Forums
Posted By: _Ste_ St Hillarys : The Tudor tower Wallasey - 14th Sep 2007 9:37pm
There have been churches dedicated to St Hilary on this site since at least 902 omg and it`s possible that the earliest church dates back to the Fifth century. The tower, (the oldest building in Wallasey), was built as part of the fourth St Hilary`s church in 1530.

The tower became part of the fifth church built in 1757-1760. It remained the only church in Wallasey until the Nineteenth century and on the North side of the tower was the first school in Wallasey.

Legends speak of tunnels leading from below the tower floor to other parts of Wallasey and that these tunnels were used to hide the goods collected by local shipwreckers.

This fifth church was destroyed by fire in 1857. The fire was caused by the sexton stoking up the boiler too high after complaints that the church was cold. The heat melted fat on hams being unofficialy smoked above the boiler which in turn caught fire.
It is recorded that Wallasey smelt of bacon for days afterwards.

The fire destroyed the tower floors and the six bells crashed down and were broken.
They were re-cast and placed in the present St Hilarys.

In 1893 the tower roof was repaired and the ground floor area became a mortuary chapel. The floor level was raised and decorated with Minton tiles.

The tower was re-roofed and restored in 2003.

For times of opening and access contact the Rector (0151 638 4771)

smile



Description: St` Hilarys New church
Attached picture DSCF0052.JPG

Description: Part of the old St Hilarys (Tudor tower)
Attached picture DSCF0046.JPG

Description: The front of Tudor tower
Attached picture DSCF0050.JPG

Description: Date plauque 1530
Attached picture DSCF0048.JPG

Description: You can see where the old church stood attached
Attached picture DSCF0051.JPG
Posted By: BMW Joe Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 14th Sep 2007 10:34pm
great topic mate happy

never knew anything about it
Posted By: Mark Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 14th Sep 2007 10:55pm
As Joe says.
Great topic neat pics too wink
Posted By: MattLFC Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 14th Sep 2007 11:02pm
This is the church I was telling you about earlier Mark.

Where it would be a great place to get some photographs, both at day and at night.

I been there a few times this week to visit a grave, and its a beautiful place, very picturesque, im taking me camera there this week.

smile
Posted By: Davey_Martin Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 14th Sep 2007 11:15pm
another great place is christ church in port sunlight... even more so when ur high on drugs haha... the lights make ur shadows massive... nice building too
Posted By: _Ste_ Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 14th Sep 2007 11:22pm
Originally Posted by Davey_Martin
another great place is christ church in port sunlight... even more so when ur high on drugs haha... the lights make ur shadows massive... nice building too


omg
Posted By: _Ste_ Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 14th Sep 2007 11:23pm
Originally Posted by MattLFC
This is the church I was telling you about earlier Mark.

Where it would be a great place to get some photographs, both at day and at night.

I been there a few times this week to visit a grave, and its a beautiful place, very picturesque, im taking me camera there this week.

smile


Also very quiet and has wonderfull views smile
Posted By: MattLFC Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 14th Sep 2007 11:25pm
Yep, views over the whole of Leasowe and out to sea, could see Hoylake, Hilbre and N.Wales... and those bloody mysterious islands haha!

grin
Posted By: _Ste_ Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 14th Sep 2007 11:26pm
Originally Posted by MattLFC
Yep, views over the whole of Leasowe and out to sea, could see Hoylake, Hilbre and N.Wales... and those bloody mysterious islands haha!

grin


lol. i take it they are still a mystery then? laugh
Posted By: MattLFC Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 14th Sep 2007 11:27pm
Yeah, unless you worked out where they are lmao?? grin
Posted By: Mark Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 15th Sep 2007 10:51am
Sorry that was just funny to me lol...

"It is recorded that Wallasey smelt of bacon for days afterwards."
Posted By: _Ste_ Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 15th Sep 2007 5:30pm
Originally Posted by Mark
Sorry that was just funny to me lol...

"It is recorded that Wallasey smelt of bacon for days afterwards."


Lol, thats what i thought too laugh
Posted By: Waddi Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 15th Sep 2007 7:50pm
Thats at the top of my road, do you mind If I add some of my own pics to this thread, or should I start my own?
Posted By: Mark Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 15th Sep 2007 7:55pm
just add wink
Posted By: Waddi Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 15th Sep 2007 8:11pm
heres a few of my pics of St Hillarys.

