Comerford Library opens at University of Virginia and honours the memory of leading lawyer James D Comerford

The Comerford Library opened last week at the Center for Politics in the University of Virginia, Charlottesville

Patrick Comerford

The Comerford Library opened last week at the Center for Politics in the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, and honours the memory of a leading lawyer James D (Jim) Comerford of Atlanta, Georgia, who died two years ago (21 April 2024) at the age of 64.

Jim Comerford was vice-chair of the Board of Advisors of the Center for Politics, actively engaging with the development of teaching resources for students at the University of Virginia and working tirelessly to strengthen its programmes and operations.

Because of his philanthropic support of the centre and its building expansion, the centre has named the Comerford Library in his honour and memory. He often described his support of the centre as ‘an act of patriotism,’ supporting it as a means of strengthening democracy and civic institutions.

Jim loved politics and the history of politics, and his recollection of campaign and political history was second to none. He donated his large collections of political and campaign memorabilia, including pamphlets, buttons, stickers and posters, to the centre’s archives.

Inside the Comerford Library at the Center for Politics in the University of Virginia

Jim was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on 6 June 1959, the only son of Neil Dexter Comerford Jr and Margaret (née Dower) Comerford (1920-2016), a former navy nurse. He was seven when his father died suddenly. Margaret soon moved them to Atlanta, where Jim grew up. She later married physician Dr Mark Lindsey, who considered Jim a son.

Jim attended Marist High School, Atlanta, where he was President of the Student Council and developed a lifelong Catholic faith. He then attended the University of Virginia. There he was a member of Kappa Sigma fraternity; a Student Council representative; and a guest pundit for student weekly The Declaration, where he predicted the 1980 Reagan landslide state-by-state.

He majored in history and government and graduated with the class of 1981. He counted Professor Boots Mead and Professor Irby Cauthen as his mentors and he remained a life-long friend of the political analyst Professor Larry Sabato.

After earning his law degree at the University of Georgia in 1984, Jim began a legal career with a small law firm in Marietta, Georgia, and went on to practice in some of the south-east’s leading firms, specialising in government affairs. Eventually he went out on his own, creating a group of successful investment partnerships and business ventures.

When we met, he was a practicing lawyer or attorney in Atlanta, Georgia, and a counsel with Hunton and Williams LLP, a law firm with offices in 19 cities across the US, including Atlanta, and in Europe and Asia.

Jim remained close to the University of Virginia throughout his life. He was an early supporter and long-serving board member of Professor Sabato’s nationally renowned Center for Politics. He was also a member of the Atlanta selection board for the Jefferson Scholars Foundation, the most prestigious scholarship at the University of Virginia.

Jim was also involved in the economic development of Sandy Springs, Georgia, and was engaged in the efforts leading to the incorporation of Sandy Springs as a city.

Jim loved being the father of three children and encouraging their successes at Blessed Trinity, Marist, Oglethorpe University, Mercer University Atlanta, Auburn University and Georgia Institute of Technology. He had a love of story-telling and had a passion for his family, his home state of Georgia and his Irish heritage.

On the battlements of Ballybur Castle, Co Kilkenny, with Jim and Camilla Comerford, Jimmy Comerford and Frank Gray

When Camilla and Jim Comerford visited Ireland with their son Jimmy 14 years ago (May 2012), I hosted them on a genealogical tour that brought them to Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin and the Comerford ancestral home at Ballybur Castle at Cuffesgrange, near Callan, Co Kilkenny.

They had been in London and Oxford the previous week. On a warm sunny, early summer afternoon in Dublin, after a thorough tour of the cathedral and the crypt, we sat for an hour or more outside the Bull and Castle on Christchurch Place and had lengthy conversations that ranged from Handel to Pugin, liturgy to architecture, and through politics and music to travel and politics.

We were guests the next day of the late Frank Gray, who bought Ballybur Castle from the Marnell family for £20,000 in 1979 and spent over three decades lovingly restoring the 16th century tower house, bringing it back to its Tudor glory.

In Cuffesgrange, I showed them the remains of a Comerford memorial from the early 17th century, rescued in the 19th century by Bishop Michael Comerford and placed in the corner wall of the parish church. Back in Kilkenny, we visited Kilkenny Castle, had lunch in the Kilkenny Design Centre, and met members of Camilla’s extended family.

Jim Comerford died on 21 April 2024 after a six-year battle with cancer. He is survived by his wife of 36 years, Camilla (Corrigan), their sons James ‘Jimmy’ Dower Comerford Jr and Joseph ‘Joey’ Corrigan Comerford of Atlanta, their daughter Margaret ‘Margeaux’ Eileen Comerford of Seattle, and their granddaughter Abigail Genevieve. His funeral Mass took place in the Cathedral of Christ the King, Atlanta, on 24 April 2024, and he was buried at Arlington Memorial Park.

Jim and Jimmy Comerford visiting the baptistery in Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, in 2012 (Photograph: Patick Comerford)

How Methodists and Baptists had a variety of chapels and churches in Leighton Buzzard

Three Methodist churches or chapels in Leighton Buzzard came together to form Trinity Methodist Church on North Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

I have been catching up in recent days on memories of visiting churches and chapels in Leighton Buzzard in recent months. Leighton Buzzard has a long tradition of ‘independent’ and ‘nonconformist’ churches and chapels, and once had a strong Quaker presence, which continues in the Quaker Meeting House in North Street. But the other ‘nonconformist’ traditions in the town on the borders of Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire include Methodists and Baptists, and there is interesting connection between these traditions.

Leighton Buzzard once had three Methodist churches or chapels, and so it seems theologically appropriate that when they came together the new church they built should be called Trinity Methodist Church.

The Bedford Circuit Book records the first society in the town in 1801 led by Samuel Copleston. His father had been the curate in Luton when John Wesley preached there.

Although Methodists in Leighton Buzzard first met in private homes, they grew rapidly and a chapel was built on Hockliffe Street in 1804, and was dedicated in 1805. At first, Leighton Buzzard was in the Bedford Circuit, but a separate Leighton Buzzard Circuit was formed in 1812.

The chapel on Hockliffe Street was said to be an unattractive building but it was extended twice. However, each time it quickly became insufficient for the needs congregation, and it was replaced by a much larger new chapel in 1865, and the old chapel was then bought by one the Baptist groups.

The former Wesleyan Church on Hockliffe Street, Leighton Buzzard was demolished in 1969

The new Methodist chapel was further along Hockliffe Street, it was capable of seating 1,500 people. This number was exceeded on special occasions, and there was a large Sunday School too. The basement was used for classrooms and a library, and two houses or manses were built on either side of the chapel for the ministers.

The Wesleyan and Primitive Methodists united in 1932 as the Methodist Church of Great Britain and in 1960 the Wesleyans at Hockliffe Street and the Atterbury Mission Hall gave up their premises and moved into the old Primitive Methodist chapel in North Street, which was renamed as Trinity Methodist Church.

The former Wesleyan church at Hockliffe Street was subsequently sold to the council and was finally demolished in 1969. All that remained was the former right-hand manse, at the entrance to the Hockliffe Street car park. A modern office building stands where the chapel used to be, and the left-hand manse disappeared to make way for the ring road.

Meanwhile, the Primitive Methodists made several attempts to consolidate their presence in the town with regular preaching from 1837 into the early 1840s. A local society was recorded later in the 1840s. A chapel was built in Mill Road in 1851 and a new Primitive Methodist circuit based on Leighton Buzzard was formed from Aylesbury Mission in 1862.

The original chapel was replaced in 1870 with a much larger one seating 400 people. This building was plagued with problems and eventually burnt down in 1889. This was a huge set-back for the ‘Prims’, but they secured land for a new chapel on North Street, and this was in 1890, on the site of the present Trinity Methodist Church.

This new chapel cost £2,340 to build and had seating for 500 people. A residence for the minister was also built, on the north side of the chapel. The chapel later had many changes, and was enlarged in 1967, when the adjoining residence was demolished to make room for the work.

There was also a Primitive Methodist Chapel in Linslade. The Primitive Methodist Jubilee Chapel was built in 1861 at the corner of Old Road and Station Road. During World War II, the chapel was converted to an engineering works. When it was demolished housing was built on the site.

In addition to the Wesleyan and Primitive Methodists, there was also an Atterbury Mission in Leighton Buzzard. This was at a small Methodist Mission House, built in 1885, at 83 Vandyke Road. The three Methodist congregations in the town – the Wesleyans, the Primitive Methodists and the Atterbury Mission – came together in 1960 to form the present Trinity Methodist Church.

Lake Street Baptist Chapel was built in an Italianate style in 1864, closed in 1972 and was demolished in 1983

The earliest references to Baptists in Leighton Buzzard are in returns by the Vicar of All Saints. ‘Anabaptists’ are mentioned in the returns for 1706, 1709, 1717 and 1720. Forty Anabaptists were recorded in 1706, with their own meeting house. An Anabaptist meeting was being once a fortnight In 1709 with about 40 people present. By 1717, about 15 families were meeting in the home of William Fenner, in 1720 they were meeting in two houses.

