The History of ringing at All Saints

The tower was built around 1450, and we know there were 4 bells by the 1550s. The first mention of ringing in Wokingham was in 1664, when Richard Palmer set up his charity to endow the ringing of the curfew, which finally ceased being ring in the 1980s.

18th century

The installation of six bells in 1704 must have given a boost to ringing, though it would still have been very limited by modern standards. In the 18th century, bellringing was very much a public sport, and the local inn keepers used to sponsor ringing competitions (along with pigeon shooting, cudgelling, quarter-stick matches, cock fighting, and the like). The Ship, The Bush, The Six Bells (which was in Cross Street) and the Half Moon (where the Post Office is now) all sponsored ringing contests in the late 1700s. The inn keepers provided the prizes, normally a set of embroidered hats, and they covered their costs from the profit on eating and drinking. The competitors had to eat a set meal called ‘the ordinary’, which usually cost a shilling, and some innkeepers banned people from eating anywhere else. The home team was not allowed to ring on their own bells, but there were plenty of competitions at other villages in the area.

19th century

In the early 19th century, the ringers were paid to ring on occasions of public rejoicing, and they were often paid in beer. For all this ringing and beer, the churchwardens spent £25 between1808 and 1820, a fifth of what they spent on the 1814 bell restoration, which included 2 new bells!

We don't know whether the ringers rang for services though! At the time, relationships between ringers and the church in general were not good, and Wokingham was probably the same. All this changed with the Belfry Reform movement , which swept the land in the late 1800s. Belfry Reform was not just about improving the behaviour and moral tone of ringers, and getting them accepted as church workers. It was about the promotion of change ringing,  which many of the reforming clerics learnt to ring while at university, and they saw change ringing as the means to improve the tone of ringers. They probably felt that if ringers learnt this more intellectual type of ringing, they would also adopt other middle class habits as well.

Change ringing had been established since around 1600, and change ringing peals had been rung in the early 1700s at towers within easy travelling distance of Wokingham, including St Mary & St Lawrence Reading, Windsor and Farnham. But Wokingham was stuck in the past ringing just Rounds .

In 1873, the new curate, Henry George Bird set up the Society of Honorary Change Ringers. Bird moved on after two years, and by 1880, when records of the Oxford Diocesan Guild  began, All Saints had only one member capable of ringing changes, whereas St Paul’s, which had only had bells since 1864, had ten change ringing members. Albert Hill was the lone change ringer, and he almost certainly learnt to ring before coming to Wokingham. He became Tower Foreman in 1880 and developed the band's capabilities.

20th century

Sam Paice succeeded Albert in 1896 and led the band until he died in 1920. Under Sam's leadership the bells were augmented to eight in 1903, and the band began ringing both quarter peals and peals. They still rang fairly basic methods by modern standards, but it was a vast improvement over what they had been ringing not many decades before.

Peal ringing and quarter peal ringing both declined during the inter-war years, with a bit of a boost in the late 1930s under the influence of Gilbert Thurlow, a very capable ringer who served here as curate, and later went on the become the President of the Central Council of Church Bell Ringers. 

After the war, the band was rebuilt, with many new ringers being trained (and many lost). The band was active, and introduced innovations like ringing outings, but ringing remained fairly basic, with no peals by the local band between 1935 and 1982.

The late 1970s saw an increased level of activity, which developed rapidly in the1980s, with more ringers, more quarter peals, more peals and more ambitious methods. The band entered striking competitions, and was virtually unbeatable during the mid 1980s. Since then, performance dropped back a little from what was achieved in the peak years, but on all fronts, the ringing was still more ambitious than it had been in earlier times. Landmark performances included the first peal of Wokingham Surprise Major  to mark the church's 800th anniversary in 1990.

This active band benefitted from many new ideas. In the few decades since 1980, six people have served as Foreman with ten changes of office, whereas during the previous century, from 1880 to 1979, only four people served as Foreman (apart from one who held the fort for a few months after Sam Paice died in 1920).

21st century

Ringing in the new century continues at a high level. The bell restoration in 2004  made the bells easier to ring, and enhanced their sound. The band became more heavily engaged with the local community through running tower tours, and giving talks to local groups. The 2009 upgrade to two ringing simulators enhances the band's training capability. Landmark performances included a local band ringing peals at both Wokingham churches on the same day  in May 2008.

Read the book

This short summary has only skimmed the surface of the history of ringing at All Saints. You can read the whole fascinating story in the book  that is now available.

The book uncovers this very special, but largely hidden, part of Wokingham life. It traces ringing in Wokingham since the oldest of the current bells were installed in 1704 – from an 18th century public sport, through Victorian reform, and two world wars, into the modern era. It enters the lives of successive generations of the men and women who made their mark on ringing in Wokingham and beyond.

The book has a lot more than ringing, including fear that the tower would collapse, death in the belfry, pigeon catchers among the bells, fraudulent impersonation of the ringers, a donation from the Queen, a house called ‘Ringwell’, a barrel organ, the mythical ‘Oswald’, the story of the restoration of the bells, and much more.

The book is a glossy A5 paperback, with 160 pages. It is illustrated with over 160 pictures and diagrams. It is available from the author or from All Saints Parish Office. For more details see here .

Historic artefacts

Several historic artefacts  from the tower still exist.