St Mary the Virgin Ewelme

 

I thought it time to go and visit a church so my first one is a revisit to St Mary the Virgin Ewelme. The last original blog was called Three Men in a Boat but I was never quite happy with what I wrote. The church is full of history and you read this from Wikipedia :- 

"Thomas Chaucer, who died in 1434, his wife Matilda, and their daughter, Alice de la Pole, Duchess of Suffolk, are buried in the Church of England parish church of Saint Mary the Virgin adjoining the almshouses. The tomb chest of Thomas and that of his wife Matilda Burghersh are topped with memorial brasses showing him in plate armour and her in mantle, veil and wimple with their respective crests (his a unicorn and hers a lion) at their feet. Alice's alabaster tomb, almost undamaged by time, consists of a canopy of panelled stone, below which is the recumbent effigy of the Duchess on top of the tomb chest which contains her remains; the space beneath the chest encloses her sculpted cadaver, which is viewed through elaborate reticulated arches. Her effigy was examined by Queen Victoria's commissioners in order to discover how a woman should wear the insignia of the Order of the Garter.

William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk was Alice's third husband; she was married first to Sir John Philip, and second to Thomas Montagu, 4th Earl of Salisbury. Her five-year-old step-great-granddaughter, Anne Beauchamp, 15th Countess of Warwick, also died at Ewelme, but was buried at Reading Abbey. Jerome K. Jerome (1859–1927), author of Three Men In A Boat, lived at Gould's Grove just southeast of Ewelme. He and his wife Ettie (died 1938) are buried in St. Mary's churchyard; their tombstone reads "For we are labourers together with God. I Corinthians III. 9". Scenes in the 2012 film Les Misérables were filmed at the parish church of Ewelme." 

In my last blog I warned it was quite long well this one is so get a coffee & cake

 

Looking from the road from the north east

 

From along the path to the north side of the church

The south side with wood frames entrance porch

The east end of the church

some of the tombs along the east end

there are a couple more by the path on the north side

Looking back easterly across the churchyard

Going around to the churchyard on the south side

you can find a mixture of old and more recent headstones here

over to the south side are older tombs and headstones

I was rather taken by this headstone

back around to the tombs on the east end

a memorial cross I liked near the tombs

Across the road from the church is a new cemetery

The first headstone with Hey Barbel is the last resting place of an aviator, you can also find the two commonwealth war graves of 

Flt Lieutenant D Rutherford and  BDR A.J.Billing

The porch leading to the church

with graffiti of course

 

The nave with north and south aisles

I will leave it there and show the inside in Part2

Till next time I wish you all a pleasant weekend