Harvington Hall

Today, for the first time, I visited Harvington Hall near Kidderminster in Worcestershire. The visit was organised as a summer excursion for the Brothers of the Oxford Oratory.

Harvington Hall from the east

Image: birminghamdiocese.org.uk

The Hall is an Elizabethan moated manor house with rare wall paintings and the greatest series of priests' hiding places in the country - it has seven plus a vestment hide - and they are thought to be the work of St Nicholas Owen. When they were constructed Harvington was owned by Humphrey Packington. There is an illustrated online account of the history of the house at the post Harvington Hall
from the blog Tudor Stuff, and there are more photographs and information here. 

A model of Harvington Hall as it may have appeared when completed by Humphrey Packington.

The demolition and alterations of c.1700 removed the battlements and the three blocks at the rear on the north west. The view is from approximately the same angle as the photograph above.

Image:Thornber.net

In 1696 it passed by inhertance from Humphrey Packington's daughter, Lady Mary Yates, to the  Throckmorton family, who were based at Coughton Court. Probably as an economy measure they demolished the north wing and the Great Hall on the western side about 1700, leaving a rather lop-sided plan. A model in the house indicates the rather grander appearance the Hall originally had. The house was partially occupied by relatives and by the priest but gradually decayed, and by 1826 the family had moved elsewhere and much of the top floor was unfurnished; by 1904 it was described as `hastening to decay'. However in 1923 it was bought by a benefactor, Ellen Grant-Ferris, and given to the Archdiocese of Birmingham and is now managed through a voluntary committee. Restoration work over the years has revealed the wall paintings and is a continuing process to enhance the building and its setting.The wall paintings, though faded, do indicate the often lavish and colourful decoration of houses in the period.

Amongst the items on display are some very fine vestments - one associated with St John Wall, who was martyred in 1679 and who had ministered at the Hall. These are displayed near the old chapel in the upper part of the building. Originally the walls and ceiling were covered with a trailing design of flowers whcih must have made the chapel into a simulation of a floral bower.

The official website of Harvington Hall can be seen here. I would certainly recommend the Hall for a visit by anyone interested in recusant history or more generally in the history of the period.

The Hall offers excellent refreshments - we had a good lunch to set us up for sightseeing - and audio guides as well as several publications on the history of the house. There is also a Heritage Centre in the Malt House at the rear with films about the history of Harvington.

Adjacent to the Malt House, and backing on to the moat, is the Georgian Chapel.

The Georgian chapel at Harvington Hall

The chapel was created in 1743 by adapting the upper storey of a farm outbuilding, to replace the original chapels on the top floor of the house, and was in use until 1823 when it was damaged by fire. Services were transferred to the new church of St Mary which opened in 1826, and after renovation the chapel was converted into a village school which functioned until 1913. 

In 1987 it was returned to its original use as a chapel and fitted out with contemporary furnishings, including the early 19th-century altar and communion rails which came from a church at Upton upon Severn.

Image:   © Copyright Tiger and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence./ Geograph

Facing the Hall to the east is the parish church. This is now the official shrine of St John Wall, and there are bronze reliefs of him and St Nicholas Owen in the church.

Interior of St Mary's Church Harvington

The interior of the Gothic church built across the road from Harvington Hall in 1825 for Sir George Throckmorton. The east window with interesting Y-tracery was installed in 1855, probably by C.F. Hanson, and the stained glass by Hardman of Birmingham dates from 1893.

Image:  © Copyright Tiger and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence/Geograph

It was in the church that we said the prayers used by Brothers at our weekly meetings, to bring to mind that this was a pilgrimage as well as a very enjoyable day out. 

Our jorney back brought us across Worcestershire, and with warm afternoon sunshine and lush foliage all around us a pleasure in itself. We stopped off briefly in Evesham, with me acting as guide, to look at the site of the abbey and to also see for the first time the statue of Eof, the swineherd whose vision led to the foundation of the abbey there - but I will post about that seperately next week.

After that we crossed the remainder of theVale of Evesham, climbed Broadway Hill with its specatular views of the region, and back through Chipping Norton to Oxford. A splendid day out, and my thanks to Fr Jerome for organising it and Mark for bringing his people-carrier to take the brethren out.

Coughton Court

Last Saturday I went on an excusion with the Brothers of the External Oratory in Oxford and organised by our prefect Fr Jerome Bertram to Coughton Court in Warwickshire. This was my first visit to this great recusant house ansd the whole day was both very enjoyable and informative.

