfoundry of Croydon. The new landlord of the pub (The Six Bells) next door complained of the noise, so, as the louvres were deep set from the wall face, I inverted the louvres in the soffits of the appropriate bell opening and complaints ceased. I began restoring the clock within Napier’s but the Parish Church Council decided in 1952 to sell it to clockmakers W.Potts of Leeds. During the 1950s the church was declared redundant. Work then took me to Luton and a house in St Albans in 1952.
I became a St Albans Cathedral ringer and was helping the band of St Giles, South Mymms. In 1971 a severe attack of woodworm was found in the headstocks which then required a modern rehang. Whitechapel Bell Foundry found cracks in the crowns of Nos. 1,4 & 5, due to rusting of the cast-in crown staples and would need recasting. The Parish Church Council finances could not afford the extra cost, so the Foundry proposed recasting all six bells to a much lighter weight and a higher key for no extra cost, which I thought would be a pity. I remembered that Brentford bells were in the same key and a similar weight to South Mymms, so I suggested to St Giles' Parish Church Council that if they were interested to contact Ranald Clouston who was involved with caring for bells nationwide.. Permission was obtained to split up the Brentford bells, so in 1971 Whitechapel Foundry took them out. They may have noted the details. Three of the St Lawrence bells are now used in St Giles Church, South Mymms.
The St Lawrence Church, Brentford bells:
I found in the Felstead Database a table of 54 valid peals for St Lawrence Church (TowerBase ID is 7062) . The Felstead database lists brief details of every towerbell peal that has been rung.
The first one in 1933 up to the last one in Feb 1963, so the bells were working in 1963. These were rung not every year and sometimes just a couple of times in one year, but there was a lot more of them rung in 1959 (5 times), in 1960 (6) and a great activity in 1961 (16) and 1962 (5). It seems ringing could have stopped around February 1963. In 1961 St Lawrence was amalgamated with St George and St Paul, Old Brentford.
In the 1968 edition of ‘Dove’s Guide for Church Bell Ringers‘ it says that the tower contained six bells. It was also listed as unsafe. The church does not feature in later editions of Dove’s Guide, which would suggest all ringing stopped between 1968 and 1969.
I’ve been trying to find out what monuments and things were removed from St Lawrence Church in the late 1970s and early 1980s and where they are now.
For example we do not know where the John Flaxman memorial sculpture is that he produced in 1805, of two 3 foot high mourning female figures, ‘Faith and Hope’ in St Lawrence Church, commemorating William Howell Ewin (d.1804), the usurer, and his sister Sarah Howell (d. 1808).
We do know that the Henry Redman brasses are on loan to The Museum of London.
I have contacted the London Diocesan Office and they inspected Crockford's Clerical Directory for the years 1977-1982. During this period the vicar responsible at that time at St Lawrence Church (listed as the Church of St Paul with St Lawrence and St George the Martyr) was Arthur Albert Court.
They suggested, for information relating to the contents of the church, including the bells, it would be worth while to contact the Cathedrals and Church Buildings Division Library. I have emailed them and maybe they could have more information.
We Tracked Down the St Lawrence Church Bell Frame to Kimpton Parish Church
On the Kimpton Village website in the section on the ‘History of the Bells’ of the Parish Church of St. Peter & St. Paul, it mentions St Lawrence Church bells.
“The thought of augmenting this ring of six to a ring of eight had long been a dream of the Kimpton Ringers. However, it was obvious that the existing oak bell frame, that had supported the bells since the end of the 15th century, could not be made to accommodate two extra bells. But in January 1980 the ringers heard that three bells had been transferred to South Mymms from a redundant church in Brentford where an eight bell, cast iron, frame still existed.
After much measuring it was decided that the frame could be altered to fit the Kimpton tower and what's more it was free if the ringers removed it themselves - which they did.”
We contacted the Kimpton History Group, who told us that,
“the cast iron bell frame from St Lawrence, Brentford was dismantled and transferred to Kimpton by a group of our bell-ringers between January 1980 and Easter 1981. It was re-erected in the car park of our church hall for cleaning, repair, and modification, before being installed in the tower of St Peter & St Paul, Kimpton once the old oak bell frame had been removed at Easter 1981. By 31 Dec 1981, the 6 original bells, plus 2 new bells had been hung in the cast iron frame and the old year was rung out on 6 bells and the new year rung in on 8 bells.
The Kimpton Guild of Change-Ringers made a photo album of the project, and allowed us to scan this into Kimpton History Group Archive (ref 2443 to 2486), which can now be accessed from the village website:”
