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Church of Our Lady Help of Christians Bourton-on-the-Water The Anglican church of Saint Laurence stands on the site of a Saxon Church, dedicated to the Blessed Virgin. In his ‘History of Bourton-on-the-Water’, Harry Clifford records that: “Before the reformation this aisle was a chantry, dedicated to ‘Our Blessed Lady’, where Mass was sung daily for the soul of the founder.” This aisle is known as the Clapton Aisle. Clifford goes on “After the Dissolution, Bourton Church must have presented a sorry sight “. Little then remained of the old Faith, but what there was, was held securely by some who were brave and resolute. The Victoria History of Gloucestershire reports that ‘In 1667 Bourton was clearly a known centre for papists, and figures for that year indicate that half the papists in Stow deanery were gathered there’. When Charles Trinder, attorney-at-law and later Recorder of Gloucestershire purchased the Manor House at Bourton in 1662, he established there, despite the great peril and severe penalties incurred, a Catholic centre with resident priests. This mission, which lasted for 75 years, was served by chaplains who were mainly Benedictine monks. Saint John Wall, the Franciscan Friar canonised as one of the Forty Martyrs, was almost certainly a visitor there as he was a close personal friend of Charles Trinder. He was hanged, drawn and quartered in 1679 simply for the offence of being a Catholic priest and remaining in England. On the upper floor of the large, rambling Manor House, during the nineteenth century, a secret room was discovered when a wall paper was being removed. It is believed that this had been used as a priest’s hiding place. It was apparently part of a suite of rooms, one of which was traditionally known as ‘The Chapel’. In 1927, before he married Mary Underwood of Preston (Priest’s town), Henry James Barnes was received into the Church by Father van den Biesen, who was then living in retirement at Stow and helping George de Serionne in the parish. The couple settled at Bourton. With three other practising Catholic families there, they all had to walk, cycle or beg a lift to Stow or Chipping Campden for Sunday Mass. They hoped that one day there would be a Catholic church at Bourton but in the meantime the children, on whom the future depended, must be taught the Faith.
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