Attached picture P1010011.JPG
Attached picture P1010014.JPG
Attached picture P1010029.JPG
Attached picture P1010053.JPG
Attached picture P1010031.JPG
Posted By: _Ste_ Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 15th Sep 2007 8:24pm
Great pics lee happy i particualy like the third one down, a great capture with the sunlight smile
Posted By: Mark Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 15th Sep 2007 8:27pm
yeh what a difference a bit of sun can make smile
Posted By: _Ste_ Re: The Tudor tower Wallasey - 16th Sep 2007 1:28am
Need to get a better pic but this is of some door in the garden smile


Description: Private, old door
Attached picture private.jpg
Posted By: BMW Joe Re: St Hillarys : The Tudor tower Wallasey - 16th Sep 2007 9:23am
Great pics Waddi, I like the 3rd one too
Posted By: Snodvan Re: St Hillarys : The Tudor tower Wallasey - 23rd Jul 2008 7:51pm
Originally Posted by Totopop
There have been churches dedicated to St Hilary on this site since at least 902 omg and it`s possible that the earliest church dates back to the Fifth century. The tower, (the oldest building in Wallasey), was built as part of the fourth St Hilary`s church in 1530.

The tower became part of the fifth church built in 1757-1760. It remained the only church in Wallasey until the Nineteenth century and on the North side of the tower was the first school in Wallasey.

Legends speak of tunnels leading from below the tower floor to other parts of Wallasey and that these tunnels were used to hide the goods collected by local shipwreckers.

This fifth church was destroyed by fire in 1857. The fire was caused by the sexton stoking up the boiler too high after complaints that the church was cold. The heat melted fat on hams being unofficialy smoked above the boiler which in turn caught fire.
It is recorded that Wallasey smelt of bacon for days afterwards.

The fire destroyed the tower floors and the six bells crashed down and were broken.
They were re-cast and placed in the present St Hilarys.

In 1893 the tower roof was repaired and the ground floor area became a mortuary chapel. The floor level was raised and decorated with Minton tiles.

The tower was re-roofed and restored in 2003.

For times of opening and access contact the Rector (0151 638 4771)

smile


Picking up on Totos old post in the context of current discussions concerning local "monument" buildings that have mysteriously caught fire. Well, I am SURE St Hilary's old tower will not suffer that fate but of course it became the "old tower" because of a fire

Quote"This fifth church was destroyed by fire in 1857. The fire was caused by the sexton stoking up the boiler too high after complaints that the church was cold. The heat melted fat on hams being unofficialy smoked above the boiler which in turn caught fire. It is recorded that Wallasey smelt of bacon for days afterwards."

I was talking with the Canon Paul from St Hilary's a couple of weeks ago, showing some old maps of Wallasey Village and photos of the area around the church. Some of his comments seem to show that perhaps there is "nothing new". What he told me was that it was "surprising" but the week before the fire that burned the old tower all the church plate, vestments and records were moved out - and the church authorities somehow managed to have a building plan for the new church ready in just a couple of months and the new church was ready and opened in around 18 months. Normally preparing such plans, raising the finance and organising the rebuilding is a much longer job. His comment was that "you have to wonder whether there was some pre-planning". wink wink

Snodvan
Posted By: BigBadStuey Re: St Hillarys : The Tudor tower Wallasey - 23rd Jul 2008 10:18pm
Quote
The important parish of Wallasey, -the most populous in the hundred excepting Bebington, -comprehends the three townships of Wallasey, Liscard, and Poulton-cum-Seacombe. In these, which contain 3276 acres, valued in the county books at £11,515, there are, according to the last census, 6261 inhabitants. It occupies the north-east angle of the hundred; Liscard laying at the junction of the sea and the Mersey; Poulton-cum-Seacombe at the union of the creek called Wallasey Pool with that river, and between the two, bounded on the north by the sea, is the township of Wallasey, which extends westward to the Leasowe.

