On Sunday 4th February 2024, the bell ringers celebrated the licensing of Marianne Hayward as Associate Priest with a quarter peal in the evening before choral evensong.
Marianne was able to ring in the quarter peal as shown in the summary below:
For more than 60 years, a full 3 hour peal has been attempted at St Andrew’s on Christmas Eve (or as close to Christmas as possible).
2023 was no exception and the bells were rung continuously for 3 hours and 7 minutes to celebrate the Christmas Festival:
Essex Association
St Andrew
Saturday, 23 December 2023 in 3h 7min
5040 Spliced Major (2m)
(3600 Plain Bob; 1440 Cambridge Surprise)
Composed by: R. Baldwin
1 M Louise Booth
2 Marianne R Hayward
3 William M Beech
4 Helen J Carter
5 Jonathan R Slack
6 Andrew P Barham
7 Colin Friend
8 Clive J Stephenson (C)
Rung for the Festival of Christmas.
Also in thanksgiving for the life of James A Bullock formerly of Dagenham who passed away earlier this week, 6 months short of his 100th birthday.
On Saturday 23rd September 2023, our team of 6 bell ringers travelled to Loughton church for the annual district call change competition.
We were drawn to ring first and, after some initial nerves, settled into about 5 minutes ofconfident ringing.
There were 4 other teams, all of us judged on the evenness of our ringing whilst the conductor changed the order of the bells.
At the end of the competition, Hornchurch were declared the winning team, having scored the fewest number of faults (errors).
The full results were as follows:
Well done to all those who took part.
On Saturday 16th September 2023, our coach of 47 bell ringers and friends left St Andrew’s for our autumn outing to Suffolk.
The day was organised by John Church helped by Jonathan Slack who learnt to ring in Suffolk as a child.
Our first stop was the pretty village of Boxford where we were welcomed with coffee and cake in the church. The bells here were heavy and quite difficult but we managed to ring Stedman, Cambridge and Rutland.
Our lunch stop was Hadleigh, another heavy ring of 8 bells with the tenor just over a ton. One of our ringers, James Riley, has family in Hadleigh and they were able to watch and listen to him ring the tenor to Grandsire Triples.
Following our excellent lunch, we travelled to Buxhall, a newly augmented ring of 8 bells; followed by Great Finborough, an easy going ring of 6 bells in a beautiful country setting.
Our final stop of the day was Stowmarket where we were provided with tea and cakes in the church café. We were privileged to be the first visiting band to ring on the improved and re-tuned bells which have just been augmented from 8 to 10. Jamie Slack was able to ring with his Granddad who rings in Suffolk and Carys Hayward rang Plain Hunt on 9 for the first time. The more experienced ringers rang Stedman Caters and Little Bob Royal.
Everyone enjoyed the day and our thanks go to John and Jonathan for all their hard work.
Carys Hayward at Hadleigh with Mum and sister
Experienced ringers at Stowmarket
Jamie Slack at Stowmarket with Father Jonathan (far right) and John Church (far left)
On Sunday 10th September 2023, the commitment and achievements of three of our bell ringers was recognised during the morning family service.
Mark Lendon, Valerie Swain and James Riley have all achieved ringing their first quarter peal during the past year. This means ringing continuously for about 45 minutes and involves considerable physical and mental effort.
Mark returned to ringing after the pandemic having learnt to ring as a youngster. He has rung several quarter peals in the past year. Val learnt to ring in 2018 For ‘Ringing Remembers’ and has rung regularly ever since including two quarter peals. James learnt to ring in 2022 and has now rung two quarter peals in little over a year.
Congratulations to all three ringers shown in the photo below with our vicar Ken Wylie and ringing master Clive Stephenson.
On Saturday 10th June 2023, St Andrew’s bell ringers entered a team into the SW Essex Striking Competition heats at Dagenham.
We rang for about seven or eight minutes and were judged on the accuracy of our ringing.
We rang well and finished in 2nd place behind West Ham but ahead of Walthamstow, St Mary who came 3rd.
Congratulations to our band of ringers, who are shown in the photograph below.
Those taking part were (L-R in the photograph):
Hornchurch bell ringer James Riley first expressed an interest in learning to ring in May 2022, just before the Platinum Jubilee of our late Queen.
He was directed to St Andrew’s tower and had his first introduction to bell handling on 31st May 2022.
