Is nobody going to come to the rescue of Davidson House in Lichfield before it is lost?

Davidson House, Upper Saint John Street, once the home of one the finest of Lichfield’s architects, has been neglected for over a decade (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

As I was walking up Upper John Street in Lichfield last week, setting out in search of Borrowcop Hill and Borrowcop Gazebo, I stopped once again to look at the sad state of decay and neglect of Davidson House at 67 Upper Saint John Street. This Regency-era house, built ca 1810, is more than 200 years old. It faces a prominent corner at Davidson Road and is just a few metres south of Lichfield City train station, and north of both King Edward VI School and Holy Cross Church.

Back in 2015, I had written about the sad neglect of this fine house, which had once been a museum and, before that, the home of a distinguished Lichfield architect. But in the 10 years since then, the house has decayed even further and lost more of its key architectural features.

According to the local history group, Lichfield Discovered, and the local historian Kate Gomez, this house is part of Lichfield’s ‘at-risk’ heritage. Yet, despite its important place in the heritage of Lichfield, it looks forlorn and abandoned, and is rapidly becoming an eyesore on the landscape of Lichfield.

The windows in this once elegant house are boarded up, the stonework and façade are crumbling, and there is a sad air of abandonment about the whole site.

Davidson House was once the home of the Old Comrades Association of the South Staffordshire Regiment and the collection of the Regimental Museum from 1938 until 1963, when it moved to Whittington. But Davidson House is also of architectural interest because it was once the home of the Lichfield architect Thomas Johnson (1795-1865), who lived there for over 30 years, from 1834 until he died in 1865.

Thomas Johnson trained as a pupil of the Lichfield architect Joseph Potter (1756–1842) and was influenced by his method. Potter, who had a large practice in Staffordshire and the neighbouring counties in the late 18th and early 19th century, lived in Pipehill, south-west of Lichfield, but had his office in Saint John Street.

Apart from restorations to Lichfield Cathedral, Potter’s work included Newton’s College (1800-1802), the Causeway Bridge, Bird Street (1816), Freeford Hall, which he enlarged for William Dyott (1826-1827), and Holy Cross Church, Upper Saint John Street (1835), and his son designed the Guildhall (1846-1848).

By 1814, the Potter practice was run from a house on the north side of Saint John’s Hospital. Later it was continued by his son, Joseph Potter, who died in 1875.

Meanwhile, Thomas Johnson went on to work as a junior partner with the prolific Staffordshire architect James Trubshaw (1777-1853) of Little Haywood, near Colwich. Soon, Johnson married Trubshaw’s eldest daughter, Mary.

Johnson and Potter worked on the nave of Saint Mary’s Church (Church of England) in Uttoxeter in 1828. But a year later, in 1829, Johnson set up his own practice as an architect in Tamworth Street, Lichfield, and he continued to design churches, including the very large Saint James’s in Longton (1832-1834). By 1834, he was living in the house that later became Davidson House in Upper Saint John Street.

The portico of Davidson House and its Tuscan pillars have been removed or vandalised (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Around this time, Johnson fell under the influence of the Cambridge Camden Society, which was strongly influenced by AWN Pugin. The early members included Canon James Thomas Law (1790-1876), a prebendary and chancellor of Lichfield Cathedral and a former Master of Saint John’s Hospital (1821-1826).

Both Law and Johnson were founding members in 1841 of the Lichfield Society for the Encouragement of Ecclesiastical Architecture, and both were active committee members. Canon William Gresley (1801-1876) of Saint Mary’s, a leading Tractarian and former curate of Saint Chad’s, was the first chairman, and the committee met in Canon Law’s house in Market Street. Other committee members included the antiquarian and lawyer, William Salt of Stafford, and the Revd Richard Rawle (1812-1889), who was the Vicar of Tamworth in 1869-1872 and later the Bishop of Trinidad and Tobago (1872-1888).

Johnson also began working on the restoration of Saint Chad’s Church, Lichfield, in 1841, and he did further work there in 1848-1849.

He worked with the London-born architect Sydney Smirke, who also designed the Hinkley family home at Beacon Place, in the controversial restoration of Saint Michael’s Church, Lichfield, in 1842-1843. During that work, the original memorial stone commissioned by Samuel Johnson for his family was removed as Saint Michael’s was repaved, and much of the mediaeval fabric of the church was lost. But Johnson’s restoration work is a remarkable example of the strong influence of Pugin’s ideas on his work, and the historian of Staffordshire Gothic architecture, the Revd Michael J Fisher, says it is a surprisingly god example of Gothic for its time.

Johnson designed Saint Mary’s Church, Great Wyrley, two miles south of Cannock, in the Gothic style in 1844-1845.

Johnson completed his rebuilding of All Saints’ Church, Leigh, two miles off the A522 between Cheadle and Uttoxeter, in 1846. Michael Fisher, in his book Staffordshire and the Gothic Revival, describes this as ‘one of the most remarkable of Staffordshire’s Victorian churches’, and he laments that the importance of this church has not been fully recognised. This work was funded mainly by Richard Bagot of Blithfield, Bishop of Oxford and later Bishop of Bath and Wells, and a former rector of All Saints’.

The bishop’s son, the Revd Lewis Bagot, was the incumbent at the time of Johnson’s rebuilding, while the bishop’s nephew, the Revd Hervey Bagot was Rector of Blithfield and an active member of the Lichfield Society with Johnson. The chancel furnishings and floor tiles at Leigh have been attributed to Pugin and were donated by Herbert Minton, who also donated the reredos.

Johnson was also the architect for Christ Church, Lichfield, which was built in 1846-1847 on Christchurch Lane, just off Walsall Road. The church was designed in the Victorian Gothic Revival style and was built of sandstone quarried in Lichfield. It was consecrated on 26 October 1847 by the Bishop of Lichfield, John Lonsdale.

Christ Church was endowed by Ellen Jane Hinckley, daughter of John Chappel Woodhouse, Dean of Lichfield. She married her third husband, Richard Hinckley, a Lichfield solicitor, in 1835 and they lived in Beacon Place. Ellen had suffered tragic family losses: her first husband was the Revd William Robinson, and they were the parents of two daughters who died in childhood and are commemorated in the memorial known as Chantry’s ‘Sleeping Children’ in Lichfield Cathedral.

Thomas Johnson’s part of the old Grammar School now includes the council chambers of Lichfield District Council (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Johnson’s other works in Lichfield include a wing, school room and front wall built ca 1849 at the former Lichfield Grammar School on Saint John Street.

As I recalled in my posting on Borrowcop Hill yesterday, the school moved south to a site at Borrowcop Lane, off Upper Saint John Street in 1903. Johnson’s part of the old school now includes the council chambers of Lichfield District Council, while other parts of the school are being transformed by Lichfield Discovered since last February.

