Church Micro 3398...Silsoe
This cache has been placed to bring you to the church of St James, located in Silsoe, Bedfordshire. This replaces archived
GC46NJE by pixeltash: you may recognise that much of the listing has been borrowed from theirs!
Silsoe is classed as a large village with 823 dwellings dating from the 16th century to the present day with a population of 1729 persons.
The centre of the village with its narrow High Street is dominated by the sandstone church of St James The Great. Park Avenue, the driveway past the Church leads into Wrest Park with an impressive tree lined route to Wrest Park House, at its end.
The church stands near the site of a much earlier free chapel of St. Leonard, first mentioned in the Liber Antiquus (1209–35), that became a chapel of ease in the 17th century. In the early 19th century Thomas Philip Robinson, 2nd Earl De Grey (1781–1859), wished to construct a spire but the weight of the structure proved too much for the supporting walls and the whole building collapsed, the church was then rebuilt on it's current site. It consists of chancel, nave, aisles and a tower containing three bells. Built in local ironstone, the altar rails are made from 17th century oak taken from the chapel of the original Wrest House. Most of its stained glass windows represent the families of Wrest House. On Sunday 25th July 1909 King Edward VII attended the church service here and made a donation towards the clock fund.
The clock face on the western side of the tower has a date: ABCD
The top of the downpipe on the guttering in the north-east corner has a date: EFGH
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