The General Baptist Church in Leighton Buzzard was founded at Lake Street by seven people ca 1772-1775. When the first pastor Joseph James arrived he reported that the ‘moral state of the town was deplorable, with bull-baiting and cock-fighting abounding’. A chapel and house were soon given to the church, and baptisms took place in the River Ouzel. By 1812 The Baptists had also opened a Sunday School by 1812.

A split divided the Baptists in Leighton Buzzard in 1832 when some members were dissatisfied with the pastor and with his open communion policy, left and formed the Strict Baptist Church. The original chapel was extended in 1834, and a new chapel was built on the site of the old one in Lake Street by 1864. This new chapel was built in an Italianate style, could swet 500 people and cost £900 to build.

As for the group that split from the original church, they moved into the former Wesleyan Methodist chapel in Hockliffe Street in 1865. The Baptist Church on Hockiliffe Street was rebuilt in 1892 at a cost of £4,000 and with seating for 670 people.

The Revd John Forrest Neilson became pastor of both Lake Street and Hockliffe Street Baptist church in 1961. The Lake Street Chapel closed in 1972 and the building was demolished in 1983. The site was later developed as a residential housing estate, named Chapel Mews.

Hockliffe Street Baptist Church in Leighton Buzzard (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Lecton House, beside Chapel Mews in Leighton Buzzard, is a Grade II building with many associations in the past with the town’s ‘nonconformist’ communities. It was built in 1845 as the Leighton Institute, a temperance hall. It has a Neoclassical stucco pedimented front with a tetrastyle Greek Ionic ‘pseudo portia’ and the date 1845 in Roman numerals, sash windows, panelled doors and a Welsh slate roof.

The building was financed by two local Quakers, John Dolin Bassett of Bassett’s Bank, and Hannah Grant. It served as an adult education centre and could accommodate 400 people.

The building was later transferred to a committee of 12 members of Lake Street Baptist Church, and by 1927, the Temperance Hall was owned by the trustees of Lake Street Baptist Chapel. Concerts were held there occasionally for the up-keep of the chapel, but as a Baptist building there were no whist drives or dances.

After World War II, the Temperance Hall on Lake Street was leased to the county authorities by the Baptist church trustees and in 1949 it became a branch library, with accommodation for the librarian. The library closed in 1979, when a new purpose-built library and arts centre opened on the opposite side of Lake Street. By 2009, the building was a gym or fitness centre known as Colloseum (sic). Today it is private housing.

Lecton House, beside Chapel Mews, was founded by Quakers and was later owned by the trustees of Lake Street Baptist Chapel (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

• The Revd Seung-Wook Jung, the minister in Trinity Methodist Church, is on sabbatical, and the Revd Patrick Kandeh is providing cover; Sunday services are at 10:30, Morning Worship; 4 pm, Messy Church; and 6 pm, Evening Worship. Hockiliffe Street Baptist Church is in the early stages of a process to appoint a new senior minister; Sunday services are at 10:30 and 5:30.

Sunday services in Trinity Methodist Church are at 10:30, 4 pm and 6 pm (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Two buildings side-by-side on Bird Street are part of the history of Lichfield’s libraries and museums

Lichfield Registration Office was built as the Free Library and Museum in 1856-1859 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

A good measure of a literary city and a cathedral city is whether it has a good library, a good museum and good bookshops.

Since my teens, I have valued the research and reading facilities at the library in Lichfield in its varied locations, first at the former Public Library and Art Gallery on Bird Street, later at the Friary, and more recently, since 2019, in the former Saint Mary’s Church, though with the sad and controversial loss of the Lichfield Record Office, established in 1959.

The original Library and Museum, bedside the Museum Gardens and Beacon Park on Bird Street in Lichfield, was built in 1857-1859 and designed in an Italianate style by the Wolverhampton architectural practice of Bidlake and Lovatt. It forms an interesting pair with the former Probate Court next door, and both face the Remembrance Garden on the other side of Bird Street and the causeway over Minster Pool.

Lichfield Cathedral has an important library that has been housed in the upper room of the Chapter House since 1758. But, until the mid-19th century, towns in England and Ireland did not have public libraries as we know them today.

Most libraries were attached to colleges or cathedrals or were in private stately homes. Commercial libraries were a response to the popularity of the rise of the novel in the 18th and 19th centuries, but libraries were still unknown to the working class, many of whom were uneducated and illiterate.

The Chartists, who demanded social and electoral reform and building land colonies, also set up reading rooms. By the mid-19th century, many clubs societies and institutes for working people provided lectures, libraries and book borrowing facilities, charging a nominal annual membership fee.

A Reading and Mutual Instruction Society was formed in Lichfield in 1850, and soon had over 100 members. That year, the Public Libraries Act was passed, allowing local councils to levy a halfpenny rate to fund local libraries and museums. One of the first of these was in Lichfield, where the Free Library and Museum opened in an elegant Italianate building on Bird Street in 1859.

The Reading and Mutual Instruction Society in Lichfield wound itself up and donated its books to the new library, giving everyone access to books. That year too saw the Museum Grounds open as a public park.

The architectural historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner describes the library as ‘small, of yellow brick and funny.’ The library was built in 1857-1859 and was designed by the architectural practice of George Bidlake and Henry Lovatt, based in Wolverhampton.

Robert Bridgeman’s lone sailor on the former Free Library and Museum faces the gardens (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The two-storey-over basement building was designed in the renaissance style with a right-angle plan with an inset octagonal entrance tower with a cupola. It is built in brick with buff brick façades, ashlar dressings, a parapeted roof, three-window and six-window ranges, blind arcading. The plinth has a square ashlar plaque inscribed: ‘Free Library and Museum’.

Other features include flanking roundels, lotus capitals, tympana with archivolts and keys, blind arcading, ashlar colonnettes, 20th century buttresses, and ashlar balustrading. Inside there is a geometrical stair with slender iron balusters and a wreathed handrail.

A stone statue of a lone sailor is a familiar site on the side of the building, with the name ‘HMS Powerful’ on his hat band. HMS Powerful was a Royal Navy cruiser launched in 1895, and it played an important role in delivering troops and guns for the relief of Ladysmith during the Boer War.

The lone sailor was originally intended for a Boer War memorial in York, but was later given to the City of Lichfield by Robert Bridgeman in 1901 and placed on the Free Library and Museum, Bird Street, now the Registry Office.

The architects Lovatt and Bidlake designed an impressive list of works, from railway buildings, docks and reservoirs, to churches, hotels and theatres, and landmark buildings in London. The include the Carlton Hotel, Nos 16 and 17 St James’s Place, later the Stafford Hotel, and His Majesty’s Theatre in the Haymarket, the New Gaiety Theatre in the Strand, and the King’s Theatre, Hammersmith, as well as the New Theatre Royal in Birmingham, Bilston Town Hall and the Congregational Church Sedgley. The firm also built the American Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in Paris for GE Street.

Henry Lovatt (1831-1913) was born in Wolverhampton and trained as an architect. He formed a partnership with another local architect, George Bidlake, in Darlington Street in 1853. Then in 1858 he bought the small firm of builders and contractors, John Ellis, also in Darlington Street, and turned it into an important firm in the Victorian building industry.

Lovatt lived a full and varied life. On his estate at Low Hill in Wolverhampton, he bred pedigree shorthorn cattle and sheep, grew equally celebrated orchids and collected art, including a collection of watercolours that he sold at Christie’s in 1907 when he retired and left Low Hill.

Lovatt’s partner George Bidlake (1830-1892) was a Wolverhampton architect who lived at No 54 Waterloo Road, next to the Subscription Library. His offices were in Darlington Street until his partnership with Lovatt in 1853.

Bidlake also designed Queen Street Congregational Chapel (demolished), Saint Jude’s Church (1867-1869), Tettenhall Road, Saint Mary’s Church, Coseley, Tettenhall Towers, now part of Tettenhall College, Trinity Methodist Church, Compton Road (demolished), the workhouse at Trysull, and the Congregational Chapel, Stone.

Bidlake wrote on architectural matters and in 1865 published Sketches of Churches Designed for the Use of Nonconformists. He later moved to Leamington.

His son, William Henry Bidlake (1861-1938), was the leading Birmingham architect in the Arts and Crafts movement and was the Director of the School of Architecture at Birmingham School of Art in 1919-1924. He had been a pupil of George Frederick Bodley (1827-1907), a leading Gothic Revival architect, and was known in his own time as ‘the man who rebuilt Birmingham’.

The museum moved in 1958 into the former probate court to the north of the library building. The museum closed in 1970 and the collections went into storage. The library moved out of its original building to the Friary in 1989-1990. The building was listed Grade II in 1993 and in 2003 became the Lichfield Registry Office, now the Lichfield Registration Office. The location beside Beacon Park and the views of Lichfield Cathedral from the Remembrance Gardens and Minister Pool provide romantic backdrops for wedding photographs.