Johnson also designed the railway bridge crossing Upper Saint John Street which leads trains to and from Lichfield City Station, and which I once described in a feature in the Lichfield Gazette.

The bridge, close to Davidson House, was built in 1849 for the South Staffordshire Railway Company. In his design, Johnson tried to evoke a city gate, with battlements, heraldic decoration, and side towers containing multi-arched pedestrian ways. Bishop Lonsdale, who consecrated Christ Church a few years earlier, and the Bagot family are among the Lichfield notables he singled out for commemoration in the heraldic images on the bridge next to his home in Upper John Street, as well as a depiction of the 16th century seal of Lichfield, drawing on images of the three legendary kings said to have been slain in the third century and buried on Borrowcop Hill.

The Corn Exchange in Conduit Street was designed by Thomas Johnson in a Tudor style (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The Corn Exchange in Conduit Street was designed by Johnson in a Tudor style. It was built by a company formed for the purpose and was opened in 1850. The arcaded ground floor was a market hall, and the upper floor, with an octagonal north end, housed the corn exchange. A savings bank in the same style was built at the Bore Street end of the building.

Thomas Johnson of Saint John Street was 70 when he died in 1865, and he was buried at Saint Michael’s on 11 May 1865. He left an estate of less than £5,000 and his will was proved on 18 August. He was succeeded by his son, also Thomas Johnson, and the work of the two sons is sometimes confused.

Davudson House takes its name from Brigadier General Charles Steer Davidson. He donated the building to he South Staffordshire Regimental Museum, which was located in the house from 1938 to 1963.

Davidson House is a three-storey, three-window range house built ca 1810. It is a brick building with ashlar dressings, a hipped slate roof with two large brick stacks, a gable facing, with a front to the left. There is an ashlar plinth, with sill bands and a top modillioned cornice with a blocking course.

The central entrance once had an architrave and an overlight to paired three-panel doors, and there was a porch with slender Tuscan columns. But both the doors, porch and Tuscan pillars have long disappeared through negligence or vandalism or have been purloined.

The bay window to the left had a cornice, while the windows had pilasters, friezes and cornices. A tripartite bay window had colonnettes and 8:12:8-pane sashes, but these too have now been lost. A similar window to the right had brick piers and a central open pediment.

There were two similar tripartite windows on the first floor and these had colonnettes and central open pediments. They flanked a window with an open pediment over a 12-pane sash. The second floor windows had architraves to six-pane sashes that can still be seen.

The worn steps and neglected railings at Davidson House on Upper Saint John Street, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The terrace to the right end has steps to the street level and there are plain iron railings, though these too are sadly neglected.

The street façade has similar details. You can see a high plinth, tripartite windows to ground and first floors, and the plinth to the ground floor has brick piers. At the rear there is a two-storey gabled service range. The right return has a cogged brick cornice and varied fenestration, and at one time the windows inside had shutters, although this is impossible to verify today.

In recent years, Davidson House was divided into offices. But given its past association with one of Lichfield’s architectural giants, it is sad to consider the continuing neglect of this architectural gem.

Without immediate intervention and attention, this part of Lichfield’s architectural heritage is in danger of being beyond restoration and may be lost forever.

The windows of Davidson House are boarded up (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Borrowcop Gazebo and my search for the legends and legendary graves on the highest hill in Lichfield

Borrowcop Gazebo stands at the top of Borrowcop Hill, the highest point in Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

After an afternoon walk along Cross Hand in Lane on the northern fringes of Lichfield a few days ago, I decided to cross to the other side of Lichfield and to search for Borrowcop Hill and the Borrowcop Gazebo. The hill at around 113 metres AOD (above sea level) is the highest point in Lichfield and is shrouded in myth and legend.

I have known Lichfield for 50 or 60 years, to the point that I have felt at home there almost all my life. But this was my first time ever to search for Borrowcop Hill, even though when I first stayed in Lichfield in my teens it was nearby on Birmingham Road.

I knew even then about the legends and the myths surrounding Borrowcop Hill and about its history too. But, somehow, I had never visited the hill or searched for the gazebo. I thought I knew where they were, so I was surprised how difficult it was to find Borrowcop Hill last Friday afternoon, hidden in behind the houses off King’s Hill Road and Borrowcop Lane, both reached from Upper Saint John Street.

Things would have been easier had I gone up King’s Hill Road and found the narrow lane behind King Edward VI School. Instead, I ended up walking aimlessly in the summer heat up and down along Borrowcop Lane and could find no signs pointing to the hill. I might never have found either the hill or the gazebo but for the Google Maps app on my ’phone. Eventually I found a narrow, almost secret, lane off Hillside, running between the back gardens of houses and the school grounds.

Is it any wonder that the gazebo has been described as ‘one of Lichfield’s little know gems’? Yet its hilltop location offers views on clear days across Lichfield and out towards the Black Country and Charnwood Forest.

Borrowcop Gazebo is hidden among the trees at the top of Borrowcop Hill (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Local legend in Lichfield has it that three British kings were slain on there by the Romans in the year 288 and that they were buried in a ‘barrow’ on the hilltop. Other variations of the story say it is the traditional site of the graves of three Christian kings who were killed in battle with King Penda in 288.

In its earliest written forms, the name Borrowcop appears as ‘Burwey’ or ‘Burwhay’, incorporating the Old English element burh, suggesting a fortified place or that there may have been an Anglo-Saxon fortification on the site, according to David Horovitz in his study of Staffordshire placenames.

A Historic Character Assessment or Extensive Urban Survey of Lichfield for Staffordshire County Council in 2011 said excavations carried out by antiquarians on Borrowcop Hill in earlier centuries allegedly recovered burnt bone from the mound. However, more recent archaeological investigations have so far failed to recover any evidence for human activity’.

Although most historians now accept the story is a myth without historical foundation, it inspired for the City Seal adopted by Lichfield in 1549. The city seal became part of a large relief on the façade of the Guildhall, but it was later moved first to the Museum Gardens and then to the herbaceous borders in Beacon Park.

The legend of slain kings buried on Borrowcop Hill was perpetuated in the Lichfield City Seal, still seen on the railway bridge on Saint John Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

A version of the seal is among the heraldic symbols decorating the railway bridge on Saint John Street, close to Lichfield City station, and the three golden crowns of the legendary kings were later incorporated into the emblems of Saxon Hill Academy.

The gazebo was built on the hill in 1804-1805, paid for by public subscription. Before that, buildings on the site included a late 17th century structure called the Temple, built in 1694, the ‘Temple’ of 1694, a summer-house, an arbour in the 1720s, an ‘observation turret’ and a gun store, probably built ca 1750.