CoughtonCourt (pronounced Coaton) has been the home of the Throckmorton family since 1409, although since 1946 the house has been vested in the National Trust. The Throckmortons and their house have survived the Wars of the Roses, the various stages of the English reformation, the Throckmorton plot involving a cadet member of the family, the Gunpowder Plot, the Civil War, the revolution of 1688 when the chapel was sacked by the mob, the civil disabilities laid on Catholics post-1688, and, following Catholic emancipation (the family produced the first Catholic MP after that legislation, winning one of the Berkshire seats in 1832), the agricultural depression of the nineteenth century, death duties, two world wars and everything else the twentieth or any other centory could throw up, and are able to boast of a continuity of occupancy and faith for over six centuries.

In particular the family are famous for their links to other notable Midland recusant families, such as the Catesbys and the Treshams, as well as Sir Walter Raleigh, and the family and the house feature in the story of the Gunpowder Plot. There is an article about some of its historyhere.

The oldest part of the presnt house is the gatehouse built by Sir George Throckmorton in the second decade of the sixteenth century . Successive rebuildings and repairs have produced a house with features of a wide range of styles right down to the saloon from just before the Great War.

The gatehouse from the courtyard

Image:Geograph.org.uk

Amongst the many interesting relics in the house there is the remarkable Tabula Elienis, a painted cloth dating from 1596. So called from its picture of Ely cathedral and similarity to another example there, it depicts English kings and monnks, as well as the arms of recusant families, and appears to be a depiction of recusant heritage and identity. It is displayed in the tower room where the wives of some of those involved in the Gunpowder Plot awaited news of their husbands in 1605.

The Tabula Eliensis

Image:Keybuk photostream

Another room had a fascinating display of treasures including what is believed to be the chesmise worn by mary Queen of Scots at here execution in 1587. Apparently it bore blood stains until relativelty recently. One thing which struck me as being in support of the tradition is that its length would fit with the fact that Queen Mary was a tall woman. In the same room were mementoes of her descendants the Jacobite Kings James III and VIII, Charles III and Henry IX and I.

Chemise worn by Mary Queen of Scots at her execution
Image: Felicityfaery photostrean on Flickr

In the same room, but rather difficult to appreciate because of the necessarily low light levels and the case in which it was displayed, was a cope which is associated through its pomegranete motifs with Queen Catherine of Aragon. This photograph gives a better idea of the vestments which has been restored in recent years. It is, I think, Sarum blue rather than purple, and is a very fine piece of early sixteenth century work.

The Catherine of Aragon cope

Image: The Photostation.net

In the same room were a selection on manuscripts on display, including a late medieval priest's manual in which the clause giving the Pope's name could be seen to have been blotted or smudged out from the canon of the Mass as directed by King Henry VIII in the 1530s.

Elsewhere I was interested to see the possessions of a female members of the Throckmorton family who had been a lady-in-waiting to the Empress Elisabeth of Austria, including photographs of the Empress and the young Crown Prince Rudolf and the insignia of the Orders of the Starry Cross and of St Elizabeth.

We did not really have enough time to explore fully the gardens which have been developed by the family in the last fifteen years, but as well as the nineteenth century Catholic church built by the family we also looked in the late medieval parish church which adjoins the house, and contains many Throckmorton tombs. Like the gateway to the house it is a reminder of the prosperity of late medieval midland England.

The tombs include those of Sir George, the builder of the gatehouse, and his wife, of the last Abbess of Denny in Cambridgeshire, who, as a member of the family, returned to Coughton with two of her nuns to live out their lives, and, presumably, their vocations there. There is also the handsome tomb of Sir John Throckmorton(d.1580) and his wife Marjorie. A younger son he was alawyer and judge, apparently dismissed not long before his death by Queen Elizabeth I for his recusant sympathies. He lived at feckenham in Worcestershire, and his son Sir Francis gave the family name to the throckmorton Plot of 1583. I particularly liked this panel on the tomb base showing the sons as mourners and presumably including the conspirator Francis:

The mourners on the tomb base.

Image: Walwyn on Flick

The interior of the church.

Sir John Throckmorton's canopied tomb is to the right of the altar.

The one in the foreground was intended for one of his ancestors who died on pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1518.

The tracery lights contain late medieval stained glass.

Image: Roy Reed on Flickr