The former Probate Court stands on the site of the childhood home of David Garrick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The former Probate Court next door is also a Grade II listed building. It stands on the site of the house where the actor David Garrick (1716-1779) spent his early life. Hs mother, Arabella Clough, was the daughter of a Vicar Choral of Lichfield Cathedral, Anthony Clough, and he was educated at Lichfield Grammar School before becoming one of the first and last students at the school Samuel Johnson set up in Edial.

Garrick’s early family home was demolished in 1856, and the former probate court was built in 1856-1858. It is a single-storey building with a basement. An interesting feature is the elliptical-headed entrance has moulded arch and hood, the recessed six-panel door and the frieze above inscribed ‘Probate Court.’

In many dioceses, each archdeaconry had its own probate court. In Lichfield, this did not happen and the Consistory Court was the main court for the whole diocese. Until 1858, wills were generally proved in the diocesan courts, so the building in Lichfield is a rare example of a purpose-built probate court.

A plaque on the former Probate Court recalls the actor David Garrick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Etz Hayyim Synagogue in Chania launches campaign to saveCrete’s Jewish library

Etz Hayyim Synagogue stands in a small alley off Kondhilaki Streer in Evraiki or the former Jewish quarter in the old town of Chania (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

Etz Hayyim, meaning ‘Tree of Life’ (עץ חיים) is a popular name for synagogues. I was writing last week about the reopening of the Etz Hayyim synagogue in Larissa; it is the name of the oldest synagogue in Athens and, closer to home, the name of the synagogue in Milton Keynes. And it is also the home of one of my favourite synagogues, the Etz Hayyim (Ετζ Χαγίμ) Synagogue in Chania.

The phrase is used for the Tree of Life in the Garden of Eden (see Genesis 2: 9). It also found throughout the Book of Proverbs, where it refers figuratively to Wisdom (Proverbs 3: 18) and is associated with ‘the fruit of a righteous man’ (Proverbs 11: 30), ‘a desire fulfilled’ (Proverbs 13: 12) and a ‘healing tongue’ (Proverbs 15: 4).

The plural form Atzei Chaim (עצי חיים) is also used for the wooden poles to which the parchment of a Sefer Torah is attached. In Kabbalah, Etz Ḥayim is the name of a work by Rabbi Ḥayim Vital after the death of Isaac Luria in 1572 and the foundational work for later Lurianic Kabbalah.

The courtyard of the Etz Hayyim Synagogue in Chania … there have been Jews in Crete for over 2,300 years (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Etz Hayyim Synagogue in Chania is vital link in Crete’s 2,300-year-old Jewish heritage, and it urgently needs help to buy the neighbouring building on 24 Parodos Kondylaki Street. The building is rented but is integral part of Etz Hayyim as the home to the library, archives, and essential facilities. But now it is at risk of being lost to commercial development.

The synagogue must raise €300,000 by the end of this summer to secure this vital space and protect it for generations to come as part of the historical identity of Etz Hayyim and to protect the synagogue’s cultural and spiritual significance.

Etz Hayyim Synagogue, in the heart of Chania’s historic Jewish quarter, is the last remaining trace of Jewish life on Crete. This space is more than a synagogue – it is a centre for cultural exchange, reconciliation and education. It welcomes over 30,000 visitors annually, offering a unique window into a rich history of resilience and survival.

The building housing the library has been an integral part of Jewish life in Chania for over 15 years. The property is rented and houses the library, archives and the Evlagon Research Centre, as well as an apartment the caretaker and his family.

The building was owned by the Jewish community until 1945. Now it is at risk of being sold and being used for commercial tourism that would pose threats the historical significance and security of the synagogue. Chania is undergoing rapid gentrification, and many properties being transformed into tourist accommodations, eroding the city’s rich cultural fabric.

Losing this building would mean losing the secure location of the library, its archives and the repository of Jewish history in Crete.

The revival of the Etz Hayyim Synagogue in Chania is due to the vision and hard work of Nicholas Stavroulakis (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The name of the Evlagon Institute for Cretan Jewish Studies honours the memory of Avraham Evlagon (1846-1933), the last Chief Rabbi of Crete. The library originated in the personal collection of the founding director, Nikos Stavroulakis. It also houses 250 CDs of Romaniote and Sephardi liturgical and secular music.

A significant portion of the collection was lost or damaged in arson attacks in 2010, when the synagogue’s archive were also destroyed, including documentation of its renovation in the 1990s.

The holdings on Jewish history in Crete continue to expand. In collaboration with the University of Crete’s library in Rethymnon, the collection is being integrated into the university’s online library catalogue, improving access for scholars and researchers worldwide.

Etz Hayyim’s archive is also a resource for people of Romaniote and Sephardi descent tracing their family histories in Chania and Crete.

The library is an integral part of Etz Hayyim and houses books, archives,and essential facilities (Photograph: Etz Hayyim

Anja Zuckmantel has been the Executive Director of the Etz Hayyim Synagogue in Chania since 2014. She worked with Nikos Stavroulakis for over 10 years in putting in place his vision for Etz Hayyim as an inclusive and inspiring place, ‘a true synagogue’.

Nikos died at 85 on 19 May 2017. Since then the team of staff members and volunteers at Etz Hayyim have been working at maintaining the unique character of Etz Hayyim, expanding its outreach, especially in education, research and a variety of initiatives, preserving the memory of the Jewish community of Crete. At the heart of these efforts is the library, built largely on Nikos’s private collection of books and papers and also including the research library.

However, in an email this week, Anja Zuckmantel has reached out to the friends of Etz Hayyim with an urgent request, saying Etz Hayyim is facing a serious challenge.

She points out that the building is a space that safeguards the memory and history of the once-thriving Jewish community of Crete. But it is now up for sale, and unless the synagogue finds the resources to buy it, ‘the space risks being lost to commercial development and overtourism in Hania. At the same time, the synagogue would lose an important pilar in the security arrangements for Etz Hayyim.’

The Aron Hakodesh or Ark in the Etz Hayyim Synagogue (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Etz Hayyim must raise €300,000 by the end of this summer to secure this vital building and preserve its contents for generations to come. ‘Every contribution counts, and even the smallest donation brings us closer to safeguarding this irreplaceable part of our community’s life,’ she says.

A fundraising campaign has started and the urgency of the campaign is further detailed on the crowdfunding page here.

This is not just about a building. It is about protecting the stories, research, and memory of a community almost entirely destroyed during the Holocaust, when the Jews of Crete were deported by the Nazis on the ship Tanais. Tragically, the ship was sunk by a British torpedo – unaware of its human cargo – and the entire community perished.

By the 1950s, Etz Hayyim stood abandoned and in disrepair. But decades later, with the help of the Central Board of Jewish Communities in Greece and international supporters, the synagogue was restored and reopened – transforming it into a living monument, a place of worship, and a centre for interfaith dialogue and cultural preservation.

Today, Etz Hayyim welcomes thousands of visitors each year – Jewish and non-Jewish alike – from around the world.

Etz Hayyim commemorated the Cretan Jewish community in Crete last year (2024) with a series of cultural events. A documentary film, The Tanais, by Vicky Arvelaki recently premiered at the Thessaloniki International Film Festival, renewing public awareness of this tragic history. You can watch the trailer here.

The fundraising campaign is administered by Etz Hayyim, a legally registered charitable organisation. In her email, Anja Zuckmantel promises ‘all donations contribute to the purpose of the fundraising campaign. We post regular updates on the status of the campaign on our Social Media channels.’

The bimah or prayer platform in the Etz Hayyim Synagogue (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The campaign to ‘Save Our Library, Safeguard Our Future’ can be supported by

• Donating here: https://whydonate.com/en/fundraising/etz-hayyim-hania

• Sharing the campaign with family, friends and networks

• Following the campaign on social media

• Subscribing to the monthly newsletter on Substack

All these links are in available in one place.

Shabbat Shalom, שבת שלום

A will in the Bodleian in Oxford links Comberford Hall with the Battle of Bosworth Field and Stanley family intrigues

Comberford Hall, east of Lichfield and north of Tamworth … William Stanley was living at Comberford when he made his will in 1552 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

I have been in Oxford three times in the space of six or seven weeks for medical tests, surgical procedures and hospital visits, with one overnight stay, and time too for walks by the river, Choral Evensong in Pusey House and browsing in the bookshops.

During some of those visits, I began thinking about the potential for resources in the Bodleian Archives and Manuscripts that might be important sources for my continuing research in genealogy and family history when I came across the will of William Stanley (1474-1552) of Comberford, Staffordshire, made in 1552.

William Stanley’s kinship with King Henry VII, although there was a 20-year age gap, is analagous to that of a third cousin: his father, Sir Humphrey Stanley of Pipe, near Lichfield, was a second cousin of Thomas Stanley, 1st Earl of Derby, who married the king’s mother, Lady Margaret Beaufort. William Stanley’s will is held the Bodleian Libraries as part of the Weld Family Papers, including deeds relating to the manors in Staffordshire held by the Stanley, Heveningham, Simeon, Weld and Eyre families, dating from 1293 to 1809.

