ST MARY

St Mary's from the South East

A parish church, dedicated in the Middle Ages to the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, has stood on this site for almost nine hundred years. This church was built by William FitzOsbern, who came over with William the Conqueror. But there may well have been a church already on this site.

Anglo-Saxon origins

F.C Bedford, who wrote a guide to St Mary’s in 1936, says, ‘It is generally agreed among historians that a Saxon church existed at one time in Hinckley’. The name Hinckley is Anglo-Saxon: ‘Hinck’ is someone’s name, and ‘ley’ is a meadow. So if there was an Anglo-Saxon settlement here, it is fairly safe to assume that there would have been a church building. Peter F. Ryder, an historian and archaeologist visited St Mary’s in June 2000 and afterwards wrote:

Anglo-Saxon Sundial at Hinckley ‘Built into the south-west face of the diagonal buttress at the south-east corner of the chancel, 3m above ground level, is a block of sandstone about 0.25m square. Although much worn, it is clear that it bears an incised semicircle, with three radial lines; at the point from which they radiate is a sunk hole. The stone is clearly an early sundial, re-used, set on its side; it can obviously never have been used in its present condition. The sunk hole would have taken the base of the style or gnomon, the short iron bar which would have cast the shadow that moved across the dial. Although the stone has no decorative detail from which it might be dated, its form would seem to indicate an Anglo-Saxon date (before 1066). The study of Anglo-Saxon Sundials by A.R.Green (1928) examines the distinctive features of Anglo- Saxon sundials, as opposed to the more common medieval ‘mass dials’. In this it is stated that the most common form of Saxon sundial is the half circle, and the most common division one based on the octaval system – the division of the day into eight tides (from which our words ‘noontide, eventide’ etc derive).

The duodecimal system (the division of the day into twelve hours) seems to be a later introduction, although it still took place before the Norman Conquest. More recently Wall (1997) has suggested that the octaval system was in use in the Celtic church, and that the duodecimal system, which had become the norm throughout the Roman Empire, became dominant after the Synod of Whitby in
664 when Celtic church practices throughout Britain were officially replaced by Roman observances. Thus it would appear that we have our first tangible relic of pre-Conquest Hinckley; its actual date must remain uncertain, but it is clear that it was already ancient when re-used by the builders of the present chancel in the 13th century.’ Peter F Ryder 7th June 2000 1066 - 1926. The church’s income was granted by its founder, William FitzOsbern, to the Abbey of Lyre in Normandy, and the connection with this Norman abbey continued intermittently until 1415 when the revenue was finally transferred to the Priory of Mount Grace in Yorkshire. (This piece of history explains the name given to Mount Grace High School, Leicester Road, Hinckley, which is
built on land once owned by the church). When Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries in 1542 he gave the former estates of Mount Grace Priory in Hinckley, together with the patronage (the right to
appoint the vicar) of St. Mary’s to the Dean and Chapter of Westminster Abbey in return for St. James’s Park, London. The Dean and Chapter kept the patronage
until 1874 when it was transferred to the Bishop of Peterborough. When Leicester became a separate diocese in 1926 it was taken over by the Bishop of Leicester.

WHY VICAR AND NOT RECTOR?
The above history explains why the priest at St Mary’s is called Vicar and not
Rector. A Rector had the right to the income of a parish (from tithes etc) whereas
a Vicar was someone appointed by the authority that held the patronage and so
had the right to the income (in Hinckley it was Mount Grace Abbey, which
provided a stipend for the Vicar). Vicar comes from the same Latin word from which we get Vice- (Chairman). Today the title has no significance at St Mary’s
and in most parishes, though it has been resurrected in team ministries where
the leader of the team is known as the Team Rector, and the other members are
called Team Vicars.
A Benedictine priory was founded in Hinckley in the eleventh century. The old
priory building, which was on the south side of the church (where the present St
Mary’s Church Community Hall is) survived until 1827 when it was demolished,
to make way for cottages (Hunter’s Row). These were demolished in 1912.

Old photograph, taken before the 1875 - 78 restoration.
Note the 18th Century Vicarage on the right (now the school playground)
and Hunter’s Row cottages on the left (site now occupied by the Church Hall)

Laying the Base Stone of the Pier in the South Transept at the commencement of the Restoration in 1875. The Vicar, Rev. W.H.Disney (bearded) is in the centre holding the mallet.

