Above: All Saints Church 1828
I quite regularly pass All Saints Church in Bristol. As it is right next to the St.Nicholas
covered market just off the city centre there are thousands of others who also
pass it on the way to work or while on shopping trips. Surrounded by businesses and narrow streets
it looks rather “snug”. Snug but with “a
history”.
All Saints dates from the 12th Century with enlargements and alterations such
as the 15th Century aisles and East nave and in 1716 the NE tower
was designed by William Paul and eventually completed by George Townsend, The Chancel was rebuilt in the mid-19th
Century.
The church contains memorials and graves to a
number of 18th Century businessmen and merchants not to mention the
tomb of Edward Colston (1636-1721); Colston helped to fund the restoration of
the All Saints Church's tower in 1716.
The Church itself is said to be
haunted by a “black monk” who supposedly hid the treasures of the place from
Henry VIII. How the monk died, whether
killed by Henry’s men or having committed suicide is uncertain. However, at that period the act of suicide
was to damn oneself so it’s rather unlikely a religious man would resort to
this. As for the treasure….never been
found.
The “Mayor’s
Register” or “Gild of Kalendars” is thought to be one of,if not the first guild in Britain. The early history of The Kalendars was lost
after a fire around 1466. William Of Worcester asserts the Guild was found in
700 A.D. It was a brotherhood of the
clergy and laity –men and women of the City of Bristol.
Robert
Earl Of Gloucester and Robert Fitzharding,a Burgess of Bristol,had The
Kalendars moved from The Church of Holy Trinity [Christ Church]
to All Saints in the time of Henry II.
Some priests were trained there “for the conversion of the jewes” but
The Kalendars inner workings and finances seem somewhat murky,but it was a
powerful body –full of the “movers and dealers” of the day.
Perhaps with such a long history All Saints
might have a ghost or two?
Above: the entrance to All Saints that you'll find as you turn in to St Nicholas Market. Photo credit -unknown.
It is worth quoting the account as it first appeared
in the Bristol Times [1 & 2] during 1846, the writer having his tongue
firmly in his cheek and finding the whole affair, obviously, very funny:~
“A Ghost At Bristol.
“We have this week a ghost story to
relate. Yes,
a real ghost story,and a ghost story
without as yet
any
clue to its elucidation. After the
dissolution of
the Calendars,their ancient residence,adjoining
and
almost
forming a part of All Saints’ Church,Bristol,
was converted into a vicarage-house,and
it was in 1846,
called by that name,though the
incumbents have for many
years ceased to reside there.
“The then occupants were Mr. &
Mrs.Jones,the sexton
and sextoness of the church,and
one or two lodgers;and
it is to the former and their
servant-maid that the strange
visitor made his
appearances,causing such terror by his
nightly calls,that all three
determined upon quitting the
premises,and indeed carried their
resolution into effect.
Mr. and Mrs.Jones’ description of
the disturbance as given
to
the landlord,on whom they called in great consternation,
is as distinct as any ghost story
could be. The nocturnal
visitor was heard walking about
the house when the
inhabitants were in bed:and
Mr.Jones,who was a man of
by
no means nervous constitution,declared he had several
times seen a light flickering on one of the walls. Mrs.Jones
was
equally certain that she had heard a man with creaking
shoes walking in the bedroom above her own,when no man
was
on the premises (or at least ought not to be),and ‘was
nearly killed with fright.’
“To
the servant-maid,however,was vouchsafed the
unenvied honour of seeing this restless night visitor;
she
declared she had repeatedly had her bedroom door
unbolted at night,between the hours of 12 and 2
o’clock --the period when such beings usually make
their promenade—by something in human semblance.
She
could not particularise his dress,but described it as
something antique,and of a fashion ‘lang syne gane’,and
to
some extent corresponding to that of the ancient
“Calendars,the
former inhabitants of the house. She
further
stated that he was ‘a whiskered gentleman’ (in her own
words) ,which whiskered gentleman had gone to the
length of shaking her bed,and,she believed,would have
shaken herself also,but that she invariably put her head
under the clothes when she saw him approach.
“As
far as can be ascertained no elucidation of this
mysterious affair was ever forthcoming.
Mrs.Crowe,to
whose knowledge the account was brought,subsequently,
wrote to the editor of the ‘Bristol Times’,and received a
reply that ‘the whole affair
remains wrapped in the same
mystery as when chronicled in the pages of this paper’,and
this statement was subsequently confirmed by Mrs.Jones.”
Well, I suppose
that, if this whiskered gent was described as looking and dressed like one of
the Calendar Order then he must have been the ‘ghost’ of one –the black monk
said to haunt the Church?
This is not, however, a straight-forward
haunting. The sound of foot-steps, a
ghostly figure or even lights, yes. But
here we have a strange hybrid of the poltergeist; the figure seen physically
(in some way) shook the bed. Was the
servant-maid of “a certain age” that she
might be seen as the focus of these events?
There have been summaries of this affair but
these include references to Mr.Jones wanting to throw himself from the window
several times and having been so terrified on one occasion that his trembling
almost doubled him up.
I’m still waiting
to hear from the church to see whether anything has occurred over recent years
and searching dusty old volumes for 1846 is a long process. But I’ll keep looking.
References.
[1] “A Ghost At Bristol”,Bristol
Times,1846. Sadly,my copy of this item
and the
date have
been lost. However,the following carries
the account given here.
[2] R. MacDonald
Robertson, “Some Ghost Stories Of Bristol
and the West”, Illustrated Bristol
News,vol.5,September,1962