There are accounts of Erasmus Darwin recovering bits of burnt bone on the hill in the 18th century. At times of celebrations and at times of threatened invasion, beacons were lit on top of the hill.

In a talk organised by Lichfield Discovered in 2014 on Philip Larkin’s connections with Lichfield, Peter Young, the former Town Clerk of Lichfield, said that Larkin wrote three poems when he was staying with relatives at Cherry Orchard in 1940-1941. Young suggested the arched field in ‘Christmas 1940’ refers to Borrowcop Hill.

When Larkin returned to Lichfield from Oxford for a Christmas holiday in 1940-1941, he regularly walked from Cherry Orchard into the centre of Lichfield to drink in the George and the Swan. During that time in Lichfield, he wrote three poems: ‘Christmas 1940’, ‘Out in the lane I pause’ and ‘Ghosts’.

Writing about ‘Christmas 1940’, Larkin told Jim Sutton: ‘I scribbled this in a coma at about 11.45 p.m. last night. The only thing is that its impulse is not purely negative – except for the last 2 lines, where I break off into mumblings of dotage.’

This poem was never published during Larkin’s own lifetime. It was first published in 1992 in Selected Letters of Philip Larkin, 1940-1985, edited by Anthony Thwaite (p 8). It was included in 2005 by AT Tolley in Philip Larkin: Early Poems and Juvenalia (p 135), and more recently it is included by Archie Burnett in Philip Larkin: The Complete Poems (p 171).

The Gazebo was in poor condition by 1963. John Sanders, then Principal of the School of Art and chair of a Lichfield Study Group for the preservation of buildings of interest, announced the group’s intention to enter a Civic Trust ‘improvement competition,’ hoping for a grant of £450.

Meanwhile, the grammar school, which dates from 1495, had moved to the area from Saint John Street in 1903, and it merged with the adjacent King’s Hill secondary modern school in 1971 to become King Edward VI School. Another school in the area, evocatively named Saxon Hill, opened in 1979.

Borrowcop Gazebo was restored in 1985 thanks to the persistence of Derrick Duval (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The gazebo is a square pavilion built of brick with two round arches no each side, a pyramidal tile roof and a ball finial on roof. The arches have square brick piers and pilasters, and narrow imposts on the proud brick arches. Inside, there is a spine wall with a on bench to each side and embossed-tile paving, and renewed roof timbers.

The condition of the gazebo was a cause of concern once again in 1981, when Derrick Duval, an architect who was then a newly elected city councillor (1980-1995), pushed for its restoration. He was the Mayor of Lichfield in 1982, I stayed in his home on Dam Street two or three times around 2009-2011, and he died on 16 December 2022.

Derrick’s dream for the gazebo was eventually achieved in 1985 through the Government’s Community Programme. Borrowcop Gazebo is now owned and maintained by Lichfield City Council.

Borrowcop Hill was once the venue for a Good Friday fair after the more sombre services in the cathedral. The hill was a place for walks and other entertainment, and until the late 20th century children enjoyed tobogganing and skiing down the slopes in the snow at winter.

The urban survey of Lichfield in 2011 pointed out the potential for archaeological deposits to survive at Borrowcop Hill and associated with the line of the Roman Road.

But, as I found on Friday afternoon, it is no longer possible to walk across fields from Cherry Orchard to Borrowcop, as Philip Larkin must have done 85 years ago. Now high railings have enclosed the school field and access to the Gazebo today is only possible along an enclosed, marrow footpath between King’s Hill Road and facing Minor’s Hill.

A hidden narrow pathway off King’s Hill Road leading to Borrowcop Hill (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Christmas 1940, by Philip Larkin

‘High on arched field I stand
Alone: the night is full of stars:
Enormous over tree and farm
The night extends,
And looks down equally to all on earth.

‘So I return their look; and laugh
To see as them my living stars
Flung from east to west across
A windless gulf?

– So much to say that I have never said,
Or ever could.’

‘High on arched field I stand / Alone’ (Philip Larkin) … a lone carved owl perched on books beneath the gazebo on Borrowcop Hill (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Moat House in Lichfield, and mulling over links with the Moat House on Lichfield Street, Tamworth

Moat House at the north end of Bird Street, Lichfield … its name recalls the story of the mediaeval moat around the Cathedral Close (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

I once suggested bringing together the two main local history groups in Lichfield and Tamworth – Lichfield Discovered and the Tamworth and District Society – for shared walking tours of Lichfield Street in Tamworth and Tamworth Street in Lichfield.

Nothing has come of these proposals – yet. But each time I pass the Moat House on Beacon Street in Lichfield, close to Lichfield Cathedral, as I did earlier this thing, I cannot but fail to impishly think of linking it with the Moat House, the former Comberford family home on Lichfield Street in Tamworth.

Moat House and Langton House are two neighbouring Georgian houses at the north end of Bird Street, Lichfield, between the Garden of Remembrance and the entrance to the Cathedral Close. They face the site of the former childhood home of David Garrick, close to the former museum and library. Both are reminders in their names alone of the moat that protected the cathedral in the Middle Ages and of the bishops who built and maintained it.

The Cathedral Close in Lichfield is almost an island onto itself, covering 16 acres and surrounded by a ditch on three sides, with and Minister Pool on the fourth, south side.

According to a 14th century Lichfield chronicler, Roger de Clinton, Bishop of Lichfield (1129-1148), surrounded the Cathedral Close in the early 12th century with a ditch and he fortified the castle or castrum of Lichfield. His work may have included building a wall and gates, strengthening the Cathedral Close.

About a century later, Walter Langton, one of his successors as Bishop of Lichfield (1296-1321), built a new palace in the north-east corner of the Cathedral Close, and he converted a canonical house in the north-west corner into a common residence for the vicars choral.

However, there is no evidence that the ditch around the Close was ever filled with water, and it was dry at the end of the 16th century.

The names of both the Moat House and Langton House, a pair of semi-detached houses on the east side at the north end of Bird Street, recall the work of these two bishops.

Moat House was built on Bird Street in the mid-18th century, probably around 1750, by Thomas Ames, a Lichfield-based builder, in the south-west part of the Close ditch.

Moat House is a Grade II listed building, along with the attached wall to the left and an outbuilding to the rear.

The house is built in the Georgian style in brick with, ashlar dressings, a hipped tile roof and brick stacks. It has a double-depth plan, two storeys with an attic, a four-window range, and a top cornice.

The segmental-headed entrance to the left of centre has a doorcase with an architrave and consoled pediment, with an enriched radial-bar fanlight over a six-panel door.