This collection of papers in Oxford includes deeds, family papers, court rolls, list of charges and even an indulgence granted to Sir John Stanley by Michael Laskeis (?Laskaris), in return for a florin given to Laskeis to help him liberate his family at Constantinople in 1468. Among the wills in this collection in the Bodleian are two wills of Dame Ellen Stanley, widow of Sir Humphrey Stanley of Pipe, near Lichfield, dated 1516 and 1518, and the will of her son William Stanley of Comberford, between Lichfield and Tamworth, made in 1552.

The Bodleian Library, Oxford … a collection includes the wills of Dame Ellen Stanley, widow of Sir Humphrey Stanley of Pipe, near Lichfield, and her son William Stanley of Comberford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

I wondered why William Stanley was living at Comberford Hall, and how he was related to one of the most powerful political families in Staffordshire, who were among the kingmakers during the wars of succession now known as the ‘Wars of the Roses’.

The Stanley family rose to political prominence first in Lancashire and Cheshire through Sir John Stanley (I) (ca 1350-1414), a younger son of Sir William de Stanley of Stourton.

John Stanley married Isabel Lathom, despite the opposition of John of Gaunt, and as heiress she brought him great wealth. He was Lord Lieutenant of Ireland on three occasions (1386-1388, 1399-1401, 1413-1414), and was granted the Lordship of Mann or the Isle of Man by Henry IV in 1406, becoming titular King of Mann. He died on 6 June 1414 at Ardee, Co Louth, and was brought back to England and buried in Burscough Priory, Lancashire.

John Stanley and Isabel Lathom were the parents of both Sir John Stanley II (1386-1437), ancestor of the Earls of Derby, and Thomas Stanley (1392-1463), ancestor of the Stanleys of Elford and of William Stanley of Comberford Hall.

The Stanley coat-of-arms (left) in a stained glass window in the Chapter House, Lichfield Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The eldest son, Sir John Stanley II (1386-1437), was also titular King of Mann. He died on 27 November 1437 in Anglesey, Wales, and was buried in Saint Oswald Churchyard, Winwick, Cheshire. He married Elizabeth Harrington and they were the parents of three sons and two daughters, including: Thomas Stanley (ca 1405-1459), 1st Baron Stanley; Richard Stanley, Archdeacon of Chester (1425–1433); and Edward Stanley, Archdeacon of Chester (1454-1462) – at the time, Chester was part of the Diocese of Lichfield or Coventry and Lichfield.

The eldest son of Sir John Stanley II, Sir Thomas Stanley (1405-1459), was the titular King of Mann, 1st Baron Stanley (1456) and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (1431-1436). He died at Knowsley, Lancashire, on 20 February 1459 . John Stanley and Joan Goushill were the parents of three daughters and four sons, including: Thomas Stanley (1435-1504), 1st Earl of Derby; and James Stanley (1478-1485), who was also Archdeacon of Chester when it was still part of the Diocese of Lichfield.

The eldest surviving son, Thomas Stanley (1435-1504), was the 1st Earl of Derby and became the stepfather of King Henry VII. He was the last of the Stanleys to style himself King of Mann. His first wife, Lady Eleanor Neville, was a daughter of Richard Neville, 5th Earl of Salisbury, a descendant of Edward III and a sister of Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick (‘Warwick the Kingmaker’), creating a powerful alliance with the House of York. In 1472, when the House of York was back on the throne, he married his second wife, the widowed Lady Margaret Beaufort (1443-1509), whose son, Henry Tudor, later became Henry VII.

Lady Margaret Beaufort married Thomas Stanley in 1472 and founded Christ’s College and Saint John’s College, Cambridge … her coat of arms at the gatehouse of Christ’s College (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

After the death of her second husband Sir Henry Stafford, Lady Margaret Beaufort married Thomas Stanley in 1472. She founded both Christ’s College and Saint John’s College in Cambridge, and gives her name to Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. She was a daughter of John Beaufort, 1st Duke of Somerset, and had previously married Edmund Tudor (1430-1456), 1st Earl of Richmond and half-brother of Henry VI, and then Sir Henry Stafford (1433-1471), son of the Duke of Buckingham.

Haselour Hall, one of the homes of the Stanley family in Staffordshire, became one of her homes too, and the house played a role in the War of the Roses. The house is within the boundaries of Lichfield District Council, 4.6 km from Comberford and from Comberford Hall, 12 km east of Lichfield and 8.3 km north of Tamworth. Haselour Hall is the house where Thomas Stanley’s son, the future Henry VII, is said to have spent the night before his decisive victory at the Battle of Bosworth Field.

Henry Tudor, then Earl of Richmond, is said to have spent a night at Haselour Hall, after slipping away from his march from Lichfield to the Battle of Bosworth Field with a small band of his guards before his decisive victory in 1485. While he was visiting his mother, Henry entreated Stanley, his step-father, to join him in battle against Richard III. Stanley, however, refused to choose sides, opting instead to remain neutral for a while longer before making clear his allegiance. This neutrality was so important to the Stanleys, that when Richard kidnapped one of Stanley’s sons to force him to join his ranks, Stanley replied laconically: ‘I have other sons.’

The Battle of Bosworth Field was the last significant battle in the War of the Roses. On the day of the battle, it is said that Stanley watched it unfold from afar, and when Henry defeated Richard III, Stanley rode down the hill from which he was watching, took the defeated king’s crown from his head and used it to crown Henry VII, only then pledging his allegiance to the new king. It was a decisive intervention that brought an end to the War of Roses and put the first of the Tudors on the throne of England.

Thomas Stanley died on 29 July 1504, and was buried in the family chapel in Burscough Priory. His descendants included the subsequent Earls of Derby. When Lady Margaret died on 29 June 1509, she was buried in Henry VII’s Chapel in Westminster Abbey.

Haselour Hall, one of the homes of the Stanley family in Staffordshire, played a role in the War of the Roses

Meanwhile, the second surviving son of Sir John Stanley who died in 1414 was Thomas Stanley (1392-1463) of Elford. He was Sheriff of Worcestershire, Leicestershire and Staffordshire, and MP for Staffordshire, and he was the ancestor of the Elford branch of the Stanley family, which continued until 1508.

Thomas Stanley acquired the Elford estates through his marriage to Matilda Arderne (1396-1423) of Elford. The most famous member of her family was Sir Thomas Arderne, who fought with the Black Prince at Crecy and Poitiers. Matilda and Thomas Stanley were the parents of a daughter and two sons: Anne Gresley, Sir John Stanley and George Stanley.

The younger son, George Stanley (ca 1440-1509) of Hammerwich, near Lichfield, High Sheriff of Staffordshire (1473), has been identified recently with the Stanley effigy in the South Choir Aisle in Lichfield Cathedral, despite its Victorian inscription.

Elford Hall, home of the Stanley family and their descendants, was demolished in 1964 (Photograph © Lost Heritage/Staffordshire Past Track)

The elder son, Sir John Stanley (1423-1474) of Elford, was married three times. He was first married in 1428 at the age of five and with a special church dispensation to Cecile de Arderne of Harden, and eventually the were the parents of a son, Sir John Stanley (1447-1508).

His second wife was Isabel Vernon (1427-1471), daughter of Sir Richard Vernon of Haddon, Speaker of the House of Commons, and they were the parents of three daughters and a son, Sir Humphrey Stanley (1452-1505) of Pipe. His third wife was Dulcia Leigh, and they were parents of a further son, Roger Stanley. When this Sir Thomas Stanley died in 1474, he was buried in Saint Peter’s Church, Elford, and his eldest son, also Sir John Stanley, succeeded to the Elford estates.

This eldest son, John Stanley (1447-1508) of Elford, is said to have joined his first cousin’s son Thomas Stanley (Lord Stanley) and Henry Tudor, the future Henry VII, at Haselour Hall on 21 August 1484 ahead of the Battle of Bosworth Field. Lord Stanley’s decisive intervention in the Battle of Bosworth the next day brought the first of the Tudor monarchs to the throne.

Local legend says John Stanley was the father of John Stanley, the last male heir of the Elford Stanleys, who was fatally injured ca 1460 by a tennis ball that severed his jugular vein. He is depicted in a monument in Saint Peter’s Church, Elford, that was completely restored in the Victorian period. The ‘Stanley boy’ has short hair and a simple robe, his left hand holds a round object, and his right touches the side of the face, while a Latin inscription on the plinth reads Ubi dolor ibi digitus (‘Where the pain is, there is the finger’).

The legend is retold by many local historians, including Sampson Erdeswicke (1603), William Wyrley and Thomas Pennant (1781). However, Sophie Oosterwijk has examined all the historical evidence and concludes the effigy is a post-mediaeval forgery and the unusual hand gestures may have been introduced by a 17th or 18th century forger to illustrate the legend even more convincingly.

