The Belltower

St Mary's has a ring of eight bells hung in a tower at the West end of the church.

From ground level thirty five spiral steps bring you to the ringing chamber where the eight bell ropes hang from the ceiling arranged in order in a circle, from the lightest bell, the Treble to the heaviest, the Tenor. The narrow lancet window shown in the picture allows only a little daylight in to the ringing chamber.

From that height more spiral steps take you up to the Clock Chamber which houses the tower clock with its two faces - one facing up the High Street and the other the Old Rectory. The clock was made by John Thwaites of Clerkenwell in London in 1803 and installed in the present tower by C.E. Arnold in 1911.

The clock is a conventional Turret Clock with a two-second pendulum (half the rate of a domestic long-case or grandfather clock) striking the hours with an outside hammer on the tower's tenor bell (see below). A "bolt and shutter" maintaining system keeps the clock going while it is wound weekly, usually by the Steeple Keeper, one of the bellringers who also looks after maintenance of the bells. The bell ropes themselves pass straight through the clock Ccamber from floor to ceiling.

Another stage up the spiral staircase and you reach the bells themselves hung on steel headstocks swinging on bearings set on a steel framework which fills the tower floor area. The bells are attached to large wooden wheels (several of which can be seen in the picture) round which the bell rope runs. The sound of the bells emerges through open louvres which are clearly visible on the side of the tower.

The final flight of spiral stairs brings you to the top of the tower where a door leads out on to the flat, leaded, roof of the tower. From this vantage point there are superb views of the village in all directions.

The Bells

The details of the bells at St Mary's are as follows:-