He has attended regularly and made determined progress ever since. He now rings on Sunday mornings and was part of the team that rang for the Coronation of King Charles III.
Furthermore, on 31st May 2023, James rang his first quarter peal exactly one year since his first bell ringing lesson.
Although a bit nervous, James rang exceptionally well for 45 minutes to complete this fantastic achievement.
Well done James!
The quarter peal was a celebration of the wedding of fellow bell ringer Charles Page to Linda Hardwidge on 29th May 2023 at St Laurence Church in Upminster where James also attends.
Full details of the quarter peal are as follows:
St Andrew
Wednesday, 31 May 2023
1260 Plain Bob Doubles
1 Mark E Lendon
2 John M Church
3 Philip Petchey
4 Hayden R Musham
5 Clive J Stephenson (C)
6 James P Riley
Rung to celebrate the wedding of Charles and Linda Page on 29th May.
First quarter for tenor ringer on the one year anniversary of his first bell ringing lesson.
On Saturday 13th May 2023, 46 bell ringers and friends set off from St Andrew’s to visit 5 different churches in Hertfordshire.
Most of the churches had eight bells, not too heavy and fairly easy to ring. This gave our young ringers, Carys, Ellen & Jamie a good opportunity to ring well whilst the more experienced ringers could ring some difficult methods without having to worry about the bells.
We visited Great Stanmore and Aldenham before our buffet lunch at Bushey Heath. After lunch, the bells improved and the ringing became more enjoyable, especially at Bushey and Langleybury.
Bushey was home to a ringer called Bertram Prewett who rang in a record peal of 9 hours at Hornchurch in 1912. He sadly lost his life in the First World War, but we were able to see many peal boards at Bushey with his name on.
Our final stop at Langleybury gave people an opportunity to walk along the canal before our evening meal at a pub with Harry Potter connections.
An enjoyable day with some good ringing, excellent food, and great company.
As bell ringers our central body encouraged us to ‘Ring for the King’ and on Saturday 6th May 2023, that is exactly what we did.
At St Andrew’s at 10.00am, 25 bell ringers gathered to celebrate this momentous occasion. Most of the ringers present could not remember the last coronation in 1953 and none were old enough to have rung for it.
Taking it in turns, we rang St Andrew’s bells for a full hour leading up to the Coronation service at Westminster Abbey at 11am. Everybody had the opportunity to ring from ‘Rounds to Kings’ which on ten bells would be changing from 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 to 9,7,5,3,1,2,4,6,8,10; a very musical combination.
We ended with 70 changes of Grandsire Triples, marking the 70 years between the coronations of Queen Elizabeth II and King Charles III.
The photograph below shows some of the ringers that took part in the morning ringing.
In the afternoon, a different team assembled to ring a full peal of Grandsire Caters on all 10 bells. The peal lasted for more than 3 hours and was a fitting way to celebrate the new King’s Coronation.
Full details are shown below along with a photograph of the ringers taking part.
Essex Association
St Andrew
Saturday, 6 May 2023 in 3hr 5min
5003 Grandsire Caters
James George
1 Andrew P Barham
2 Matthew E Rayner
3 Dylan J Thomas
4 Marianne R Hayward
5 Simon M Barnes
6 Lucas J Owen
7 Kye L Leaver
8 Roderic K Bickerton
9 Clive J Stephenson (C)
10 Dave J Capewell
Rung following the Coronation of H M King Charles III and Queen Camilla at Westminster Abbey earlier this day.
First peal for 26 years – 10.
On Sunday 7th May, the bells were rung before both of our services with a Coronation theme.
In the evening, a quarter peal slightly earlier than usual allowed two of our bell ringing choristers (Ethan & Hayden Musham) to ring and sing for the Coronation Evensong; an outstanding contribution to the life of St Andrew’s.
Quarter peal details are as follows:
St Andrew
Sunday, 7 May 2023
1260 Plain Bob Triples
1 Michelle A Stephenson
2 Julie A Bloomfield
3 Gavin S Carpenter
4 James Laken
5 Hayden R Musham
6 Anthony J Bloomfield
7 Clive J Stephenson (C)
8 Ethan J Musham
For Evensong celebrating the Coronation of H M King Charles III and Queen Camilla.
First inside on 8 – 5.
25th Quarter – 1.
The Coronation of King Charles III will take place on 6th May 2023. Anyone wishing to learn to ring bells for this occasion should get in touch using the Contact Us page.