Putting legends aside, John Stanley was the father of three daughters who eventually became co-heiresses to the Elford estates: Maud married Sir John Ferrers (1438-1484) of Tamworth Castle; Anne married Christopher Savage of Worcestershire; and Margery married William Staunton. Elford passed through the female line to William Staunton then to Richard Huddlestone, then to William Smythe and finally to Sir John Bowes.

This line of descent then continued in the Bowes, Howard and Paget families until the end of the 1930s. Henry Bowes Howard (1687-1757), 11th Earl of Suffolk and 4th Earl of Berkshire, built a new hall on the site of the old Elford Hall, ca 1720-1730. Elford Hall was finally demolished in 1964.

Pipe Hall near Lichfield … once home of the branch of the Stanley family that included William Stanley of Comberford Hall (Photograph © Pipe Green Trust)

Sir John Stanley (1423-1474) of Elford and his second wife Isabel Vernon (1427-1471) were also the parents of Sir Humphrey Stanley (ca 1452-1504), of Pipe Hall near Lichfield.

Sir Humphrey Stanley of Pipe Hall married Dame Ellen Lee, daughter of Sir James Lee of Stone, and they were the parents of four sons, John, William, Humphrey and George, and two daughters, Maud (Wolverston) and Alice (Swinnerton).

Sir Humphrey Stanley died on 12 March 1504 and was buried in Westminster Abbey. But antiquarians in the 18th century mistakenly identified him with the Stanley effigy in the south choir aisle in Lichfield Cathedral. His widow, as Dame Ellen Stanley, widow of made two wills, dated 1516 and 1518, that are in the collection of papers in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, that includes the will of her son William Stanley (1474-1552), who lived at Comberford Hall.

Their eldest son, Sir John Stanley of the Pipe Hall near Lichfield, married Margaret Gerard, daughter of Sir Thomas Gerard, and they were the parents of two daughter and co-heiresses: Isabel, who married Walter Moyle of Kent, and was the mother of an only daughter Mary, who married Erasmus Heveningham; and Elizabeth, who married Sir John Hercy of Grove, Nottinghamshire.

The Stanley effigy in the south choir aisle in Lichfield Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

A brass plate in the niche above the Stanley effigy in the South Choir Aisle in Lichfield Cathedral has long identified it as the tomb of John Stanley, son of Sir Humphrey Stanley of Pipe. But this appears to be a Victorian addition and so is not conclusive evidence of the effigy’s subject.

William Stanley (1474-1552), who lived at Comberford Hall, was the second son of Sir Humphrey Stanley of Pipe Hall and Dame Ellen Lee. He was born in Morpeth, Northumberland, in 1474, and he married the much younger Margaret Comberford (1494-1568), daughter of Thomas Comberford of Comberford and Dorothy FitzHerbert. She was a sister of Humphrey Comberford, of Comberford Hall and Master of the Guild of Saint Mary and Saint John the Baptist in 1530; Richard Comberford, putative ancestor of the Comerfords of Kilkenny and Wexford; Henry Comberford, Precentor of Lichfield Cathedral; and John Comberford of Wednesbury.

How did William Stanley come to live at Comberford Hall in the 1550s? He was then in his mid-70s and I can only speculate that this is because his eldest brother-in-law was living at on the Northamptonshire estates at Watford, Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger inherited from the Parles family; the next brother, Canon Henry Comberford, was heavily involved in Church life; Richard may have died by then; and John was living on the family’s estates in Wednesbury.

William Stanley and Margaret Comberford had probably married late in life, when he was in his late 50s and she was in her 30s. They were the parents of an only daughter Dorothy.

Dorothy Stanley (1530-1587), who married her cousin Christopher Heveningham (1540-1574), daughter of Mary Moyle and Erasmus Heveningham. Dorothy and Christopher were the parents of Dorothy Heveningham and Sir Walter Heveningham, of Aston and Pipe, and the descendants of these lines of the Stanley and Comberford families continued to live in the Lichfield area for many generations.

But this is a story that involves continuous litigation, lost fortunes, and economic decline. And that is, indeed, a story for another day.

As an aside that brings me back to those recent visits to Oxford, the crest in the Stanley coat of arms gave rise to the popularity of the Eagle and Child as the name for public houses in England, often in former manors once held by the Stanley family. They include the Eagle and Child on St Giles in Oxford, currently undergoing extensive refurbishment. It is known for its literary associations and is affectionately dubbed ‘the Bird and Baby’.

The Eagle and Child on St Giles in Oxford, currently undergoing extensive refurbishment (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Edward Swinfen Harris in Stony Stratford and further afield

Patrick Comerford

Swinfen Harris in Stony Stratford and further afield,

an illustrated presentation,

7 pm, Tuesday 25 February 2025,

Stony Stratford Library

The Friends of Stony Stratford Library (FOSSL)

Personal Introduction:

Good evening, thank you for your introduction and your welcome here this evening.

I have been living in Stony Stratford for the past three years, and my wife Charlotte is from Galley Hill.

As Richard [Deveson] has said, I am an Anglican priest, before moving here I spent five years in parish ministry as a country vicar in the west of Ireland. Before that, I spent 15 years in academic theology, where my specialist areas were liturgy and church history – these came together in my interests in sacred space, how we use church buildings and church architecture in the public worship of the church, and how ecclesiastical architecture has been part of local and church history over the centuries.

Before that, I spent 30 years working as a journalist.

But my interests have also been shaped by family background too: my grandfather and my great-grandfather worked as architects and stuccodores in the Gothic Revival and the Arts and Crafts movement, two movements in architecture that strongly influenced Edward Swinfen Harris.

Repton House, Wolverton Road … part of the architectural legacy of Edward Swinfen Harris in Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Introducing Swinfen Harris

The two major architectural influences in Stony Stratford before the development of Milton Keynes are the two fires in the 18th century, and the extensive works in the late 19th and early 20th century of Edward Swinfen Harris (1841-1924), the Stony Stratford-born architect who died 100 years ago last year, on 30 May 2024.

Stony Stratford suffered two great fires. The sundial on the house at No 40 Church Street bears a Latin inscription from 1739 that translates, ‘Time and Fire Destroy All Things.’ The bigger fire in 1742 destroyed 146 buildings, and even crossed the River Great Ouse, burning houses in Old Stratford. The fires destroyed most of the town’s mediaeval buildings. But the coaching era also ushered in a new prosperity that enabled much of the building work now standing on High Street today.

The other great influence on the architectural legacy of Stony Stratford was the locally-born architect Edward Swinfen Harris, whose works, mainly in the Arts and Crafts style, can be seen throughout the town. He died in 1924. His works in Stony Stratford and the neighbouring towns in Buckinghamshire and Northamptonshire include vicarages, houses, schools, church alterations and additions, church halls, almshouses, lynch gates and the memorial cross in the London Road cemetery. He seems to have been particularly adept at receiving commissions from local GPs, and his work can be seen in Stony Stratford and neighbouring towns and villages, including Bletchley, Buckingham, Calverton, Great Linford, Maids Morton, Newport Pagnell, Roade and Wolverton.

His architectural legacy in North Buckinghamshire and Northamptonshire, particularly in his home town of Stony Stratford, is immense and might have been celebrated with more panache last year, the centenary of his death.

Biographical summary:

Edward Swinfen Harris was born on 30 July 1841 at 36 High Street, Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Swinfen Harris was a distinguished architect with a national reputation. The architectural historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner, best known for his monumental 46-volume series of county-by-county guides, describes him as ‘the only outstanding local architect working in’ north Buckinghamshire.

Swinfen Harris worked in London as well as Stony Stratford, and many of the fine houses he designed in North Buckinghamshire are still standing today, with surviving buildings also in Dorset and Northamptonshire.

He was born on 30 July 1841 at 36 High Street, Stony Stratford. His father was the clerk to the town magistrates, the Board of Guardians and other bodies, and Edward was the eldest son. The family later moved to Back Lane. He began his formal education when he was 11 at the Belvedere Academy at Old Stratford, and then went to Ullesthorpe House School in Leicestershire as a boarder.

He was apprenticed to the book trade around 1858, and was then articled to an architect in London. On completing his apprenticeship, he shared an office in London with two friends, but he returned to Stony Stratford in 1868 to make additions to the vicarage of Wolverton Saint Mary on London Road, Stony Stratford, and also to Calverton Limes.

Swinfen Harris returned to Stony Stratford in 1868 to make additions to the vicarage of Wolverton Saint Mary on London Road (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Wolverton Saint Mary Vicarage, London Road:

The Church of Saint Mary the Virgin on London Road was designed in 1863-1865 in the Gothic style by Sir George Gilbert Scott and at the time was in Wolverton Parish.

When Swinfen Harris completed his architectural apprenticeship, he shared an office in London with two friends, but then returned to Stony Stratford in 1868 to make additions to the vicarage of Wolverton Saint Mary on London Road, Stony Stratford, and also to Calverton Limes.

