The South Somerset village Church of St. John and All Saints at Kingstone, and its memorials and epitaphs.

Kingstone’s village church of St. John and All Saints sits surrounded by farm buildings and cottages atop Kingstone Hill around a mile south-east of Ilminster in South Somerset.  It has a central tower where the bell-ringers stand among the worshippers, and a 13^th century font standing in front of the blocked western doorway.

The village Church of St. John and All Saints, Kingstone, South Somerset viewed from the south.

On the north wall of the nave is a plaque commemorating 2^nd Lieutenant John Arnold Munden of the 6^th Battalion, Somerset Light Infantry.  He was killed in action at Delville Wood, during the Battle of The Somme, on 28^th August 1916.

Most of the 6^th Battalion SLI withdrew from the front-line on 19^th August to rest and recuperate at Fricourt, but one company was in Delville Wood between the 26^th and 30^th of August.  It appears that Lt. Munden was serving with that company and was killed on the 27^th or 28^th, according to Commonwealth War Graves Commission records.  He was not immediately identified and subsequently buried as an “Unknown British Officer” at Longueval, (Delville Wood).

 In January 1929 his body was exhumed, identified and re-interred at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemetery at Serre Road, north-east of Albert.  John Arnold Munden was the 28 year old youngest son of Doctor Charles Munden and Lucy Jane Munden of Ilminster.

The fine stained glass window in the east of the church is in memory of the wives of a local man.  The dedication reads:

“To the glory of God & in memory of Anne Elizabeth who died March 1899 and of Florence Honor who died June 1922. the beloved wives of John Daniel Rutter of Allowenshay. 1924.”

The stained glass east window of St. John and All Saints Church, Kingstone, South Somerset.

Just inside the western wall of the churchyard is a gravestone with an epitaph to Edward (Bob) Gummer who died in 1984 aged 85 having been “THE LAST TENANT OF KINGSTONE FARM 1938-1978”.

Near the south wall is the gravestone of a man with the wonderful name of Zechariah Chick who died at Allowenshay, a hamlet less than a mile east of Kingstone, on March 29^th 1886 aged 84.  Also named are his wife Eliza who died on January 9^th 1901 aged 72, and their sons William Albert Chick who died aged 26 in 1880 and Zechariah Chick who died aged 43 in 1905.

 

The gravestone of Zechariah Chick, St. John and All Saints Church, Kingstone, South Somerset.

Also in the churchyard at Kingstone is a memorial stone commemorating Squadron Leader Sinclair ‘Tif’ O’Connor Distinguished Flying Cross, Air Force Cross, Air Force Medal, who served with RAF Bomber Command’s 49 Squadron during Operation Grapple – the testing of hydrogen bombs.

On 11 September 1958, while holding the rank of Flight Lieutenant, he was pilot and captain of the Vickers Valiant jet bomber (XD827) which dropped a hydrogen bomb on Christmas Island in the Pacific during Operation Grapple Z.

The memorial stone records Sinclair O’Connor’s birth on 26-5-1922 and death on 21-3-2013.

St. John and All Saints Church, Kingstone, South Somerset viewed from the east.

I have previously written, link below, of Lieutenant Arthur Hopkins Tett a Canadian who served in the Boer War and World War One.  His is the only Commonwealth War grave at St. John and All Saints.  He is at rest beneath the branches of a yew.

Views from Somerset: Lieutenant A. H. Tett, a Canadian who served in The Boer War and The Great War. At rest at St. John and All Saints Church in the Somerset village of Kingstone. (viewfromsomerset.blogspot.com)

Epitaphs of interest. James Fownes Somerville.

Admiral Sir James Fownes Somerville lies at rest, with his wife, at the Church of St. Michael in the village of Dinder which lies in the shadow of the southern foothills of the Mendips.

His modest epitaph reads "Admiral of the Fleet and Squire of Dinder".

The headstone of James Fownes Somerville and his wife in the Somerset village of Dinder.

The commemoration to James Fownes Somerville "Admiral of The Fleet and Squire of Dinder" in the churchyard of St. Michael's in the village of Dinder, Somerset. 

I wrote of Sir James' highly distinguished career in a previous post. Below is a link.

