CHAPTER VI.

TRINITY CHURCH.

THE NEW CHURCH OF HOLY TRINITY, TWICKENHAM COMMONERECTION IN 1841-ENDOWMENT ENLARGEMENT IN 1863MEMORIAL WINDOWS, &C.-SCHOOLS-MURAL INSCRIPTIONS PERPETUAL CURATES OR VICARS FROM 1841-1872.

In the year 1837, as the need of church accommodation. pressed strongly on the public mind, certain proposals were made in vestry to repew the Parish Church, and plans for that purpose were prepared and submitted. This scheme was ultimately abandoned, and the following course of action adopted :—

A public meeting was held in the school-room, Twickenham, on the 27th of July, 1839, to decide upon the necessary steps to be taken for providing an additional church in the parish. Major Harriott occupied the chair. The first resolution, moved by W. Clay, Esq., M.P., and seconded by Henry Pownall, Esq., set forth strongly the necessity of increased church accommodation. The population of the parish was stated to be at its lowest 5,000, for which, spiritually, there was, as the inhabitants had declared in vestry on the 27th December, 1838, no adequate provision in fact the report of the Ecclesiastical

Revenue Commissioners in 1835 had described the church accommodation of the parish to be for 800 only.

It was further determined that a new church should be erected, having a separate ecclesiastical district, with a minister, to be appointed by the bishop of the diocese, and that a committee should be appointed consisting of the following gentlemen :

W. Clay, Esq., M.P.

T. Twining, Esq.

D. Crole, Esq.

W. Jones Burdett, Esq.

J. J. Briscoe, Esq., M.P.
H. Pownall, Esq.

Capt. Jelf Sharp.

E. H. Donnithorne, Esq.
Major Harriott.
Mr. Goodchild.
Mr. Toone.

Mr. May.

who were empowered to take the necessary steps to attain these objects. Of this committee the Rev. Archdeacon Cambridge was Treasurer.

Their application to his Majesty's Commissioners for Building Churches was favourably responded to, and the Bishop of London gave his consent to the proposal that the appointment of the ministers should be vested in himself and his successors. An eligible site was procured at a cost of 200l., and reported by Mr. Warren, a land-surveyor of eminence, to be in every way fit for the intended building.

Mr. Basevi was employed as architect, and he prepared a plan and an estimate for a building to contain 600 persons, half of the area of which was to be fitted with free seats, to be devoted to the use of the poor; the remainder with pews to be let upon a scale of moderate prices. The cost of the church was 2,800l. It was endowed with 2,000l.; and with nineteen acres of land given by Archdeacon Cambridge, two acres

of which were sold to the South Western Railway Company for 700l., which sum has been added to the original endowment fund.

The subscription list contained many munificent contributions; one-half of the required sum being provided by the committee on the occasion of their first meeting.

The church, which was dedicated to the Holy Trinity, was consecrated on July 15th, 1841, by the Bishop of London (Dr. C. J. Blomfield), attended by the Rev. J. Sinclair, his chaplain.

After the lapse of twenty years, during which time the population of that part of the parish had more than doubled, further provision for spiritual needs became necessary. Trinity Church was for this reason enlarged. By the removal of the original east wall the old church was made to form a nave to a new transept, and an apsidal chancel of great and somewhat disproportionate dimensions, and 400 additional seats, were thus obtained. Several other improvements were contemplated which have not yet been carried out. Mr. Dollman, formerly a pupil of Mr. Basevi's, was the architect of the additions, and the cost of them, defrayed by subscriptions, amounted to 3,000l. The interior presents few features of interest except the stained glass windows. Of the windows which fill the chancel apse the centre one depicts “the Crucifixion," the two on the left hand "the Adoration of the Shepherds," and "the Baptism of our Lord;" the two on the right hand, "the appearance of the Angel to the Holy Women at the tomb," and "the Ascension."

A brass plate beneath the centre window, which was erected by the Hon. and Rev. F. E. C. Byng, as a memorial of his first wife, is thus inscribed :

In gratitude to Almighty God for his mercies still vouchsafed: and in pious memory of the dead, this window has been placed by F. E. C. B., Sept 1865.

The enlarged church was consecrated on December 24th, 1863, by the Bishop of London (Dr. A. C. Tait), the Rev. W. H. Fremantle, his chaplain, attending him.

Another window, recently inserted at the south end of the transept, is in memory of Mr. John May. The centre light represents "the Sermon on the Mount;" the left, "S. John Baptist preaching in the wilderness ;" the right, "S. Paul preaching at Athens." Sacred symbols are placed above, and beneath is the text "Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God," with this very simple dedicatory inscription,

"To the Glory of God and in Memory of John May, this window has been placed as a mark of esteem and affection." *

Its cost, subscribed by Mr. May's friends and neighbours, was 200l.

Messrs. Ward and Hughes, of Frith Street, Soho, are the artists of both windows.

The Registers necessarily do not yet contain any names of historical note. That of baptisms commences in 1841, that of marriages in 1847, that of burials in 1848.

* Mr. May had been churchwarden of Holy Trinity Church from its consecration in 1841 until his death in 1867. He had also been churchwarden of the parish, and had served almost every parochial office. Besides having been chairman of the Board of Surveyors, he was chairman of the Board of Guardians in the Brentford Union for twenty-two successive years.

Among the earlier entries in the last, is the interment of the Rev. Thomas Bevan, the first incumbent the officiating clergyman on the occasion was the Rev. Dr. Frederick Temple (then Principal of the Training College at Kneller Hall), the present Bishop of Exeter. Among the more recent marriages (August 4th, 1866) is that of the then incumbent, the Hon. and Rev. Francis Edmund Cecil Byng, son of George Stevens Byng, Earl of Strafford, to Emily Georgina, daughter of Lord Frederick Herbert Kerr, Captain R.N., performed by the Right Hon. and Right Rev. Archibald Campbell, Lord Bishop of London, assisted by the Rev. Edwyn Arkwright, curate of Holy Trinity Church.

The parish of Holy Trinity possesses excellent national schools, generally known as "Archdeacon Cambridge's Schools." They were built by subscription as a memorial of Archdeacon Cambridge, and in grateful remembrance of his liberal contributions towards the erection and endowment of the Church. His widow left 700l., which yields a little more than 20l. per annum, as a school endowment; the property is vested in trustees and the schools are governed by a committee. There are two school-rooms for boys and girls respectively, with class-rooms for each, and houses. for the master and mistress. They accommodate 160 boys and 140 girls. There is also an infant school in another part of the parish, under a separate trust.