After his marriage in 1870, Edward Swinfen Harris lived at 15 Wolverton Road, Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

After his marriage in 1870, Swinfen Harris and his wife Emily Harriet settled in Stony Stratford at a new house at 15 Wolverton Road. In this period, he designed the house at 19 Wolverton Road for Dr McGuire.

In the following years, Swinfen Harris was involved in ecclesiastical architecture, restoring many churches. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects (FRIBA) and travelled extensively in Europe to study architecture.

In his professional life, he was the county surveyor of North Buckinghamshire. After the Education Act was passed, he built a number of local schools.

Calverton Limes, London Road:

Calverton Limes on London Road, Stony Stratford, was designed by Edward Swinfen Harris (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Calverton Limes is one of the many major houses in Stony Stratford he designed. Until recently, this landmark building at 18 and 20 London Road was known to many as the Working Men’s Social Club, but it also has interesting links with the Trevelyan family, who lived for a time in the house.

The story of the Trevelyan family has links with the Irish Famine, colonialism in India, and social and educational reforms in Stony Stratford and Wolverton.

Calverton Limes is dated 1870, and was designed in an ornate and mannered Victorian ‘vernacular’ style. It was built in two and three storeys in three irregular blocks, faced in cobbled, herringbone and upright-laid limestones divided by rubble lacing courses.

Calverton Limes and the Trevelyan family offer interesting links between church life in Stony Stratford and global changes over the last two centuries (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The brick dressings and quoins are offset by a low plinth, there are scallop tiles laid in horizontal colour bands, and a crested ridge, with a ridged chimney on No 18.

The left-hand block, No 20, has a gable end to the street. The architectural features include a bargeboard, a bay window with sash windows.

The recessed central block has raised top-lighting. There are two high windows with terracotta shafts and slightly pointed heads. The ground floor projects with a lean-to roof. The central ornamental entrance has a pointed arch, roof shafts, buttresses and raised gable, and there are panelled double doors.

No 18, the right hand block, breaks forward again. This part of the building is of two storeys, with two attic windows with pointed relieving arches.

There are light sashes on the first floor, with a brick mullion on the left. The ground floor has a five-light rectangular bay to the right. There are three light sashes in the attic with half-timbered gables.

The return on the north-west side has much decorative brick work and a half-timbered gable with a moulded wood bargeboard.

The Revd William Pitt Trevelyan (1812-1905) lived for a time at Calverton Limes (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Calverton Limes was built for William Cole Daniell, a local surgeon. Later, the Revd William Pitt Trevelyan (1812-1905) lived there. Subsequently, it became the home of Colonel LC Hawkins, a local magistrate. In more recent decades, this was the Working Men’s Club. It has since been converted into separate dwelling houses.

For many years it was the home of the Revd William Pitt Trevelyan, who was the Vicar of Wolverton (1856-1872) and of Calverton (1859-1881), both in Buckinghamshire and in the Diocese of Oxford.

When Trevelyan came to Calverton, it covered the west side of Stony Stratford and was known as one of the first Tractarian parishes in this part of Buckinghamshire. Many of the Tracts for the Times were planned in the old vicarage, where the regular visitors included Cardinal Henry Manning; both Newman and Pusey preached from the pulpit and Pusey celebrated at the altar in All Saints’ Church.

The neighbouring Parish of Wolverton covered much of the east and south sides of Stony Stratford, and in 1868 the parish established Saint Mary the Virgin on London Road as a daughter church. The church was designed by the architect Sir George Gilbert Scott, and a vicarage, two curate’s houses, now known as Jesuan House, and a Parish Hall were built also.

Saint Mary’s became a parish in its own right, and its priests were supporters of the Tractarian and Anglo-Catholic movements in the Church of England. Some of the priests were persecuted for what were regarded as ‘ritual offences’ and one was deprived of his living for these practices.

In Stony Stratford, Trevelyan began to develop the lower end of London Road, part of the new parish of Wolverton Saint Mary, and contributed to building Saint Mary’s Church and the church schools. With Lady Mary Russell and the Radcliffe Trust, he was one of the principal benefactors in building Saint Mary’s Church on London Road in 1864.

Trevelyan was instrumental, alongside John Worley and others, in inaugurating the Stony Stratford Dispensary and the Cottage Hospital, although the cottage hospital later closed and was replaced by a hospital fund.

Calverton Limes was built in 1870 and designed by Swinfen Harris (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

William Pitt Trevelyan’s third son, the Revd George Philipp Trevelyan (1858-1937), was born in Wolverton. He was also Vicar of Wolverton Saint Mary’s in Stony Stratford from 1885. Later, he was Vicar of Saint Alban’s, Hindhead, in Surrey, and Saint Stephen’s, an Anglo-Catholic parish in the centre of Bournemouth (1911-1928).

His son, Humphrey Trevelyan (1905-1985), Baron Trevelyan, was a leading colonial administrator, diplomat and writer. He was ambassador in Beijing after the Revolution, Egypt during the Suez crisis, Iraq during the attempt to annex Kuwait in 1961, and the Soviet Union, and the last high commissioner of Aden.

Saint Mary’s School (the Old School House), Wolverton Road, Stony Stratford:

Saint Mary’s School, now the Old School House, remains one of the most visible designs by Edward Swinfen Harris in Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The schools designed by Swinfen Harris include Saint Mary’s School, on the corner of Wolverton Road and London Road. The Radcliffe Trust donated the site to build Wolverton End School and School House in 1867, and the church school for the poor, designed by Swinfen Harris, was built in 1871-1873. The school was financed by Mrs Russell of Beachampton, and over 280 pupils attended in the early 1890s.

Swinfen Harris designed both the school and the School House (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The school became the Plough Inn in 1937, and in recent years was refurbished and renamed The Old School House. It remains one of the most visible of Swinfen Harris’s designs in Stony Stratford.

London Road Cemetery (Galley Hill Cemetery):

Swinfen Harris designed the London Road Cemetery, including the lychgate (above) and the ecclesiastical cross (Photographs: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The John Radcliffe Trust bought a parcel of land on London Road for use as a cemetery for the new-built church in 1870. Swinfen Harris was commissioned to design and build the London Road Cemetery, also known as Galley Hill Cemetery, and the first burial was recorded in 1871.

The Lychgate and Ecclesiastical Cross designed by Swinfen Harris have been restored in recent years.

All Saints’ Church, Calverton:

The reredos installed by Swinfen Harris in All Saints’ Church, Calverton in 1871-1872 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Swinfen Harris restored and decorated All Saints’ Church in Calverton 1871-1872. His work there included laying Minton tiles on the chancel floor, the application of sgraffito patterns to the chancel walls and the installation of a mosaic reredos of the Epiphany, which is unusual in depicting Christ not as a babe in swaddling clothes but as a toddler standing on his mother’s knee. This depiction is said to reflect the Christ Child at the age when Herod commanded the slaughter of all male children up to the age of two.

Figures were also painted on the stone pulpit by the artist Daniel Bell at about this time. The stone cross at the south-west corner of the church, about four metres high and with the symbols of the four evangelists at the four corners of its base, dates from ca 1873.

Post Office, Newport Pagnell:

The Post Office in Newport Pagnell was built in 1872 for Bassett’s Bank

The Post Office in Newport Pagnell was built in 1872 for Bassett’s Bank, the oldest banking institution in Buckinghamshire. This building was designed by Swinfen Harris, and later became Barclays Bank.

Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford:

Swinfen Harris added the north vestries in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Swinfen Harris restored Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, then known as Saint Giles Church, in Stony Stratford, in 1876-1878, when he put new tracery in the windows and added the north and south galleries.

Later, Swinfen Harris also added the north vestries in 1891. A year later, in 1892, he commissioned stained-glass windows in the church by Nathaniel Westlake, one of the best stained-glass artists of the time, to commemorate his parents. I shall return to those windows later this evening.

Swinfen Harris Church Hall, London Road, Stony Stratford:

The Swinfen Harris Church Hall on London Road was built by Swinfen Harris in 1892 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Swinfen Harris Church Hall on London Road was built in 1892 by Swinfen Harris as the Parish Hall for Saint Mary the Virgin Church.

The church and hall are now owned by the Greek Orthodox Community of Milton Keynes and have undergone extensive restoration.

The Retreat almshouses, Stony Stratford:

The Retreat almshouses in Stony Stratford were designed by Swinfen Harris in the Queen Anne revival style in 1892 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Retreat almshouses in Stony Stratford form a group of three cottages off High Street designed by Swinfen Harris in the Queen Anne revival style in 1892. They are built in limestone and brick and are listed Grade II buildings.

Nos 14-16 High Street, in their style and features, show evidence of being the work of Swinfen Harris (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The premises at the front of the Retreat, Nos 14-16 High Street, are not listed buildings, but in their style and features show evidence of being designed by Swinfen Harris.