Views from Somerset: Admiral Sir James Somerville, commander of Force H, the squadron which crippled the Bismarck, at rest in a Somerset churchyard in the village of Dinder. (viewfromsomerset.blogspot.com)

In St. Mary's churchyard in Portchester, Hampshire, is the Commonwealth War Grave of Private Frank Arthur Penn of The Pioneer Corps.

Our good friend L from Hampshire took this photo, in the churchyard of St. Mary’s in Portchester, of the Commonwealth War Grave of Private Frank Arthur Penn of The Pioneer Corps.

Private Penn died in the Liverpool Road Military Hospital in Chester on the 20 January 1942.  The hospital was a wartime one in use from 1940 to 1945.

Frank Arthur Penn was the son of Mr and Mrs W. F. Penn of Wicor, Fareham.  William Penn died on 10 July 1948.  It is unusual to find the name of a father in the personal inscription on the headstone of a Commonwealth War Grave.

The Commonwealth War Grave of Private Frank Arthur Penn at St. Mary's in Portchester.

A visit to the village church in Buckland St. Mary high on the Blackdown Hills in Somerset.

The ancient Somerset village of Buckland St. Mary, Buckland means land granted to the thanes by the Saxon Kings, stands 700 feet high on the Blackdown Hills. 

A short drive along narrow country lanes, not far from the A303, brings you into the village and its incongruous, but impressive, Church of St. Mary.  Incongruous because of the small size of the community which it serves, yet impressive enough to be known as the “Cathedral of the Hills”.

The Church of St. Mary in the Somerset village of Buckland St. Mary.

The church was built between 1853 and 1863. It was designed by London architect Benjamin Ferry and paid for by John Edwin Lance.  It is the third church to be built on the site.  Lance, from a well-to-do family, was rector of St. Mary’s from 1832 to 1885.

On arrival John Lance had himself built a new rectory in the style of a Victorian Gothic mansion – today it is known as Buckland House.  When finished the ground floor of the rectory had a hall, library, double drawing room, dining room, parish room, kitchen, larder, pantry, butler’s pantry and bedroom.  The first floor had nine bedrooms, a dressing room, and a linen room with 4 attics above.  The house stood in 37 acres of glebe land and had a staff to match its size and stature.

It was the death of his wife which motivated Lance to have the church rebuilt.  The finished building was described by Pevsner as: “A noble incongruity, due to the rector, the Rev. J. E. Lance.  Large with a substantial s w tower and in a style not at all du pays.  Moreover far too large for a small and scattered congregation.”

The s w tower of St. Mary's church in the Somerset village of Buckland St. Mary.

The war memorial in the churchyard of St. Mary's, Buckland St. Mary, Somerset.

Sadly a carter was killed during the construction of the church.  He was carting materiel when his horses ran away; the wagon overturned and the man was crushed to death beneath the stones.  The story is on a stone in the churchyard with this quaint warning: “May all carters who read this take warning and never get in their wagon”.  I could not find the stone on my stroll around the church, but I am sure to visit Buckland St. Mary again and will have another look.

However, I did come across the grave of Lt. Col. John Conrad Pringle, Royal Engineers, who died in 1952 aged 71, and that of his wife Ethel Gladys who was over 100 years old when she died in 1991.  Perhaps the fresh air on the Blackdowns accounted for the lady’s longevity?

The grave of Lt. Col. and Mrs John Conrad Pringle in the churchyard of  St. Mary's in the Somerset village of Buckland St. Mary.

A stroll around the Somerset village of Stoke St. Mary and its Church of St. Mary.

The village of Stoke St. Mary in Somerset lies comfortably sheltered in the shadow of the northern slopes of the Blackdown Hills.

Agriculture was once the main provider of work in the village, but now it is primarily a dormitory village for the county town of Taunton which is only 2 miles away to the north-west.

Sadly the last pub in the village, the Half Moon Inn, is closed and up for sale. It is a fine red-brick building and was formerly a manse. When I strolled by on the road through the village it was looking rather forlorn with its outside seating area showing signs of neglect.

Stoke St. Mary's only pub, the Half Moon Inn, was closed when I passed by in September 2021.