The windows have sills and rubbed brick flat arches with keys over 12-pane sashes, and there are hipped dormers with casements. The left return has two brick platt bands. There is a 20th century wing to the left of the segmental-headed window with a pegged cross-casement that has leaded glazing.

The rear of Moat House has two coped gables and an attached small gabled outbuilding to the right. There are varied window arrangements, including a 19th century canted bay window.

It is worth looking for the two 18th century rainwater heads with downspouts., and for the stone-coped wall to the left with its a segmental-headed entrance with a plank door.

In the early 19th century, this house was home to Henry Chinn, a lawyer who founded a long-lived legal practice in Lichfield. Henry Chinn was articled as a clerk to William Jackson, a proctor, in 1798. Later that year, he transferred to George Hand of Beacon Place. Hand died childless in 1806, and Chinn continued the practice, admitting his son Thomas in 1816.

The Chinns used Langton House, the house next door to Moat House in Beacon Street, as their offices. The practice survived in the family until the death of Alan Chinn in 1919.

Today, Moat House is divided into offices that are inter-connected with Langton House, on the south side. Like Moat House, Langton House was built in the mid-18th century, probably around 1775, and is also a Grade II building. It was built in the Georgian style as a three-storey house, with a double-depth plan, a four-window range and a top cornice. It is built in brick with ashlar dressings, and it has a hipped tile roof with brick stacks.

There is a segmental-headed entrance to the right of the centre that has a doorcase with an architrave and a consoled pediment, and a radial-bar fanlight over paired three-panel doors. The windows have sills and rubbed brick flat arches over 12-pane sashes, and six-pane sashes on the second floor.

The three-window right return has similar windows over a single-storey wing, with a 12-pane sash window and a plastered return with an end stack. At the rear of the house there is an interesting round-headed stair window.

Although these neighbouring houses now form one block of inter-connected offices, they are a reminder of the once elegant Georgian townhouses that were built as family homes in Lichfield in the 18th century.

Langton House was built in the mid-18th century, probably around 1775, and is also a Grade II building (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

‘Under an oak, in stormy weather, I joined this rogue and whore together’: Jonathan Swift’s wedding in Lichfield

Comberford Hall glimpsed from the train between Tamworth and Lichfield on a foggy morning yesterday … where was the oak tree near Lichfield where Dean Jonathan Swift conducted a wedding? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

When I travel on the train between Tamworth and Lichfield, I take familial pleasure in stretching my neck to catch a swift glance of Comberford Hall, in the rich rolling green Staffordshire countryside, surrounding by mature, spreading trees.

I wondered as passed Comberford Hall on a foggy morning yesterday about a curious account by Dean Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) of a visit to Lichfield almost 300 years ago, when he recalls a clandestine wedding he conducted while he was sheltering from the rain beneath the branches of a spreading tree.

Local lore now associates the story with the name of Shire Oak, near Walsall. But I sometimes wonder whether Swift might instead have conducted that hasty wedding near Lichfield, beneath a spreading oak tree between Tamworth and Lichfield.

Or, as he was travelling on from Lichfield to Chester, could Swift’s wedding have taken place beneath one of the spreading trees along Cross in Hand, on the north-west fringes of Lichfield, once the opening stage of the ancient pilgrim route between Lichfield and Chester, a journey of 142 km (88 miles)?

The last oak of Shire Oak remembered in the pub signs at the Shire Oak, on the corner of Lichfield Street and Chester Street, near Walsall (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Jonathan Swift never married, despite persistent speculation about whether he secretly married Esther Johnson (‘Stella’) in 1716. He also had an interesting relationship with Esther Vanhomrigh (‘Vanessa’), but they never married either, and she died in 1723.

Three years later, in March 1726, the Dean of Saint Patrick’s Cathedral travelled from Dublin to London to deliver the manuscript of Gulliver’s Travels to his publisher, Benjamin Motte. Motte recognised a best-seller but also realised this was an anti-Whig satire and risked prosecution. Swift may have had the manuscript copied so his handwriting could not be used as evidence in any prosecution.

Motte grudgingly gave Swift only £200, and cut, edited or altered many passages and added other material. He used five printing houses to speed production and to avoid piracy, and the first edition of Gulliver’s Travels was published in two volumes on 28 October 1726. By then Swift was back in Dublin. On the return journey, he travelled on foot or on horse from London back to Chester.

Swift later recounted how he stopped near Lichfield on that return journey and sought shelter from what he described as ‘a summer tempest’ under a large oak by the road. I imagine a Swift looking diminutive beneath the Lichfield oak, like Gulliver in Brobdingnag, the land of giants.

While he was there, a man and a pregnant woman joined him, also seeking shelter from the rain under the same spreading tree. Swift recalled the incident later in a letter to his friend Alexander Pope, and how he engaged the pair in conversation. He found they were on their way to Lichfield to be married, but it was obvious the woman was heavily pregnant and that little time was left for a wedding to take place. Every drop of rain was the loss of yet another fretful moment.

The dean realised no time should be lost. He proposed to save the couple the rest of their journey to Lichfield and offered to marry them there and then. His offer was gladly accepted, the ceremony was performed and as the rains cleared and the skies brightened, the newly-weds were about to set off home. But as they were about to leave, the groom realised they needed a certificate to convince their families that they had been married legally and had a church wedding.

When he asked the dean for paper confirmation of the nuptial legalities, Swift pulled out some crumpled paper and a pen, and wrote wittily:

Under an oak, in stormy weather,
I joined this rogue and whore together;
And none but he who rules the thunder
Can put this rogue and whore asunder.

The monument to Jonathan Swift in Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

From Lichfield, Swift travelled on to Chester, and from there to Holyhead to board a boat back to Dublin. His Thoughts on various subjects, also published in 1726, Swift mused again on marriage: ‘Matrimony has many children; Repentance, Discord, Poverty, Jealousy, Sickness, Spleen, Loathing, &c.’

Swift was back in England one more time in 1727, and again stayed with Alexander Pope. The visit was cut short when Swift received the news that Esther Johnson was dying and rushed back home to be with her. She died on 28 January 1728, though Swift was not present at her death and was too ill to attend her funeral in Saint Patrick’s Cathedral. He died on 19 October 1745.

The Shire Oak area near Walsall is named after an ancient tree that was said to have been the sole survivor of the original Walsall Wood. The oak stood on the London to Chester road, marking the boundary between Walsall and Shenstone. Local legend there says that this was the oak where Swift had sheltered and had married the couple on their way to Lichfield. All that now remains of that oak is a piece preserved with a plaque at Shire Oak School

The Shire Oak public house stands at the corner of Lichfield Road and Chester Road in Walsall. The Royal Oak off Chester Road closed in 2015 and was abandoned.