There has been much confusion in the orthography of this parish, which in the Doomsday survey occurs as Walea, and at the period of the compliation of that document the adjacent parish of West Kirkby is called, in the deed of gift of its church, Cherchebie. To this, "West" was afterwards prefixed, to distinguish it from Kirkby in Walley, by which this parish was designated until the early part of the thirteenth century, when the name of Walaysegh first occurs. It was invariably called Kirkby in Walleia, in the registers of Lichfield until 1487, where it appears there as Wallasey, the name it yet retains in the Diocesan books. Walley's Kirk, which frequently occurs, is an evident corruption of Kirkbye in Walleia.

At a very early period Wallasey was a divided rectory, one part of which was held, with various estates in the township, by the prior of Birkenhead, and the other was given by William de Waleya to the abbot and convent of St. Werbergh; at the dissolution these moieties were vested in the bishop of Chester, who is the patron of the rectory. That portion which belonged to the prior of Birkenhead is held under a separate lease from the bishop by the Rev. William Armistead, the present curate of West Kirkby, but the glebe, rectory house, and appurtenances, are attached to the incumbency, as decreed in Chancery in 1720. The value of the living, according to the Clergy List of 1837, is £393; the present Rector is the Rev. Thomas Byrth, D.D., F.S.A. who was instituted in 1829 on the removal of the Rev. Augustus Campbell A. M. to the Rectory of Liverpool.

The priory of Birkenhead formerly maintained a chaplain in Wallasey, and the chapel and which he officiated is that called "Lees-Kirk" in Bishop Gastrell's Notitia, which in this instance is mainly correct, although the information transmitted to the bishop by the rector was derived from Henry Robinson, then schoolmaster of Wallasey, who, in a history of the parish yet remaining in the church chest, details many circumstances upon which the greatest reliance cannot be placed. The Bishop in 1720 wrote:
"There were formerly two churches in Wallasey, one called Walley's Kirk, situated in the present church-yard, the foundations of which are yet visible, and Lee's Kirk, near a narrow slip of land still called the Kirk-way; but when one became ruinous and the other wanted a priest, they were both taken down and the present one erected in their stead. Walley gave those lands near the Crook Hey and the meadow adjoining, and the Town Crook Hey, to the high altar and the priest for ever, for a burying place in the chancel belonging to the church. This deed of gift was in the parish church, and read by H. Robinson, schoolmaster, when I received the information"

The present church, which is dedicated to St. Hilary, has been several times rebuilt; the principal part of the present fabric is not above ninety years old. The tower represents a fair specimen of the architectural style that prevailed in the reign of Henry VIII. when it is stated to have been rebuilt; the date, 1530, appears on the tower and in other parts. A chapel at the west end, distinguished by a curious oak ceiling, is evidently of much greater antiquity tha any other part of the edifice. the church stands in the most commanding situation in the parish, affording from the tower a prospect of vast extent. There are no monuments of particular interest in the church or church-yard, both of which contain numerous memorials of the fatal effects of the storms by which the banks opposite the parish have visited.* The rectory house which stands immediately adjacent the church is a building partly of stone, commenced in 1632, and finished with brick in 1695 by the Rev. Thomas Swinton.**

* The sad destruction of human life that occurred in January 1839, when the Pennsylvania, St. Andrew, Lockwoods, and other vessels, were lost on this coast, must be fresh in the memory of all; the greater part of the sufferers, after being taken to Leasowe Castle and every exertion used to restore them, were buried in this churchyard. About fifteen years since a number of guineas, apparently fresh from the mint, some coins and gold ornaments, were found on a part of the shore now known as the golden sands, supposed to have come from the strong box of some unfortunate ship that must have foundered with all her crew, as far back as the reign of Charles II, as the few other coins were also of that time. It is probble that the chest in which they had been contained at length gave way, as they were only to be found for a few days, when they were as palpable to the sight as if they had just been placed there. In the year 1844, Lady Cust established, in a small building near the beach, Dennet's Rocket apparatus for saving lives from shipwreck, many having been lost within a few yards of assistance for want of means rendering it.

** "The original endowment of the rectory has been found in Rome. in the place in which the duplicate of our English endowments are kept, but I do not believe any copy was taken." -Extracted from information from Bishop Law to the Rev. Augustus Campbell, A. M. and by him obligingly communicated. May 1845.
© Wirral-Wikiwirral