Rothenburg House, 107 High Street, Stony Stratford:

The inscription over the door of Rothenburg House, ‘Nisi Dominus’, quotes the opening words of Psalm 127 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Swinfen Harris built Rothenburg House at 107 High Street as his family home in 1892. Now a Grade II listed building, it was designed in his highly individual style.

The inscription over the door, Nisi Dominus, quotes the opening words of Psalm 127: ‘Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labour in vain.’

Swinfen Harris built Rothenburg House at 107 High Street, Stony Stratford, as his family home in 1892 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Repton House, 19 Wolverton Road:

Repton House at 19 Wolverton Road is an interesting house in the Victorian architectural history and heritage of Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Repton House at 19 Wolverton Road is an interesting house in the Victorian architectural history and heritage of Stony Stratford, with its romantic turret, jettied gable, bargeboard, half-timbered gables, arched entrance that once led into stables, and its sash windows.

Repton House today provides supported housing for people who require assistance in all aspects of daily living skills, as a result of long-term and enduring mental health problems.

Repton House is part of Richmond Fellowship’s Supported Housing Service, which is tailored for each individual using the service with the ultimate goal of helping them to manage their accommodation and assist them with reintegration back into independent living and the wider community.

Richmond Fellowship is a national mental health charity that has been ‘Making Recovery Reality’ for over 60 years. It is part of Recovery Focus, a group of charities with the shared aim to ‘Inspire Recovery Together.’ Since 1959, its services have pioneered work with individuals, communities, and families to overcome mental ill-health and support people on their recovery journeys.

The architectural details of Repton House include a romantic turret and an arched entrance (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Repton House, on the west side of Wolverton Road is a Grade II listed building dating from 1883, when it was designed by Swinfen Harris in the Arts and Crafts style.

Swinfen Harris designed the house at No 19 Wolverton Road for a medical practitioner, Dr TS Maguire, who was also a local magistrate.

The arched entrance leading into a rear courtyard is a reminder by Edward Swinfen Harris that Stony Stratford was once a coaching town (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Repton House is a two-storey, seven-bay house built in a Victorian vernacular style. It is a long, low, red-brick building with extensive rear quarters.

The left-hand bay of the house breaks forward and has a jettied gable with a bargeboard, blind tracery on studs and the date of the building of the house on the bressumer or supporting beam on the first floor of the jetty. This gable is partly hung, and it has a two-storey, four-light bay below.

There are sash windows with glazing bars in the top sash, and a continuous moulded string at sill level. The five-panel door to the left has a depressed arch over it. The central glazed door is flanked by pairs of windows.

There are stone heads on the windows on the ground floor and half-timbered gables on the first floor.

The date A.1883.D on the bressumer or supporting beam on the first floor of the jetty marks the date Repton House was built (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

To the right, a wide, arched entrance leads into a rear courtyard that once had stables, a reminder by Swinfen Harris that his home town had once been a coaching town.

Further to the right again is a tiled, roofed turret and a single storey extension with a foiled gablet in the roof. There is a wrought iron finial over the square bay on the south-west front of the house.

Repton House has a variety of dormers over the main part of building. The tiled roof has a crested ridge and brick chimneys.

The front of the house is covered with wisteria, and the growth at the front of the house means many people probably walk by Repton House on Wolverton Road without fully appreciating its place in the architectural heritage of Stony Stratford.

Stony Stratford lychgates:

The lychgate on London Road Cemetery, or Galley Hill Cemetery in Stony Stratford was designed by Edward Swinfen Harris (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Stony Stratford has not just one but three lychgates at its churchyards and cemeteries. The oldest lychgate is at Stony Stratford Cemetery on Calverton Road. This small, one-acre burial board cemetery dates from 1856-1857. The site was designed by the Northampton architect Edmund Francis Law (1810-1882), with a typical collection of cemetery structures, including two separate chapels and a stone boundary wall with a lychgate.

The cemetery on Calverton Road is now in a residential area but was originally in a partly rural setting. In the early 19th century, the site was in agricultural use, lying in a rural area to the south of the town near the River Great Ouse.

With the introduction of the Burial Acts in the mid-1850s, the Burial Board of the United Parishes of Saint Giles and Saint Mary Magdalene, Stony Stratford, was formed and directed a cemetery to be laid out. Law’s design for the cemetery included two chapels in Gothic style, an Anglican chapel and a Dissenters’ chapel, but the two chapels have since been demolished, although their sites can be seen.

The lychgate at the London Road Cemetery, or Galley Hill Cemetery, was designed by Swinfen Harris (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The second lychgate in Stony Stratford is at the London Road Cemetery, also known as Galley Hill Cemetery, and was designed by Swinfen Harris.

The John Radcliffe Trust bought a parcel of land measuring two roods and four perches on London Road in 1870 for use as a cemetery for the new-built Church of Saint Mary the Virgin – now the Greek Orthodox Church.

Swinfen Harris was commissioned to design and lay out the cemetery. The first burial there was in 1871. A second area of the cemetery was bought by Milton Keynes Council in the 1980s.

In recent times, the lychgate and memorial cross designed by Swinfen Harris fell into disrepair and the cross was considered unsafe. Following a concerted effort from members of Stony in Bloom, local tradesmen, finance from the Stony Stratford Futures Group and money from Milton Keynes Council Heritage Projects, the lychgate and cross were restored to their former glory in 2011.

Stony Stratford has a third and more recent lychgate at the north-east side of Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church. The lychgate and calvary facing on to the High Street were erected in 1931 in memory of Arnold Steer by his wife Clara and children, Eric, Gwen and Wilfrid. Canon Eric Steer had been a curate in Slough before becoming a naval chaplain during World War I. In all, three Steer brothers were priests in the Church of England, and Arnold Steer came to Stony Stratford to live in the vicarage in his old age and died in 1930.

The lychgate was made from an old oak tree that once stood on the same site, and remains an attractive feature on the High Street, next to where I am living.

Lovat Bank, Newport Pagnell:

Lovat Bank, designed by Swinfen Harris for the Taylor family, on the banks of the Ousel or Lovat River in Newport Pagnell (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Lovat Bank on Silver Street, Newport Pagnell (1876-1877), was designed for FJ Taylor, of Taylor’s Prepared Mustard fame. William Taylor came to Newport Pagnell in 1825. His first business was manufacturing soda and then later mustard. The instructions to Swinfen Harris were to build a grand house overlooking the river in the style of Queen Anne, including Gothic features.

Here too, sunflowers appear as a feature all over the house.

Lovat Bank on Silver Street in Newport Pagnell is regarded as the ‘chef d’oeuvre’ of Swinfen Harris (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The lawns were terraced down to the river. A wooden bridge crossed the river to the daffodil meadows that were all part of the property. A water wheel was used to pump water to the house from the river.

Lovat Bank served as local council offices in 1969-1974. Wendy and David Loughlan bought the house in 2018 and renovated it over the following months. Today, this grand building with a vibrant history is now home to unique and creative businesses along with a picturesque Yoga space.

Lovat Lodge, beside Lovat Bank in Newport Pagnell (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Lovat Lodge, beside Lovat Bank in Newport Pagnell, also has the appearance of being the work of Swinfen Harris.

The Old Rectory, Great Linford:

The Old Rectory in Great Linford dates from the late 16th or early 17th century (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Old Rectory in Great Linford is close to the gates of Great Linford Park, near the old manor house and to the south-east of Saint Andrew’s Church. The house was extensively and sympathetically renovated, extended and rebuilt in the Arts and Crafts style in 1876-1878 by Edward Swinfen Harris. Further extensions were carried out in the Edwardian era.

This is a stone building, built mainly at the close of the 16th century and in the early 17th century, although there seems to be work from a century earlier in the south-east wing and much of the building was altered by Swinfen Harris in the late 19th century. His work includes the south wing, rebuilt in the 19th century in the Tudor manner.

The house now has four reception rooms and six bedrooms and stands on two acres of mature grounds, including a former orchard. It has been on the market twice in recent years, with asking prices of £1.6 million and £1.75 million.

London House, 5 High Street, Stony Stratford:

London House, 5 High Street, Stony Stratford, designed by Swinfen Harris in the 1880s (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

London House, at 5 High Street, Stony Stratford, now the Nationwide Bank, is Grade II listed building designed by Swinfen Harris in the 1880s.

This is a two-storey house with a gabled attic employing a variety of decorative surface treatments. It is brick built, with a tiled roof with a crested ridge and end stacks, a gabled dormer to the left and a large jettied timber framed gable to right.

The features include brick nogging and plaster panels below both windows, blind tracery on the corner posts of main gable, a moulded jetty beam and bargeboards, and casement windows.

The decorative stuccowork, including sunflowers, on the façade of London House, 5 High Street, Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

No 5 has a double shop front with a recessed entrance and small passageway that leads through to the rear on the left.

There is a five-light wooden rectangular oriel window on the left of the first floor, that is mullioned and transomed with small panes in the upper lights.