The Shire Oak public house stands at the corner of Lichfield Road and Chester Road in Walsall (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Of course, there other oaks and spreading trees near Lichfield with literary credentials. The local history group Lichfield Discovered has asked whether a spectacular ancient oak tree on Cannock Chase, west of Lichfield, inspired JRR Tolkien.

Tolkien spent time at military camps on the Chase during World War I. When he was in Lichfield in September 1915, he met three close schoolfriends at the George Hotel on Bird Street – a gathering that may have inspired his writing about young hobbits contemplating heading off to war.

Lichfield Discovered has also suggested that the ancient oak tree on Cannock Chase inspired the Ents, tree-like creatures led by Treebeard who fought alongside the forces of good in The Lord of the Rings.

In his poem Ghosts, written in Lichfield on 19 December 1940, Philip Larkin (1922-1985) may be referring to the ghost story of the White Lady at the Swan on Bird Street. Larkin refers to Beacon Park when he says ‘this corner of the park was haunted’, and he refers to people in Lichfield who recounted being touched by something

Like a slim wind with an accusing hand –
Cold as this tree I touch.

Trees also feature in Christmas 1940, a poem written by Larkin that same night:

‘High on arched field I stand
Alone: the night is full of stars:
Enormous over tree and farm
The night extends,
And looks down equally to all on earth.

‘So I return their look; and laugh
To see as them my living stars
Flung from east to west across
A windless gulf?

– So much to say that I have never said,
Or ever could.’

The trees along Cross in Hand Lane prompted an exchange with the poet and songwriter Frank Callery (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The morning fog was a mere memory yesterday afternoon when I went for a walk along Cross Hand Lane behind the Hedgehog after the mid-day Eucharist in Lichfield Cathedral. When I was in Tamworth and Lichfield about this time in February last year, I posted photographs on Facebook taken that day of both Comberford Hall and of the spreading trees along Cross in Hand Lane. In reply, the Dublin-born poet and songwriter Frank Callery, who now lives in Kilkenny, shared with me his song ‘The Lichfield Oak’, which he describes as ‘a mock Traditional / Folk song in search of a singer’:

The Lichfield Oak by Frank Callery:

O the Lichfield Oak was tall and grand,
For centuries it made its stand;
And many folk who passed that way
Admired its shade by night and day!

Inclement weather being the scene,
For shelter, there reposed the Dean;
From Chester came an urgent pair
And with the Dean they sheltered there!

The woman, she was big with child,
She told the Dean, in accents mild,
‘In Lichfield soon we must be wed
Before my bundle’s brought to bed!’

‘Ah!’ says the Dean, ‘No time be lost!
I’ll wed you here without the cost!
And save a journey too, no doubt,
When stops the rain, just turn about!’

‘But what about the ‘Cert’? they cried,
‘ ’Tis requisite — they’ll think we’ve lied!’
From out his pocket came the pen,
And this is what he wrote for them:

Chorus:

‘Under an oak, in stormy weather,
I joined this rogue and wench together,
And none but he who rules the thunder,
Can put this wench and rogue asunder.’

The Lichfield Oak was strong and straight
A Parson might officiate
For those who wished to jump the broom —
The high road for a honeymoon!

And if a cert be requisite
The Parson’s word is law and writ,
To prove the couple truly wed
And give them licence for the bed.

But the Dean being straighter nor the Oak
His holy writ contained no joke,
With crumpled paper and with pen
He made them ‘man and wife’, Amen!

Chorus:

‘Under an oak, in stormy weather,
I joined this rogue and wench together,
And none but he who rules the thunder,
Can put this wench and rogue asunder.
Can put this wench and rogue asunder!’

Spreading trees offer shelter on Cross Hand in Lane in Lichfield, along the old pilgrim road to Chester (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The Lichfield Oak © Frank Callery, 23 July 2021.

A Victorian clock inspired by Lichfield Cathedral remains on display in the old grammar school

The Cathedral Clock in the style of Lichfield Cathedral by Charles Thorneloe (1805-1885), on display in the old grammar school (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

The ‘house warmer’ hosted by Lichfield Discovered in the Old Grammar School, Saint John Street, last week was a joyful celebration and was an opportunity to meet many old friends. But it was also an opportunity to visit the premises of Lichfield District Council, and to see many of the historic exhibits on display.

One of the (literally) striking exhibits is labelled as a ‘Golden Clock for a Great Exhibition’. The Cathedral Clock is a cased striking clock made in the style of Lichfield Cathedral by Charles Thorneloe (1805-1885) of Tamworth Street and later of Bore Street for the Great Exhibition in London in 1851.

The Victorian clock is a reminder of the artistic craft work in Lichfield almost 200 years ago. It was described in the exhibition catalogue as a ‘Gothic Skeleton Clock which strikes quarters and goes 32 days. Lichfield Cathedral.’

The Great Exhibition in the Crystal Palace in Hyde Park attracted 13,000 exhibitors from around the world. It was a celebration of Victorian progress and invention, showcasing the finest technologies from around the world, and was divided into over 30 different classes of objects, ranging from mining and minerals to the latest weaponry.

Charles Thorneloe was exhibitor number 43 among the 739 exhibitors who made up Class 10, Philosophical, Musical, Horological, and Surgical Instruments. He was a well-respected clockmaker and watchmaker based at Tamworth Street and later on Bore Street. His ornate striking clock at the Great Exhibition was designed in the shape of Lichfield Cathedral and displayed his skills as both a metal worker and a clockmaker.

There are records of watchmakers working in Lichfield since at least in 1741, and by 1818 there were five watch and clockmakers, including William Vale in Bore Street, still working in 1841. Edmund Vale was a brass founder employing 15 men and five boys in 1861 and was one of five clockmakers in Lichfield in 1864.

The Thorneloe family in Lichfield can be traced for more 300 years back to Richard Thorneloe and his wife Mary Bell. They had moved from Lancashire by 1705, when their first son, Richard Thorneloe (1705-1749), the ancestor of this family, was born in Lichfield.

Richard Thorneloe’s son, William Thorneloe (1733-1810), was born in Lichfield in 1733 and married Mary Bailes in Saint Michael’s Church, Lichfield, in 1770. Their son, Thomas Thorneloe (1771-1846), was born in Lichfield in 1771. He married Ann Knight (1769-1827) in Coventry in 1797, and they were the parents of seven children, four sons and three daughters, including Charles Thorneloe, who was born in Lichfield in September 1805 and was baptised in Saint Chad’s Church on 8 October 1805.

Charles Thorneloe married Sarah Saunders (1797-1861) in Saint Mary’s Church, Lichfield, on 15 September 1831. By 1834, he was in business as a brass founder and clockmaker in Tamworth Street. He designed and manufactured clocks for over 30 years, and also served as a mentor to clockmakers.