By contrast the unpretentious village Church of St. Mary has a very well cared for graveyard.  Pevsner kindly describes St. Mary’s as having a: “Good two-staged C13 w tower.  One w lancet and an uncommonly vigorously moulded tower arch.  The chancel arch also has shafts and capitals of the C13.”

The Church of St. Mary in the Somerset village of Stoke St. Mary.

In the churchyard is the devotedly tended Commonwealth War Grave of Sapper Alexander James Bussell, Royal Engineers, who died on 21 March 1947, aged 27.  He was the son of Samuel and Helen Bussell of Stoke St. Mary, and the husband of Gladys Hazel Bussell of Taunton.  The touching inscription on the gravestone, not visible in the photo, reads “THOUGHTS DRIFT BACK TO BYGONE DAYS LIFE MOVES ON BUT MEMORY STAYS”.

The Commonwealth War Grave of Sapper Alexander James Bussell, Royal Engineers. 

The village of Stoke St. Gregory in Somerset, its parish church, and final resting place of a notable tennis player.

Stoke St. Gregory, like its neighbouring village of North Curry, straggles along a low ridge which rises from the Somerset Levels and runs south-west to north-east with West Sedge Moor to one side and Curry Moor and Stan Moor on the other.

The Somerset Village Book, Somerset Federation Of Women’s Institutes (Countryside Books, 1988) has this to say of the village:

“The village, one of the largest in Somerset, covers an area of 3,967 acres and took its name from the church dedicated to St. Gregory the Great.

It is situated on the Somerset Levels, which for centuries has been the centre of withy growing and basket making.  The willow tree flourishes naturally on the wetlands of Somerset and it was discovered that the young straight shoots could be twisted, plaited and woven into many useful articles.

Present day Stoke St. Gregory is a study in contrasts – the rattle of the tractors – the rumble of the occasional bus and also the piercing shriek of a jet plane passing overhead.”

In 1988 the jet planes were almost certainly Fleet Air Arm Sea Harriers from RNAS Yeovilton, but sadly, in a short sighted move by the Labour government, they were retired from service in 2006.  However, we may hear the sound of jets over Somerset again in the not too distant future as the F35B Lightning is to enter service with the Fleet Air Arm – it is already at sea with an RAF squadron operating from the carrier HMS QUEEN ELIZABETH.

As Wimbledon is upon us again, at this time of year I thought I would wend my way along the narrow undulating road to the village and pay my respects at the grave of the noted tennis player “Bunny” Austin.  He is at rest in the churchyard at the parish church of St. Gregory.

Henry Wilfred “Bunny” Austin was the last British man to reach the final of a Grand Slam tournament until Andy Murray in 2012.

In the years 1933-1936 he helped Fred Perry win the Davis Cup for Britain.  In 1938 he reached the final at Wimbledon only to be soundly beaten by the American Don Budge, one of the finest players of the era.  Budge was the son of a Scottish immigrant to the USA named John “Jack” Budge who had played several times in Rangers reserve team before emigrating. 

In 1939 Austin was made top seed at Wimbledon, but was eliminated early in the competition – it was his last appearance on court there.

Bunny Austin married English actress Phyllis Konstam in 1931.  They met on a trans-Atlantic liner in 1929 when Austin was travelling to play in the US Open. 

The grave of Bunny Austin and his wife Phyllis in the churchyard of the parish church of St. Gregory in the Somerset village of Stoke St. Gregory.

Arthur Mee, when writing of Stoke St Gregory, beautifully describes its parish church in his The King’s England – Somerset (Hodder and Stoughton Ltd., 1968).

“It has a noble church, with a handsome pierced parapet, glorious windows, and a central octagonal tower built in the thirteenth century fashion before such towers were ousted  by the stately towers of 200 years later, for which Somerset is renowned throughout the land.  The tower has eight sides cunningly fitted on four arches, with smaller arches joining the corners.  Niches and statues are everywhere – nineteenth century apostles round the tower, a mediaeval St. Gregory in the south porch with a dove in his hands, and the statues round the pulpit.  We have seen pulpits like this at Thurloxton and North Newton, but nowhere else in Somerset.”

