ST. JOHN'S
A pre-Conquest foundation, St. John the Baptist's church became for a while (1075-1095) the seat of a bishop. Peter, the first Norman bishop of the united dioceses of Lichfield, Coventry and Chester started to build a cruciform building on the usual grand scale of Norman Cathedrals and it continued intermittently long after the see was transferred to Coventry in 1095. The church retained its collegiate status and held the rank of a Cathedral with its own Dean and Chapter, with Vicars Choral living in Vicars Lane and petty canons on the river side of the church, until the dissolution, when about a quarter of the by now dilapidated building became the parish church.
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ST. JOHN'S CHURCH TOWER |
- April 15th 1881. Frank Simpson was 18 when he
took this photograph on Good Friday, the morning of this great disaster. hie records somewhat breathlessly 'April
14 - on the eve of this day the Rector was worried of the State of the Tower. At 10 p.m. a rumbling Noise was heard
and Sound of Bells. It was then found the Tower had fallen. Next morning (Good Friday) at 4 a.m. a further fall
took place, Roof gave way. The Belfry, windows on the North East sides disappeared almost entirely.'
It was believed that there were three towers to the church, a central one very tall and large which fell in 1468
and destroyed. - the choir and part of the south transept, and two massive western ones one of which fell in 1574
and the other which is depicted here. This tower was pulled down in 1881 and the present small bell tower and early
English style porch were built very quickly over the next 3 or 4 years. Perhaps the parochial church council agreed
with Ormerod (1819) who felt that 'there is something displeasing in the general appearance of the tower and its
disproportion to the venerable ruins which it stands at the side of'. The church itself had been greatly restored
1859-66 but by 1880, Helsby reported that the stone of the tower 'is so very soft and crumbling that it . . . is
hardly safe in its present state'.