After displaying his skills to the world at the Crystal Palace, Thorneloe returned to Lichfield with his clock. He continued to work at Tamworth Street as a clockmaker and watchmaker, but later moved the business to 25 Bore Street. He was the Mayor of Lichfield in 1861, the year his wife Sarah died.

Charles Thorneloe died on 21 December 1885. Although his siblings had children, whose descendants continued to live in Lichfield in the 20th century, Charles had no children. His business was taken over by John Salloway, who had worked as an apprentice clockmaker to Thorneloe in Tamworth Street from 1861.

John Salloway died in 1900, leaving the business to his brother William Salloway and wife Harriet Salloway. Harriet continued to run the shop and shifted the focus to jewellery and silver. Following a distinguished military career, William’s son, Frank Salloway took over the business in 1922 and eventually passed the baton on to his son John Salloway.

John and Mary Salloway were the parents of Nigel Salloway, who joined the company full time in 1984 and became the fourth generation of the family to run the firm. Salloways traded as a family-run business in Lichfield until 2018, when plans were announced to close shop.

When Nigel Salloway decided to retire, he told the local media that none of his three children wanted to take over the business. ‘Salloway has been a part of my life, man and boy. It’s going to be a very sad day when we finally close the doors,’ he said at the time.’

Meanwhile, Thorneloe’s striking clock designed in the shape of Lichfield Cathedral for the Great Exhibition was acquired by Lichfield District Council in 1983, and was put on display in the District Council House. It continues to impress people to this day, and it is a reminder of one of Lichfield’s finest craftsmen.

The old grammar school is the new home of Lichfield Discovered (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Lichfield Discovered gets a new home in the old grammar school thanks to district council

The Schoolmaster’s House (left) at the old Grammar School on Saint John Street, Lichfield … a new home for Lichfield Discovered (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

I was in Lichfield last week as a guest of the community heritage and history group Lichfield Discovered at the ‘house warmer’ to unveil plans for the Schoolmaster’s House at the old Grammar School on Saint John Street.

Lichfield Discovered has plans to use the rooms in the centuries-old buildings for workshops, tours, events, talks and exhibitions for an initial five-year period, under an agreement with Lichfield District Council.

The former school buildings at the corner of Saint John Street and Frog Lane were bought by Lichfield Rural District Council in 1917 and became council's offices in 1920. In recent years, the rooms have been part of the council offices, for two centuries the property was part of Lichfield Grammar School, where both Samuel Johnson and David Garrick went to school. But, until now, the building has not been open to the public.

The oldest surviving part of the complex is the former headmaster’s house at 45 Saint John Street, built in 1682. The main school room behind the house was rebuilt in 1849. The features that still remain include wood panelling, fireplaces and a wooden spiral staircase up to the attic, which was once used as a dormitory by school boarding pupils and still has some of their names carved into doors.

Lichfield Discovered has found a new home at the old grammar school (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

I have been involved with Lichfield Discovered in small ways in the past, including leading a walking tour around the Cathedral Close in 2014, and recording five interviews with Dave Moore for Lichfield Discovered, discussing my family connections with Lichfield, in 2015.

The former school buildings are part of a larger complex that includes the modern offices that are home to Lichfield District Council. Both the council chamber and the office of the leader of the council are housed in two of older buildings, the Old Grammar School and the School Master’s House. These older buildings in the complex date back to 1682, and have a history that goes back even further, over 500 years.

In its day, it is said, the old grammar school in Lichfield ranked alongside schools such as Eton and Winchester. The school was on the same site for more than 400 years. In that time, it provided education to many famous people, who later went on to be influential in their age.

Lichfield Grammar School was founded in 1495 when Bishop William Smyth refounded Saint John’s Hospital (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The school dates back to November 1495, when William Smyth, Bishop of Lichfield in 1493-1496, refounded the Hospital of Saint John the Baptist and added to it a school for poor children. In the new statutes, Bishop Smyth wrote: ‘It is appointed that there be a Master of Grammar in Priests Orders who shall instruct in grammar all Scholars Gratis, which Master shall receive for his stipend the sum of £10 annually.’

Smyth was a benefactor of a number of educational institutions: he was a co-founder of Brasenose College, Oxford, endowed a fellowship in Oriel College, and gave manors to Lincoln College.

The first school probably stood nearer the road than its successors and must have been demolished before 1577 as a deed from the 27 April 1577 describes the ‘new school’.

The Schoolmaster’s House was built in the Jacobean style in 1682, and fronts onto Saint John Street. The grammar school was separated from Saint John’s Hospital in 1692, but the school continued to use the chapel.

The schoolboys who attended the school included local worthies such the antiquarian Elias Ashmole, the lexicographer Samuel Johnson, the Shakespearean actor David Garrick and the politician and essayist Joseph Addison.

The stone mullioned windows on the ground floor of the building, adjoining the garden, were originally in the second grammar school, which was built in 1577 and demolished in 1849 to make way for the present building. As well as being home to 14 successive headmasters of the grammar school, the attics were also used as dormitories for the boarders. Some of their initials can still be seen carved into the oak doors.

The Jacobean oak fireplace in the house was originally made for No 11 Market Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The site was used as a grammar school until 1903, and the area at the front was used as a playground. In the end, the lack of land meant the school moved to a site on Upper Saint John Street. It merged with King’s Hill Secondary Modern in 1971 to become King Edward VI School.

Meanwhile, the school and master’s house were sold In December 1902 to Theophilus Basil Percy Levett, who promptly sold them two months later to Dr Herbert Major Morgan.

Dr Morgan brought the Jacobean oak fireplace to the house. It was originally made over 400 years ago for the house at 11 Market Street, and its features include carefully carved dragons, wand marine creatures fossilised in the marble.

Lichfield Rural District Council bought the property in 1917, but it was immediately taken over by the army and was used it as a pay office for the Lincolnshire Regiment for the rest of World War I. After World War I, Lichfield Rural District Council regained ownership of the building. It has been used for local government offices since 1920, and the school house now houses the council chamber.

Civic heraldry in the council chamber (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

After the reorganisation of local government in 1974, the building passed to Lichfield District Council. A large extension was added in 1987 facing Frog Lane, incorporating a new main entrance, but the 1849 school room continues to serve as the council chamber. The council leader Doug Pullen was among the speakers at last week’s ‘house warmer.’

Today, Lichfield Discovered has more than 10,000 followers online, including historians, teachers, community workers and museum curators who volunteer in their own time.

Katie Gomez of Lichfield Discovered describes the building as stunning and packed with history, and says she is passionate about using it as a place to share Lichfield’s history and legacy. The future plans include open days, tours of the building, family history days and events in partnership with museums throughout the region.