The parish church of St. Gregory in the Somerset village of Stoke St. Gregory.

The octagonal tower of St. Gregory's with its apostles in the Somerset village of  Stoke St. Gregory.

The tower and clock of the parish church of St. Gregory in the village of Stoke St. Gregory.

A stroll around St. Michael and All Angels Church in the South Somerset village of Chaffcombe.

The village of Chaffcombe and its Church of St. Michael and All Angels is north east of the South Somerset town of Chard.  I approached it from the A358, driving past Chard Reservoir and on along ever narrowing country lanes until the road took me down into a sheltered valley where it seems most of the village houses have found a haven.

In the last century Arthur Mee in his The King’s England, Somerset (Hodder and Stoughton Ltd. 1968) writes of Chaffcombe: “It hides its charms among hills wooded with oak and larch, with a paved way up one of them through a tiny orchard to the church. We found it in apple-blossom time, and saw the creeper-covered tower between pink trees, a lovely memory.”

Today, the creeper has gone from the tower and the orchard on the approach to the church is no more, but standing beside the church gate, as if on guard, is an intriguing totem-pole-like wood carving – an awful lot of care must have gone into its making.  The churchyard has been left overgrown and meadow-like in places, something the blackbirds seem to appreciate as there were several busily scurrying around and hopping on and off the gravestones.

Approaching the Church of St. Michael and All Angels in the village of Chaffcombe, Somerset.

The Church of St. Michael and All Angels in Chaffcombe, Somerset.  Note the blackbird on the path!

Pevsner has very little to say about St. Michael and All Angels.  In his day it was just St. Michael’s.  He describes the exterior of the church as having a “West tower with set-back buttresses and two pinnacles above them on the corner of the battlements.  Higher stair-turret.  The church was rebuilt in 1860 by F. M. Allen.”

The tower of S. Michael and All Angels in the South Somerset village of Chaffcombe.

I came across some interesting, and poignant, gravestones in the churchyard.  On the headstone of Major Edward Noel "Teddy" Clist R.A. were the noble words “Always a Soldier”.  Major Clist was born in Dulverton, Somerset and died in Malvern, Worcestershire.

The grave of Major Edward Noel "Teddy" Clist R.A. and his wife Beatrice "Betty".

A tall square simple stone column marks the grave of Emanuel Vincent Harris, often more simply known as E. Vincent Harris.  He was a distinguished architect and Royal Academician who was born in Devonport in 1876 and died in Bath in 1971.  He was thought of as a classicist and his buildings suggest the influence of Sir Edwin Lutyens.  Many prominent public buildings were designed by him, before and after World War Two, including: Bristol Council House, County Hall Taunton, Sheffield City Hall, Nottingham County Hall, Leeds Civic Hall, Kensington Central Library in London, and the Ministry of Defence Main Building in Whitehall.

The headstone of Emanuel Vincent Harris. Architect and Royal Academician.

Just to the west of the church tower is the headstone of Sgt Richard Morley Neale RAFVR.  Although the commemoration states that Sgt Neale was killed in action he did, in fact, die as a result of an accident.  He was serving in No. 15 Operational Training Unit at RAF Harwell in Berkshire while under training as an observer/air bomber.

On March 26 1941 Sgt Neale and the 5 other crew members of a twin engine Wellington Mk1c (serial number R1243) took off from RAF Harwell on a 4 hour training mission which included the dropping of munitions in Cardigan Bay.  At 1130 observers on the Welsh coast saw the Wellington approach from the east and fly out over Cardigan Bay where it entered sea fog.  The aircraft was then seen to crash about one and a half miles from the coast.  Rescue boats were despatched, but just 2 members of the crew were found; only one, Sgt Neale, was alive, but sadly he died later that day.

Richard Morley Neale was the only son of Mr Morley Havelock Neale and his wife Ida Walker Neale.  He attended Chard Grammar School, and then Sherborne School (Abbeylands) in Dorsetshire from 1933 until December 1937.*

Sgt Neale’s headstone also has the following touching verse included in his epitaph:

NOW EVERY BIRD HE LOVED BY WOOD OR WAVE

SING SWEET THE REQUIEM ABOVE HIS GRAVE

KINDEST OF HEARTS GENTLEST OF GENTLEMEN

*Source aircrewremembered.com

The headstone of Sgt Richard Morley Neale, Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve.

