Patrick Comerford
In recent weeks I have been visiting a number of churches in Bedford, including Saint Paul’s Church, the main church in the centre, Saint Peter’s Church on Saint Peter’s Street in the De Parys area, and Saint Cuthbert’s Church, on the east side of the town centre, in the middle of a traffic island between Castle Road, Mill Street, Saint Cuthbert’s Street and Newnham Road.
The church now known as the Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Saint Cuthbert, was built as Saint Cuthbert’s Church, a Church of England parish church named in honour of Saint Cuthbert of Lindisfarne, who died in 687.
There have been church buildings on the same site since the eighth century, predating Bedford Castle. The first Saint Cuthbert’s Church is said to have been founded by Offa, King of Mercia, in 772 CE. If so, this would make the church site over 1,250 years old and the oldest existing ecclesiastical foundation in Bedford.
The earliest known rector of Saint Cuthbert’s was Robert de Kelseya, who was instituted in 1235. The advowson of Saint Cuthbert’s was granted in the early 13th century to Saint Peter’s Priory, Dunstable, which held it until the priory was dissolved at the Tudor Reformation. After the dissolution, the advowson passed to the Crown, with the Lord Chancellor presenting the rector.
The parish register, dating from 1607, includes the record of the baptism on 16 November 1672 of Joseph Bunyan, a son of John Bunyan, who at one time was a parishioner of Saint Cuthbert’s, and the marriage in 1686 of Sarah Bunyan, a daughter of John Bunyan.
Alexander Leith, Rector of Saint Cuthbert’s in 1689-1732, noted in 1706 that the parish ‘is of small extent, consists of about 50 families, most labourers. Of these many are Dissenters who resort to the Independents’ Meeting house [the Bunyan Meeting] , but know little more of religion than that they do not like the Church of England, but think they edifie more at a conventicle. There is no Papist or reputed Papist here’.
Henry Kaye Bonney (1780-1862), Archdeacon of Bedford, suggested in 1822 that the north entrance of the church dated from the 12th century and described it as ‘a simple and elegant specimen’ of its time. He noted that the turret contained a single bell. He said Saint Cuthbert’s Church was 66 ft long, including a 25 ft-long chancel, it was 20 ft wide, and the top of the turret was 37 ft from the ground.
Sir Stephen Glynne (1807-1874), a noted antiquarian and Gladstone’s brother-in-law, visited the church in the 1830s. Glynne was a vice-president of the Ecclesiological Society, and during his life he visited over 5,500 churches, making detailed notes on their architectural details and fittings. These churches totalled over half the surviving mediaeval churches in England, and more than half in Wales.
Glynne believed the earliest portions of Saint Cuthbert’s date from the 13th century. He described the church as ‘a small mean fabric,’ with only a nave and chancel. There was no steeple, but it had a wooden turret rising above the roof about the middle of the church.
There was one lancet window on the south side, and the other windows were mainly of late curvilinear character. The north doorway was early English, with good moulding and shafts. The chancel was separated from the nave by three arches of wood. On the south side of the altar were two Early English niches with good mouldings and divided by a central shaft. The font was circular, supported by four shafts standing on a square base.
Glynne also noted that the church had newly-installed pews.
The Bedford architect James Woodroffe reported on the poor condition of the church in 1838. Archdeacon Henry Tattam (1789-1868), Rector of Saint Cuthbert’s from 1822 to 1850, tried to get financial assistance to carry out much-needed repairs. However, the vestry decided in 1844 to knock down the old building and to build an entirely new church.
The new Saint Cuthbert’s Church was built in 1845-1847 as an overflow church for Saint Paul’s Church. It was designed in the neo-Norman style by Woodroffe, who also designed a new rectory built for Henry Tattam in Saint Cuthbert's Street in 1843. The new church was built at a cost of £2,100 and was consecrated on 8 July 1847.
Tattam, who was Archdeacon of Bedford from 1845 to 1866, was also known as a Patristics scholar. He visited Egypt and the Holy Land in 1838-1839, meeting the patriarch and acquiring Coptic and Syriac manuscripts for the British Museum that are now in the British Library. He became and a chaplain to Queen Victoria in 1853.
The north and south aisles added in 1865 were designed by the architect was Francis Cranmer Penrose (1817-1903). The church was enlarged again in 1877, when it was extended westward, a cloister-porch was added on the west front, and an organ chamber was erected on the north side of the chancel.
A new organ chamber was added on the south side of the chancel in 1886, and the former chamber was converted into a vestry. The church could seat 1,200 people, and the church fittings were of solid oak that came from Chicheley Park in Buckinghamshire.
The east window depicts Saint Cuthbert, the Communion plate included an ancient silver chalice, and a legacy from Alderman Horsford was used to erect an oak screen between the chancel and the vestry and for other improvements.
A single bell, hung in 1900, replaced the bell of 1831 that had been part of the former church. The north transept porch was built in 1907.
Christ Church, an iron structure on Castle Road, was built as a chapel-of-ease for Saint Cuthbert’s in 1883.
The Revd William Frederick Lindesay (1857-1907), who was the Rector of Saint Cuthbert’s in 1897-1907, inherited the Loughry estate near Cookstown, Co Tyrone. Jonathan Swift is thought to have written part of Gulliver’s Travels at Loughry.
Lindesay’s successor, Bishop Edward Noel Hodges (1849-1928), had been Bishop of Travancore and Cochin (1890-1904) in South India. He was the Rector of Saint Cuthbert’s in 1907-1916 and was Archdeacon of Bedford (1910-1914) and an Assistant Bishop in the Diocese of St Albans in 1914-1924.
The parish bought 2 Rothsay Gardens as a new rectory in 1923.
The last Rector of Saint Cuthbert’s, the Revd Clifford Sidney Mason, was appointed in 1957. Saint Cuthbert’s Church was closed in 1974, when the parish united with Saint Peter de Merton, which received an additional dedication and is now known formally as the Church of Saint Peter de Merton with Saint Cuthbert.
Saint Cuthbert’s was declared redundant by the Church of England on 22 October 1975, and was later bought by the Harpur Trust. It was used by the Serbian Orthodox community in Bedford and was then presented to the Polish community in Bedford in 1979.
Today, the church is the Polish Church of Sacred Heart of Jesus and Saint Cuthbert. It is a Grade II listed building.
In addition to serving the Polish community, the church also hosted a regular Tridentine Mass said by the priests of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter for a few years. That community later moved to other locations in the Diocese of Northampton before returning to another church in Bedford.
The church is the middle of a traffic island but is within sight of other buildings that have played key and interesting roles in the religious history of Bedford, including the Bunyan Meeting, the John Bunyan Museum, and the home of the former Panacea Community.
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