The former school house now houses the council chamber for Lichfield District Council (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Sunset and evening lights in Lichfield before Choral Evensong and a ‘house warmer’

Sunset during my walk along Cross in Hand Lane in Lichfield on Thursday evening (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

I was in Lichfield on Thursday to join my friends in the local history group Lichfield Discovered as they celebrated with a ‘house warmer’ to mark their move into the old Grammar School on Saint John Street, across the street from Saint John’s Hospital.

Ever since my late teens, I have seen Lichfield as my spiritual home, and on each visit take time for quiet reflection and prayer in the chapel in Saint John’s and to follow the cycle of daily prayer in Lichfield Cathedral. This week, this included the mid-day Eucharist with prayers for peace at Saint Chad’s shrine in the Lady Chapel and Choral Evensong later in the day.

These regular visits to Lichfield are part of recharging my spiritual batteries, putting me back in touch with the early experiences that would help to shape my adult faith and eventually lead to ordination.

But this is not as pious or sanctimonious as it might sound or seem. I make sure there is time too n these mini-retreats to meet friends, to reconnect with family roots, to eat lunch or dinner, and to go for long walks that are good for the soul and body, the heart and the stomach.

Walking along Cross in Hand Lane, one of my favourite walks in the English countryside (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

On Thursday, after the mid-day Eucharist, I first went for a walk around Minster Pool, then along Beacon Street and on into Cross in Hand Lane, one of my favourite walks in the English countryside, close to the junction of Beacon Street and Stafford Road on the northern edges of Lichfield.

According to the Victoria History of Staffordshire, Cross in Hand Lane was the main road from Lichfield to Stafford until 1770. Now it is just a quiet country lane, where I regularly stroll through fields and farmland, by country cottages, farmhouses and timber-framed barns and by babbling brooks.

The lane eventually leads to the small and delightfully-named village of Farewell, about 3 km north-west of Lichfield. The name does not mean ‘goodbye’; instead, it means ‘clear spring’, and comes from the Anglo-Saxon name, frager, meaning ‘fair’ or ‘clear’ and wiell, meaning ‘spring.’

But spring has not yet come to Cross in Hand Lane, and there is still a winter look about the fields. The soil is a combination of gravel, clay and sand, particularly suitable for growing turnips, wheat and barley. This had been agricultural land ever since Anglo-Saxon days, and landscape has probably looked the same for centuries.

Walking along Cross in Hand Lane, behind the Hedgehog Vintage Inn (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Many historians believe Cross in Hand Lane is so named because pilgrims or travellers on their way to Lichfield and wanting sanctuary at the Benedictine priory in Farewell would use this route, carrying a cross in their hand. Others say the priory and a cross may have stood out as one of the last stages on the pilgrim route between Chester and Lichfield.

There are records of a mediaeval cross between Beacon Street and Cross in Hand Lane, but there are no traces of this cross today. Others say that the cross with the hand that stood at the fork in the road in the 15th century was simply a post to point directions.

The course of the road was straightened in 1770 to avoid the hollow way in Cross in Hand Lane, and the road was diverted to follow a new line to the east, now the present Stafford Road.

Once again, I decided to have lunch in the Hedgehog Vintage Inn, near the corner of Stafford Road, Beacon Street and Cross in Hand Lane. I have stayed there many times in the past, and it has breath-taking views across miles-upon-miles of open, flat Staffordshire countryside and to the spires of the cathedral.

As I left the Hedgehog after a lingering and late lunch, the bare trees were silhouetted in black against a sky that was turning to a glowing orange thanks to the low and slowly setting sun. It was a suitable reminder on this short one-day retreat of the majesty of God and the beauty of God’s creation.

Walking aorund Stowe Pool before Choral Evensong in Lichfield Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

From there, it took less than half an hour to stroll back into the cathedral. But before going back into the cathedral, I went for a walk around Stowe Pool. The colours of the sky were a dark purple, with shades of orange in the aftermath of the sunset, and the light was still bright enough for me to take in the panoramic view that encircled Stowe Pool, with Lichfield Cathedral at the west end of the pool, the spire of Saint Mary’s slightly to my left, and Saint Chad’s Church behind me.

I then returned to Lichfield Cathedral and sat in the chapter stall for Choral Evensong, sung by the boys and girls of the Cathedral School choir.

After enjoying the ‘house warmer’ with Lichfield Discovered in the old grammar school, I caught a late evening train back to Milton Keynes. On the journey home, my heart was filled with joy as I reflected on the beauty of the world seen on Cross in Hand Lane and reflected in the skies and waters of Stowe Pool. At Choral Evensong, the choir had sung Psalm 34 which reminds us to ‘taste, and see, how gracious the Lord is.’

The West Door of Lichfield Cathedral after Choral Evensong (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

But my heart is also filled with a sadness that is tinged with anger as I think about the events unfolding in the United States these last weeks. Perhaps some verses of Psalm 34 at Evensong were also offering me consolation if not comfort:

Keep thy tongue from evil : and thy lips, that they speak no guile.
Eschew evil, and do good : seek peace, and ensue it.
The eyes of the Lord are over the righteous : and his ears are open unto their prayers.
The countenance of the Lord is against them that do evil : to root out the remembrance of them from the earth.
The righteous cry, and the Lord heareth them: and delivereth them out of all their troubles.

Bore Street at night time, on my way from Lichfield Cathedral to the Lichfield Discoered ‘house warmer’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

A day of reflections in Lichfield Cathedral in the company of the ‘Ladies of the Vale’

The three spires of Lichfield Cathedral seen through an archway in the Cathedral Close this afternoon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

I have spent much of today in Lichfield, visiting the chapel in Saint John’s Hospital, going for walks along Cross in Hand Lane, Beacon Street, and around Minister Pool and Stowe Pool, attending Choral Evensong in Lichfield Cathedral this evening and, earlier in the day, attending the mid-day Eucharist with the Thursday Prayers for Peace at the Saint Chad Shrine in the Lady Chapel, celebrated by Bishop Paul Thomas. He is Bishop of Oswestry, a suffragan bishop in the Diocese of Lichfield, and a provincial episcopal visitor in the Province of Canterbury since he was consecrated two years ago (2 February 2023).

For many reasons, both Lichfield Cathedral and the chapel in Saint John’s Hospital have been my spiritual homes since my late teens.

For residents of Lichfield and visitors alike, the three spires of Lichfield Cathedral symbolise of the city. It is the only mediaeval cathedral in England with three spires: Truro Cathedral in Cornwall also has three spires, but it was built in 1880-1910; in Scotland, Saint Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh, also has three spires, and was built in 1874-1879.