The Church of St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburga in the South Somerset village of Broadway, and an epitaph of note.

 The village of Broadway is situated to the west of Ilminster in South Somerset, just a few hundred yards off the A358.  Writing over 50 years ago in his The King’s England – Somerset (Hodder and Stoughton Ltd., 1968) Arthur Mee tells us of Broadway: “It stands on an ancient track cut through a royal forest, leading straight as an arrow to the fortified hill of Castle Neroche; it is said that the wide verges of this old road were for preventing robbers from hiding close enough to spring out on the unwary traveller.”  I am not sure where the “wide verges” are, but when I visited the village, on the way to the parish church the 13^th century Church of St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburga, the lanes were narrow and the hedgerows thick and tall.

Broadway’s village church stands some way outside the village because, it is thought, of an outbreak of the plague.  Ronald Webber in his The Devon and Somerset Blackdowns (Robert Hale & Company, 1976) informs us: “The church of St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburgha (sic), well outside the village, has a chancel and transept of late 13^th century or early 14^th century construction.  The interior abounds with solid oak bench ends with a preponderance of poppy heads.  The chancel has carved beams and bosses while the 16^th century pulpit has carved panels depicting the five wounds of Christ.  An octagonal font of the Perpendicular period has a small figure on each side.”

The Church of St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburga in the South Somerset village of Broadway.

There does seem some uncertainty as to who the church is dedicated.  St. Aldhelm was an Anglo-Saxon literature scholar born in the 7^th century.  He became Abbot of Malmesbury Abbey and Bishop of Sherborne.  However, there is some confusion over St. Eadburga.  Is the dedication meant for St. Eadburh of Winchester granddaughter of King Alfred, or St. Eadburga of Bicester an English saint from the 7^th century and a daughter of King Penda of Mercia?  English Heritage gives the dedication as St. Eadburh while outside the church a sign names it St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburga. 

Whatever its name may be, it is a charming little church with a well maintained graveyard.  Several of the gravestones have interesting epitaphs, but the following one in particular caught my eye.  It was on the reverse of the gravestone of one Frank Fawcett who died on 13 June 1971, aged 73 – the words suggest he was a farmer:

Teach me to work

diligently, with courage

and fortitude, but above

all with meekness and

humility, not striving for

profit or the gratification

of vanity, but seeking

rather to produce the fruits

of your good earth so that

my fellow creatures and

the community in which

they live may enjoy them.

Epitaphs of interest. At rest in the Churchyard of Christ Church, Redhill, North Somerset is C.T.D. "Sox" Hosegood FRAeS.

 The epitaph on his gravestone includes the description “A good egg”.

Charles Thomas Dennehy “Sox” Hosegood FRAeS is best remembered for his career in aviation.  He joined the Royal Navy just after the outbreak of World War Two and gained his Fleet Air Arm wings in July 1940.  Late in the war he was one of the first six Naval Pilots sent to America to convert to helicopters on the Sikorsky R4.  In March 1945 Hosegood became the Navy test pilot at the Joint Service Helicopter Test Unit of the Airborne Forces Experimental Establishment (AFEE) at Beulieu.  He left the Navy in November 1946.

In 1952 Hosegood became Chief Test Pilot of the Bristol Aeroplane Company’s Helicopter Division.  He worked on the Bristol Sycamore, the first British helicopter to gain its Certificate of Airworthiness.  He made the initial flights of the Bristol Belvedere and saw it into service with the RAF.

After Westland took over Bristol’s Helicopter Division in 1963 Hosegood joined the South Western Electricity Board to set up their Helicopter Unit for power line inspection duties.  He managed the Helicopter Unit for 20 years up to his retirement by which time it had expanded to cover power line inspections for 4 neighbouring Boards.

He is buried in the churchyard of Christ Church in the village of Redhill, North Somerset.

Source:

https://www.aerosociety.com/news/obituary-charles-thomas-dennehy-sox-hosegood/