Madeley in Telford / Madelie

Image copyright © Wesley Chapel, 2015

No known copyright restriction / Fair Dealing

Results: 4 records

information

Scene Description: making a new font from old pews? old pews being turned into wooden panels that will make up the base or supporting structure for the new font

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © DylanHartley, 2015

Image Source: digital photograph in DylanHartley [http://dylanhartley.com/construction-of-the-font-for-madeley-church/] [accessed 9 July 2015]

Copyright Instructions: No known copyright restriction / Fair Dealing

view of basin - interior - detail

Scene Description: basin interior of the 19thC alabaster font; now in the Wesley Chapel, London

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Wesley Chapel, 2015

Image Source: digital photograph in the Wesley Chapel site [www.wesleyschapel.org.uk/Virtual Chapel/font.htm] [accessed 9 July 2015]

Copyright Instructions: No known copyright restriction / Fair Dealing

view of church exterior - southwest view

Scene Description: Source caption: "There has been a church building on the site of the present St Michael’s Church since Norman times, the present octagonal building was designed by Thomas Telford and built in 1796."

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Douglas Law, 2015

Image Source: digital photograph taken 25 March 2015 by Richard Law [www.geograph.org.uk/photo/4425863] [accessed 9 July 2015]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0

view of font

Scene Description: Fletcher's 19thC alabaster font: dreadfully Victorian; now in the Wesley Chapel, London

Copyright Statement: Image copyright © Wesley Chapel, 2015

Image Source: digital photograph in the Wesley Chapel site [www.wesleyschapel.org.uk/Virtual Chapel/font.htm] [accessed 9 July 2015]

Copyright Instructions: No known copyright restriction / Fair Dealing

INFORMATION

FontID: 16460MAD
Church/Chapel: Parish Church of St. Michael [old church demolished ca. 1795]
Church Patron Saints: St. Michael
Church Location: Church Street, Madeley, Shropshire, TF7 5BN [the new church]
Country Name: England
Location: Shropshire, West Midlands
Directions to Site: Madeley is now part of Telford, to the S of the town centre, on the B4373 [NB: not to be confused with Madeley just across the border into Staffordshire]
Ecclesiastic Region: Diocese of Hereford
Historical Region: Hundred of Patton [in Domesday] -- Liberty and Borough of Wenlock
Font Location in Church: [cf. FontNotes]
Century and Period: , Medieval
Church Notes: old church demolished ca. 1795; present church by Thomas Telford opened 1797
There is an entry for Madely [variant spelling] in the Domesday survey [http://opendomesday.org/place/SJ6904/madeley/] [accessed 9 July 2015], but it mentions neither cleric nor church in it. Anderson (1864) reports that the church of Madeley appears in the taxation of 1291. The Shropshire Note and Queries (issue of 27 August 1886: 158) reports that "The Antiquarian states that the font in use during the vicariate of Rev John Fletcher, for many years the property of a private individual, has been presented to the president of the Wesleyan Conference, and is about to be added to the recently established Museum of Methodist Antiquities in London" [cf. infra]; the entry continues to suggest that the font be restored to the church instead. [NB: John William Fletcher (1729-1785), vicar of Madeley St. Michael's between 1760 and 1785, is buried in this church]. Archaeologia Cambrensis (vol. 13 (1867), 3rd series : 402) reports on an excursion to Madeley on 13 August 1867 by members of the Cambrian Archaeological Association, who describe the church here as "one of the most remarkable in the county", and add: "The font is Norman, and unusually large even for a Norman one". The Victoria County History (Shropshire, vol. 11, 1985) notes: "Parts of Madeley old church may have been 12th-century, [...] and its dedication to St. Michael, recorded c. 1740, [...] may suggest an early centre of worship. [...] The lower part of the tower may have been 12th-century. [...] In 1788 the vestry had the tower taken down. [...] The building of a new church was soon mooted but only in 1794 did a vestry committee approve a revised plan by Thomas Telford [...] for a building to provide 600 sittings for some £1,600. The old church, then ruinous, was demolished, and for two and a half years Sunday morning services were held in the vicarage barn, afternoon services (including baptisms and celebrations of holy communion) in Coalbrookdale and Madeley Wood schoolrooms. The new church was opened in 1797." There is no mention of a font in the VCH entry. The Wesley's Chapel and Leysian Mission, a Methodist congregation located in the heart of London, reports: "The nineteenth century alabaster font came from Revd. John Fletcher’s church at Madeley in Shropshire. The carved stone within is from one of the steps of Nathaniel Gilbert’s house in Antigua, where he began preaching to his slaves in 1759. This was the beginning of Methodism in the Caribbean." [cf. supra]. A new font, made from recycled hundred-year-old pews, is reported in DylanHartley [http://dylanhartley.com/construction-of-the-font-for-madeley-church/] [accessed 9 July 2015].

COORDINATES

Church Latitude & Longitude Decimal: 52.633722, -2.45025
Church Latitude & Longitude DMS: 52° 38′ 1.4″ N, 2° 27′ 0.9″ W
UTM: 30U 537205 5831668

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone

REFERENCES

Victoria County History [online], University of London, 1993-. Accessed: 2015-07-09 00:00:00. URL: https://www.british-history.ac.uk.
Anderson, John Corbet, Shropshire, its early history and antiquities, comprising […], London: Willis and Sotheran, 1864