The ornate wrought iron weathervane has panel with ‘W.51.W’ in the openwork. The next time you are passing by, look up at the decorative stuccowork, especially the sunflowers, a theme in the Aesthetic Movement in architecture this area.

Saint George’s Rectory, Wolverton:

The former Saint George’s Rectory in Wolverton was extended by Swinfen Harris in 1889-1890 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The former Saint George’s Rectory, at Saint George’s Way, Wolverton, was extended by Swinfen Harris in 1889-1890.

The house was originally built in the 1844 for the Rector of Wolverton by Wyatt and Brandon in 1844. It was a two-storey picturesque detached house with a drive and large garden.

It was vacated as Wolverton Rectory in the 1980s, and since then has lost much of its setting.

The Elms, Green Lane, Wolverton:

The Elms, Green Lane, Wolverton, is a picturesque Arts and Crafts house with a domed stair tower (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The Elms, Green Lane, Wolverton, is a picturesque Arts and Crafts house with a domed stair tower. It was designed by Swinfen Harris for the London and North-Western Railway Company as a house, surgery and coach house for the railway works and town doctor and surgeon, Dr John Harvey, in 1903.

The domed stair tower at The Elms in Wolverton (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The house was extended in 1906. The Elms is now a grade II listed building although it has since been converted into two houses.

Four other churches, Milton Keynes:

Four other churches in the Milton Keynes area have features by Edward Swinfen Harris: Saint John the Evangelist, Wicken, altered and enlarged, including reredos (1874-1890); Saint Lawrence, Old Bradwell, restoration (1903); All Saints’ Church, Bow Brickhill, south porch (1907); and Saint Lawrence, Chicheley, new vestry (1909).

Work in Buckingham:

Edward Swinfen Harris designed the Carriage House (left) and extended the Coach House (right) at the top of Castle Street, Buckingham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Swinfen Harris was a leading member of the Aesthetic Movement in arts and architecture and he worked mainly in the Arts and Crafts style. He was commissioned in 1875 to extend the Coach House, an 18th century painted brick cottage at the top of Castle Street in Buckingham, just before the gates of Saint Peter and Saint Paul Parish Church.

Swinfen Harris extended the Coach House in 1875, designing a half-timbered bay with a timber gallery or rare ‘Juliet’ balcony (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The overall design chosen by Swinfen Harris for the extension to the Coach House included a half-timbered bay with a timber gallery or rare ‘Juliet’ balcony at the first-floor level, flamboyantly articulated with four bays of pointed arches, pierced spandrels and a balustrade with a turned baluster.

The Coach House in Buckingham is an 18th century painted brick cottage (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The prominent features of his design include a substantial brick chimney and ornamenting the street façade are sgraffito decoration panels and ironwork depicting sunflowers and vases. The 19th century revival of Sgraffito, which was revived the Arts and Crafts movement, was an ancient form of incised plaster decoration used to adorn buildings. Sgraffito is an Italian word for decorating by scratching through surface layers to reveal a lower layer and the sunflower was the symbol of the Aesthetic Movement.

Swinfen Harris also designed the adjacent Carriage House to the south-west of the Coach House, and built in 1875. It is designed with a rustic character, and is positioned with its gable facing onto the street. It is an unusual building, a quirky brick and timber house, and it compliments No 11 in its design. It was restored in 1987.

The sunflower was the symbol of the Aesthetic Movement (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Aesthetic Movement was a late 19th century movement that championed pure beauty and ‘art for art’s sake,’ emphasising the visual and sensual qualities of art and design over practical, moral or narrative considerations.

Aestheticism originated in England in the 1860s with a radical group of artists and designers, including William Morris and Dante Gabriel Rossetti. It flourished in the 1870s and 1880s, gaining prominence and the support of notable writers such as Walter Pater and Oscar Wilde, as well as local prominence in the work of architects such as Edward Swinfen Harris in Stony Stratford, Buckingham and neighbouring towns.

Tylecote House, Roade, Northamptonshire:

Swinfen Harris designed Tylecote House in Roade, Northamptonshire, for the local GP in 1894

Swinfen Harris designed Tylecote House at 33 Hartwell Road, Roade, half-way between Old Stratford and Northampton, in 1894 for the local GP, Dr O’Ryan, who used the outbuilding to the east of the main house as his surgery. This picturesque, listed house It was sold recently through Michael Graham estate agents, who quoted an asking price of £1.25 million.

One other work in Stony Stratford:

1 Calverton Road, Stony Stratford … Swinfen Harris designed the extension (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

One other work by Swinfen Harris that might be missed is the extension he designed for No 1 Calverton Road, Stony Stratford.

Swinfen Harris windows, Stony Stratford:

The first window at the east end of the south wall in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford, is one of a series of windows by NHJ Westlake commissioned by Swinfen Harris in memory of his parents (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Swinfen Harris inserted the north and south galleries in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford. The windows in the church six windows below the galleries by NHJ Westlake of Lavers & Westlake.

Their insertion was overseen by Swinfen Harris, and the three windows below the south gallery were commissioned by Swinfen Harris and serve to illustrate both his filial and his religious piety.

The first window at the east end of the south wall depicts two angels worshipping the Lamb on the Throne, Agnus Dei, an image from the Book of Revelation; the Crucifixion, with the Virgin Mary and Saint John keeping watch with the Crucified Christ as the stand at the foot of the cross; and Moses with Aaron and Hur holding up his arms.

In each of these three panels, the central figure – the Lamb on the Throne, the Crucified Christ and the ageing Moses – have two supporting figures: two angels, the Virgin Mary nd Saint John, and Aaron and Hur.

This window by Westlake is dated 1889 and was commissioned by Swinfen Harris in memory of his parents.

The second window in the south wall in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford, commissioned by Swinfen Harris and dated 1888 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The second window commissioned by Swinfen Harris is in memory of his father, also Edward Swinfen Harris, who was the clerk to the town bench of magistrates, the Board of Guardians and other bodies in the town.

This second window is of three eyelets and depicts: Joseph before Pharoah’s throne, interpreting his dreams; Jesus as an apprentice in Joseph the carpenter’s shop; and Joseph’s brothers before him with the silver cup found in Benjamin’s sack.

In each of these panels, Westlake is suggesting to the viewer that Swinfen Harris was a loyal and faithful son to his father, the late Edward Swinfen Harris, and that he had learned from him.

The third window by NHJ Westlake is in memory of Catherine Swinfen Harris (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The third Westlake window on the south wall is dated 1896 and was commissioned by Swinfen Harris in memory of his mother, Catharine Swinfen Harris, who died on 23 June 1896, at the age of 85.

This third window depicts: Jacob blessing Joseph’s sons Manasseh and Ephraim; Christ greeting two disciples at night; and Jacob’s dream at Bethel.

Asenath, the mother of Ephraim and Manasseh was an Egyptian, and so her family was outside the community of faith. Yet, they are not disqualified from God’s blessings because of their parents’ unconventional marriage. In the panels in this window, Swinfen Harris may be saying that his mother was seen as an outsider but that in life through his parents he found blessings beyond any expectations in his dreams.

Other works by Swinfen Harris:

Swinfen Harris converted designed the stables at Bletchley Park and later converted part of the north range to a cottage (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Some other works by Edward Swinfen Harris include: the Old Rectory, Maids Moreton (1878-1879); Emmanuel Church, Upper Holloway, London (1883) – most of the church was rebuilt to a modern design in 1988; the stables at Bletchley Park (1883); Nos 1 and 3 Stacey Avenue, Wolverton, a pair of model estate workers’ houses (1886), designed by Swinfen Harris; three cottages in the stable yard at Bletchley Park, involving an alteration and extension of an earlier north range undertaken, with a cottage for Sir Herbert Leon’s head groom (ca 1890); the Poplars, Newport Pagnell; and the church cottage, Newport Pagnell (early 20th century).

Nos 1 and 3 Stacey Avenue, Wolverton, a pair of model estate workers’ houses designed by Swinfen Harris Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Conclusions:

Swinfen Harris retired in 1914 and died over 100 years ago, on 30 May 1924.

He is part of the architectural and aesthetic heritage of Stony Stratford. Swinfen’s Yard, in the middle of Stony Stratford, includes individual, specialist shops under a covered courtyard, with offices on the upper floors. It is named in honour of Edward Swinfen Harris.

Last year was the centenary of his death, marked during Heritage Week by a walking tour of some of his work … in a summer downpour.

More work needs to be done on cataloguing his work in Stony Stratford and the neighbouring towns. More research is needed on his life and his work, and if his papers can be located he is worthy of a full biographical appraisal and study.

I hope to continue this research, and to talk about him again during the Heritage Week programme in September. But more about those plans in the weeks and months ahead.

(Revd Canon Professor) Patrick Comerford lives in retirement in Stony Stratford. This lecture was given in Stony Stratford Library on 25 February 2025 at the invitation of the Friends of Stony Stratford Library (FOSSL).