THE PRESENT BUILDING
The present church was rebuilt in the thirteenth century. A beam found during the Victorian rebuilding was inscribed with the date 1246. The oldest parts of the church you see today date from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries – roughly 1240 to 1400. These are the tower, nave and chancel. A large scale restoration took place between 1875 and 1878, at a cost of £10,000 (in today’s money about £10,000,000, if you take into account an average working man’s wage). The architect was Ewan Christian. The Vicar was Rev W.H. Disney, who spent ten years at Hinckley (1874 – 1884). He has written about his time here in his autobiography, Incidents during Thirty Years’ Clerical Work in Ireland and England (published 1898). He begins his account of his ministry in Hinckley: ‘My health is now broken. The nervous system gave way under the strain of ten years’ unceasing work in a manufacturing town in Leicestershire’. His description of fundraising for the rebuilding is very moving. He describes one working man making a little speech, pledging to make a generous donation. “You all know I have a large family and cannot do much, but I will give £3. I cannot give it all at once, but I will give £1 a year for three years”. It all makes fascinating reading. There is a plaque in memory of Rev. W.H. Disney on the south wall of the Chancel. So the old north and south aisles and transepts were demolished in 1875, along with the great west singing gallery or singing loft, erected 1723. (See page 25). This gallery projected two bays towards the east. There were also galleries in the north and south aisles, which were also demolished. The poor used to be herded into the north gallery, which was filled with benches seating 360. New and larger aisles and transepts were built. When completed there was seating for 1,200 people, all on splendid oak pews! Most of the pews still have their original brass holders for the cards which stated who rented that particular pew – all those who could afford it, rented a pew. The poor sat on pews in the aisles.
Pew rents began to be phased out in the late nineteenth century.The 1875 Faculty shows that the transepts were planned to accommodate children (the oak screens came later). Each transept had its own door so that the children could enter and leave without disturbing the rest of the congregation! The chancel was restored and re-roofed in 1880. Sadly a lot of the stone used by the Victorians in the 1875/78 restoration was of poor quality, and has had to be replaced over the years.

Tudor Cottages in Church Walk
which were demolished in the
early 1960’s

Restoration 1993 - 2006
Extensive restoration work was carried out to the spire
and tower in 1993 & 1994. The top twelve feet of the
spire was completely rebuilt, with much new stone.
The south west pinnacle was rebuilt, and some of the
decorative work on the tower renewed. The north
stone spitter (or spout to throw water away from the
tower) was completely renewed, and the underside
carved with a likeness of the Vicar. Several other
areas of stonework were restored including much of
the parapet on the two gables of the Lady Chapel and
elsewhere.

Further restoration was carried out in 1998 - 9. Among other work, the south east buttress to the vestry was underpinned and rebuilt, and the upper half of the east wall of the Lady Chapel (1999) had to be completely rebuilt. Early in 2006 a lot of crumbling stonework was replaced – in the eastern section of the north aisle. In particular fine new stone was added to the buttress at the north west corner of the north aisle, and the north west corner of the north transept. Also the whole of the interior was redecorated, areas were re-plastered, and
repairs carried out to several window sills. The total cost was about £35,000 – all paid from the restoration fund, the income for which comes mainly from the Coffee Bar.

Items from St Paul’s

St Paul’s, with allotments. The sale of St Paul’s in 1993 enabled much needed
improvements to be made at St Mary’s

St Paul’s, the daughter church, stood at the corner of Highfields Road and Leicester Road and was sold and demolished in 1993. The proceeds of the sale (£85,000) were used, together with other donations and a grant, to provide many improvements to St Mary’s including a new heating system, the Coffee Bar, creche and toilets, etc. St Paul’s was built in 1911 as an extra Sunday
School building, but was soon licensed for worship. The vicar, Canon Hurrell, wrote ‘The New Building has been erected to supply a want which is being increasingly felt in the rapidly developing district in the north-eastern portion of St Mary’s Parish……There is accommodation in the present Sunday
Schools for 604 Scholars: there are now 650 Scholars on the books’. Those were the days!
St Paul’s is commemorated by various items which were originally given to that church and are now placed in St Mary’s: the memorial plaques at the West end of this chapel; also in this chapel: the St Paul banner, the altar cross, the brass vases, the candlesticks and the alms dishes; the brass lectern in the north aisle, inscribed with people from St Paul’s who fell in the First World War; the processional cross (the more ornate of the two), two of the churchwardens’ staves, and the font ewer or water jug. Several of these items show the influence of the Arts and Crafts movement of the late 19C and early 20C.

The final service at St Paul’s which stood at corner of Highfields Road and
Leicester Road (see pages 32 & 34), 16th August 1992.