Christ
Church
Ramsdell
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The Ramsdell area was settled by the
time the Romans built the Portway from Silchester to Bath, crossing the
present parish near its northern boundary.
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The parish includes West Heath and
Charter Alley, and it extends to the Basingstoke to Newbury road in the
south-west Most of this area was detached from the parish of Wootton St
Lawrence, but parts came from Monk Sherborne and Tadley. Both spellings,
Ramsdale and Ramsdell, appear to have been in use in Victorian times, but
the parish was named Ramsdale until it was officially changed in the
1970s, long after rise more familiar spelling bad become generally
accepted. |
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The credit for raising the £1,100 needed to build the
church belongs to the Revd Walter Bigg Wither, then Rector of Wootton. A
wooden tablet in the north-west comer of the church records a donation of
£35 from the Incorporated Church Building Society, subject to the
condition that "all sittings were to be free and unappropriated". This recalls the tradition of family pews for which rents were paid, a practice which, by this time, was felt to be divisive. |
The church was built
of local materials—brick, flint and tile. In those days, and indeed until
1979, there was a brickworks just along Monk Sherborne Road where the
Ecophon budding now stands. A list of the vicars, of whom the first was
Revd Joseph Fuller, hangs in the porch. The vicarage, facing the church
across Baughurst Road, was built in 1869. Mr Fuller had a curate, as well
as thirty acres of glebe land. Further building work was undertaken in
1876, when the tower at the north-west corner of the church was added. It
contains the bell, shaped like an inverted cup, and the turret clock, with
its eight-day movement supplied by Willis of Basingstoke. One of the first features striking the visitor on entering is the decoration on the roof beams, which, according to local tradition, is the work of Mr Puller's daughters. The Puller family, who came from Speen, now part of Newbury, are commemorated in. several of the windows, in particular the east window dating from 1906. The war memorial in the north nave, erected in 1922 and consisting of a window and two plaques, is the work of William Glasby, one of the most noted craftsmen of the time. The window, signed in the lower right-hand comer, shows the influence of Burne-Jones and Glasby's early commissions for Morris & Co. For the plaques, naming twelve parishioners who died in the First World War, he used a technique called epus sectile, known from Roman times and used in the thirteenth-century pavement by the high altar in Westminster Abbey. The letters are cut in stone, filled with a paste of ground marble, then polished. There is no memorial for the Second World War, the one parishioner who died being commemorated at Monk Sherbome. Before mains electricity came to the village in 1952, the church was lit by oil lamps and candles, and marks left by soot can still be seen in some places. A new and greatly improved scheme of lighting was installed in 2000. |
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Also in 2000, a time capsule containing everyday objects of
the day was buried under the nave and marked by a stone tablet. The silver
can only be seen during services. The communion plate is of the same age
as the church, and the cross and candlesticks were given to commemorate
the parish centenary in 1967. The organ was pumped by hand until an electric blower was installed in 1962. The pump, which still works, can be seen by the vestry door. The organ was completely dismantled and refurbished in 1995. |
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The churchyard, dominated by a venerable
cedar, contains the graves of many parishioners and some parish clergy. It
is still used for burials. It is maintained with an eye to keeping the
memorials tidy while retaining a haven for wildlife. With this in mind a
programme of tree planting was initiated in 1979. The benefice was merged
with Baughurst in 1953, and since 1980 it has been part of a larger
benefice including the parishes of Wolverton and Hannington. |
