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| Great Chishall: copy of wall painting in 1860 |
One ‘discovery’ of the Probert
scrapbook (now deposited in the Essex Record Office: ERO A13366) contains some reports of Meetings
of the Essex Archaeological Society, text on some church refurbishments and
rebuilds, and, principally, cuttings from books (Suckling, Buckler etc) and the
compiler’s own sketches of Essex churches.
Essex churches were of particular
interest to this gentleman. The scrapbook
includes a drawing of a wall painting in the church at Great Chishall, a
village described in Kelly’s Directory of Essex (1890) as being “on the
Cambridgeshire border”. (It was transferred out of Essex in 1895.)
Probert described it as a ‘Fresco painting of the
Martyrdom of St Laurence discovered about ten years ago on the South Wall of
the North Aisle of Gt. Chishall Church. It is now (1860) obliterated”.
Randomly opening Volume XVII of the Society’s
“Transactions” (“New Series”), I found another illustration of the same image
in the frontispiece with an article by the Rev. G. Montagu Benton on ‘Wall
Paintings in Essex. I. Wall-paintings
formerly in the churches of Felsted and Great Chishall’.
Benton mentions in his paper that at Ingatestone a
painting representing the seven deadly sins was discovered during the course of
restoration in 1866. “In this instance
each sin was placed between the spokes of a large wheel, 7 feet 2 inches in
diameter, in the centre of which was hell.
After much perplexity the vicar and the churchwardens of the time
decided to cover up this picture”. As a
youngster growing up in the parish during the 1970s I remember the Rector of
the time – Canon Edward Hudson – telling the story to us as schoolchildren. An hour-glass holder of a later age – of
equal interest – covers its site on the north wall by the pulpit.
In October 2010 members of the local branch of the NADFAS
held a couple of meetings at St Edmund and St Mary Church to explain some of
the things they had discovered during the course of recording the interior of Ingatestone
Church. The present Rector – Revd.
Patrick Sherring – displayed a framed drawing of the ‘Seven Deadly Sins’ which
had been given to him only in the last two to three years. It is an original made at the time of the 1866
restoration, and is accompanied by the narrative which appeared in the Essex
Archaeological Society’s ‘Transactions’ Volume IV (“Old Series”). I was pleased to go to the Essex Record
Office and find on its bookshelves a copy of the same, and the copy of the current
Rector’s acquisition beautiful represented.
The Great Chishall painting was destroyed, according to
Benton, but the Ingatestone painting is preserved. If hidden from view. At least
the Rector and the Society has copies and I hope that one day it may be made
available to all to see on the Internet.
Andrew Smith
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