The three spires of Edinburgh Cathedral are known as Main, Barbara and Mary. But, while the three spires of Lichfield Cathedral are often known as the ‘Ladies of the Vale’, I do not know of them ever having individual names.

David Adkins of Buton upon Trent, who labels himself an anthropologist and historian, recently claimed to have solved a mystery and that he knows why Lichfield Cathedral is the only mediaeval cathedral in England with three spires.

‘They have always been something of a mystery as no-one has ever discovered why the cathedral has these three enormous spires’, he asserts. ‘A mystery that is until you remember that Lichfield was the seat of the third archbishop of England. The Archbishopric of Lichfield was short-lived and disappeared over 1200 years ago, it only lasted from 787 to 803 AD and meant that Staffordshire was the only other county in England to have ever had an Archbishopric based within it’.

He claims: ‘The three spires can only represent one thing – the three Archbishops of England – and it is almost certain that the medieval stonemasons created the three spires in memory of Lichfield’s past. The two smaller spires symbolised the two original archbishops – York and Canterbury – and the larger central spire represented the Archbishop of Lichfield itself.’

However, Adkins provides no evidence or sources to support his suppositions. And his assertion lacks credibility for a number of other.

Archbishop Hygeberht of Lichfield in a window at the east end of the Chapter House in Lichfield Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

King Offa of Mercia created the position of Archbishop of Lichfield in 787. The dioceses of Winchester, Sherborne, Selsey, Rochester and London remained within the Province of Canterbury, while the dioceses of Worcester, Hereford, Leicester, Lindsey, Dommoc and Elmham became suffragan sees of Lichfield. Pope Adrian I concurred, and it was approved at the Council of Chelsea, sometimes known as the ‘contentious synod’.

Hygeberht, or Higbert, who had been the Bishop of Lichfield since 787, became the first and only Archbishop of Lichfield. In response, King Offa agreed to send an annual shipment of 365 gold coins to the Pope – seen as the origin of Peter’s Pence, an annual levy paid to Rome by the English Church – and to supply the lights in Saint Peter’s in Rome.

However, the position of Archbishop of Lichfield lasted for only 16 years, until Hygeberht resigned in 803. One of his last acts as archbishop, it is said, was to consecrate his successor Ealdwulf as Bishop of Lichfield, and the title of archbishop was laid aside. Hygeberht is listed as an abbot at the Council of Cloveshoo in the year 803 that oversaw the demotion of Lichfield in 803, and he died some time later. His successor, Bishop Aldulf, renounced the metropolitan powers in favour of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and died ca 814-816.

Far from being a protected secret part of the history of Lichfield Cathedral, the story is told publicly in windows by Charles Eamer Kempe in the chapter house.

Adkins in his innovative but unsourced claims says the masons gave the central spire of Lichfield Cathedral ‘extra height to set it above both York and Canterbury, and as a result the whole building is a commemoration of Lichfield’s prestigious past. It clearly depicts Lichfield’s position as the third major player in Anglo-Saxon politics and religion.’

There has been a cathedral in Lichfield from about the year 700, and there may have been a church on the site as early as 659. After the invasion of 1066, the Normans built a new cathedral

Roger de Clinton, Bishop of Lichfield in 1129-1148, built a new cathedral in Lichfield in honour of Saint Mary and Saint Chad, and also laid out the main streets of Lichfield in a grid pattern, still in evidence almost 800 years later. Work on building the cathedral continued in the 13th and 14th centuries. This work probably began with the choir at the east end and progressed west through the transepts, chapter house, nave, and south-west tower. The choir dates from 1200, the transepts from 1220-1240 and the nave was started ca 1260. The octagonal chapter house was completed in 1249. The cathedral was completed when the Lady Chapel was built in the 1330s.

The central tower, the south-east tower and the three spires followed. The central spire of Lichfield Cathedral is 77 metres (253 ft) high and was completed in 1315, and its story is told in the current exhibition in the Chapter House, ‘Story of a Spire’, which was due to close last August but has been extended until this month. The west spires are about 58 metres (190 ft), with the south spire a little taller than the north spire. These towers were added over five years after the death of the one and only Archbishop of Lichfield, and it stretched creduity to imagine that at that stage anyone would go to such lengths and to such expense to structurally comment in such a brief episode in church history that is remembered as a mere political aberration.

The cathedral was besieged three times in the Civil War in the mid-17th century and was severely damage. The central spire was demolished, the roofs ruined and all the stained glass smashed. Bishop John Hacket began restoring Lichfield Cathedral in the 1660s, and had repaired the cathedral within nine years. The restored cathedral was rededicated on Christmas Day 1669.

The interior of the cathedral was rearranged at the end of the 18th century and further restored in the 19th century by Sir George Gilbert Scott, giving us the cathedral we see today.

There is no source to indicate that Hackett saw the restoration of the cathedral spires as an exercise in remembering one single episode in the history of Lichfield almost 900 years earlier, when there was a single Archbishop of Lichfield.

CE Kempe’s window in the South Quire Aisle showing Bishop John Hacket restoring the spires of Lichfield Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Adkins does not indicate anywhere on his social media profiles what his qualifications are, apart from stating he studied at the University of Leeds. There are no indications that he has ever held an academic post in either discipline, that he has been published in peer-reviewed journals or that he is author of academically acclaimed books.

On the other hand, he has made some extravagant claims, including that he has unravelled the mystery of the Staffordshire knot, and that he alone knows that the Shroud of Turin is a tablecloth that was made in Burton upon Trent in Staffordshire.

He claims that lost treasure that could include the Ark of the Covenant and the Holy Grail may be lying underneath Sinai Park, a manor house near Burton. He says he is convinced the priceless treasures were taken from Jerusalem in 1307, were stored beneath Sina Park, and that this was a secret location of the Knights Templar.

His sensationalist claims about what he describes as ‘one of the greatest religious treasures in the world’ have led to equally sensational newspaper headlines like: ‘Raiders of the Lost Park’.

In other headline-grabbing claims, he has said the so-called Shapira Scroll – said to contain ‘the 11th Commandment’, ‘You shall not hate your brother in your heart: I am God, your god’ – is buried in Stapenhill Cemetery in Burton. The Shapira Scroll was denounced widely by scholars in the 19th century as a forgery.

This evening, I am on my way from the Cathedral to the Old Grammar School on Saint John’s Street, across the street from Saint John’s Hospital. The building dates back to 1577, and is to become home to the local history group Lichfield Discovered.

Over the coming years, Lichfield Discovered plans to transform some of the spaces at the Old Grammar School and to work with local people, groups and the city’s museums and heritage sites to celebrate the history Lichfield.

Lichfield Cathedral in today’s afternoon sunshine … the only mediaeval cathedral in England with three spires (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)