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My Visit to St. Mary's Church in Brook
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My Visit to St. Mary's Church in Brook
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Views in the Three Levels of the Tower
(Text in italics is quoted directly
from a 4-page pamphlet purchased at the church.) |
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| Church Exterior | Church Interior | Tower |
| Views from Church | Views of Brook | After Lunch |
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On the ground floor of the tower there were paintings and plaques on the walls and the ceiling is very high. The screen between the nave and the tower room contains boxed-in steel girders and was erected in 1960 to support the stone arch, which was in danger of collapse. The tower room was completely refurbished in 1990. The storage units and folding doors are of American red oak and were made by local craftsmen. It houses the post-Reformation Communion table, the remaining lower half of the rood screen (the upper part was cut down in the mid-eighteenth century), the royal coat of arms dated 1829 and a Rectors’ board. |
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There is a series of paintings of the church in different seasons. |
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A wooden panel lists the names of all the Rectors of St. Mary’s since 1199. William Lawse is the name of the Rector in 1622 who might have officiated at the baptism of Richard Edgerton on November 22nd. |
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Leaving the main floor, a doorway led to the stone steps which we climbed to the Priest’s Room and the Belfry. |
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A newel stairway, within a clasping buttress, leads from the ground floor vestry to the priest’s chamber.… |
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Here we found a workman engaged in remodeling the Priest’s Chamber. |
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He was being very careful to preserve the oldest painting in the church, a depiction of Christ over the Priest’s Altar which he showed us. Under the central arch of the priest’s chamber is a faded twelfth century wall-painting of Christ in the act of blessing. A small altar must have existed beneath the painting, but nothing but rubble now remains. |
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We left the Priest’s Chamber and climbed the next circular stairway to the Belfry. The frame for the cast iron bells is no longer strong enough for them to be swung and rung in the traditional manner, but hammers and mechanisms are set up to move the clappers so they can still be rung for Sunday services. The newel stairway … then [leads] up again to the three bells – two of the fifteenth century and one of the seventeenth. |
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