The Catholic Chapel is situated in Beeche’s-lane, near the southern portion of the town walls. It is a neat building erected in 1776, and enlarged in 1825; the front is stuccoed, and surmounted by a plain cross. The interior has a tasteful and elegant appearance; the altar rests on a sarcophagus, on the front of which is a painting of the last supper, above is a figure of Christ on the cross. On the gallery is a small organ, and on each side the entrance an elegant marble shell for the holy water. The chapel will hold about three hundred worshippers. The Rev. Eugene Egan is the priest. A plot of land, extending from Belmont to the southern walls, has been purchased, with the intention of erecting a new Catholic church, on a scale commensurate with the wants of an increasing congregation. The Catholics formerly met for worship in an upper room of an old house in St. Alkmund’s-square.
The Baptist Chapel, situated in Claremont-street, a plain brick building, was opened for divine worship in 1780, and enlarged in 1810. A society of this persuasion is stated to have existed in this town, in the time of the Commonwealth. In the chapel is a small memorial, of Mr. Palmer, who was pastor of the congregation for twenty-seven years.
The Wesleyan Methodist Chapel is a commodious building, on St. John’s-hill, erected in 1804, and subsequently enlarged and decorated. It is neatly fitted up, and surrounded with galleries, in which is a small organ. It is calculated to hold 700. The Methodists have also small places of worship in the Castle Foregate and New-street, Frankwell.
The Wesleyan New Connexion Chapel, (Ebenezer,) situated at Tower-place, is a handsome building, having two entrances, with a Doric portico to each. The cost of the structure was £1500, and it was opened for divine worship, June 13th, 1834. The interior has a light and pleasing appearance; it is without galleries; in the centre of the chapel are two rows of pews, with a row on each of the sides, which ascend gradually from the floor; the blank walls display arches and pilasters, supporting a frieze and cornice.
The Friends’ Meeting House, a plain brick structure, in a retired situation, on St. John’s-hill, is fitted up with much simplicity and neatness. It was erected in 1746, and enlarged in 1807.
The Welsh Calvinistic Chapel, a brick structure, erected on the site of a former edifice, is situated in Hill’s-lane. It is calculated to accommodate about 400, and was opened for divine worship in December, 1826. The Dissenters of this persuasion have also a small chapel, situated in the Wagon and Horses passage, Pride-hill. The service in both these chapels is in the Welsh language.
The Primitive Methodists have a place of worship to accommodate about four hundred, situated in Castle-court. They have also a small chapel, at the Old Heath.
SCHOOLS.
The Royal Free Grammar School, situated near the Castle gates, is a noble institution for the education of youth, founded by King Edward VI., in 1552, and endowed with the greater portion of the revenues of the two dissolved colleges of St. Mary and St. Chad. Queen Elizabeth greatly augmented the endowment, in 1571, by adding the rectory of Chirbury, with additional tithes and estates in St. Mary’s parish. The structure is large and lofty, and occupies two sides of a quadrangle, with a square pinnacled tower at the angle, partly rebuilt in 1831. The original school was of timber, and the present tower, chapel, and library, were added in 1595. The wooden building was taken down in 1630, and its place supplied by the present stately edifice of Grinshill free stone. In the centre is a gateway, adorned on each side by a rude Corinthian column, supporting statues of a scholar and a graduate bareheaded, in the costume of the times. Over the arch is an inscription in Greek, importing that a love of literature is essential to the formation of a scholar. The whole structure exhibits an incongruous mode of building, and that mixture of styles, “where the Grecian and the pointed, however discordant and irreconcilable, are jumbled together, and compose a fantastic species, hardly assignable to any class or name.” The principal school room, which occupies the upper story, was originally divided by three partitions with folding doors, but these being removed, it forms a very spacious and noble apartment. The chapel, in which prayers are read by the head master every morning, occupies the ground floor, and is divided from the ante-chapel by a very handsome oak screen carved in the grotesque manner prevalent in the days of Elizabeth. The ceiling is adorned with fret work, preserved from the ruins of St. Alkmund’s church. Above the chapel is the library, which was rebuilt at considerable expense in 1815. It contains a valuable collection of manuscripts and books—one side being occupied by the library of the late Dr. Taylor. Two large pointed windows, with mullioned tracery, afford light to this apartment;—in the northern window are the arms of Edward VI., Queen Elizabeth, St. John’s College, Cambridge; the See of Lichfield and Coventry impaling Cornwallis, and those of the town;—in the south windows are the arms of the four principal benefactors, with appropriate inscriptions in Latin. Around the walls are portraits of Henry VIII., Edward VI., an Admiral in the costume of the time of Charles II., and several of the former head masters.
Among the curiosities in the library are three sepulchral stones, discovered in ploughing a field near Wroxeter. The largest has on its summit, a pine-cone between two lions, and beneath the pediment a rose. The first is taken from the Picea, called by Pliny, Feralis Arbor, expressive of its melancholy subject, and not unfrequent on memorials of this kind; the inscription denotes the death of C. Mannivus Secundus, of the town of Polentia, a beneficiarius, or veteran of the twentieth legion, who had served his time, and was called again into the service by the entreaties of the chief legate. The second stone has, on the upper part, a human face, two dolphins, and two serpents. The third is inscribed to M. Petronius, sigifer, or standard bearer, to the Legio quatuor-decima gemina, the fourteenth double legion, or a legion formed from two. As this legion never was in Britain, the learned Dr. Ward supposes that Petronius only came for his health and died here. There are also various other interesting antiquities, chiefly found at Wroxeter, and a small collection of fossils and natural curiosities. In front and at the back of the schools are play grounds, contiguous to which are houses for the master and the assistant-masters, with ample accommodation for boarders who come from all parts of the kingdom. The grammar school has long maintained a pre-eminent rank among the public seminaries of sound learning and religious education in this country, and has sent forth numerous individuals who have been distinguished for their eminent classical attainments. Under the care of its first master, Thomas Ashton, we learn there were two hundred and ninety scholars, among whom were the sons of many of the first families in England. Camden, when he wrote, says—“it was the best filled in all England, being indebted for their flourishinge state to provision made by the excellent and worthie Thomas Ashton”—who was a munificent contributor to the school himself, and was instrumental in procuring the grant of augmentation from Queen Elizabeth. Mr. Ashton resigned his office some years before his death, but he continued to cherish the seminary over which he had presided with paternal care. He drew up the code of laws by which it was governed for more than two centuries; and one of his last acts was to visit the school, when he preached a farewell sermon to the inhabitants of the town, after which that “Godlie father,” accompanied with the tears and blessings of the people, returned to Cambridge, near which he died at the end of a fortnight, 1578.