Did you know... Uncovering a terrible smell!

Vicar Darnell

On January 6th 1903, Vicar Darnell died of septicaemia contracted during the essential structural repairs to ensure that St Thomas’s Chancel did not collapse?

These repairs were the result of investigations into new heating & lighting systems as well as the long- standing problem of the noxious smell “lingering” in the church. On October 6 1902, work had begun on lifting the entire Chancel floor. According to Vicar Darnell, this exposed a “state bad beyond description. The smell is terrible. It is out of the question to use the church again until all has been made right”. Unfortunately, he did not live to see this happen.

Below the floor, they found a “tarrry substance” containing graves & vaults (one containing seven coffins), skulls and large quantities of bones. Many burials had no covering other than the woollen shroud, necessary to comply with the 1678 Burials Act. The disposal of the remains was urgent. Until they could be re-interred, they were removed, sprinkled with disinfectant, covered with a tarpaulin and locked in a shed in Church Yard.

It was arranged for all services to take place in St Mary’s Church, Highbury St near the Colewort Barracks. It had been built (1837-39) as a daughter church to St Thomas’s and became the Parish Church during its closure (1902-04). Vicar Darnell’s funeral was held here; then the cortège processed to Highland Road Cemetery.

A diagram showing the perilous state of the underfloor in St Thomas’s Chapel.

The church during investigations - showing the girder that was installed to prevent the collapse of the building.

The danger point was the western Purbeck marble pillar on the north side. When the “soup” was cleared away around its base, the peril was revealed: the shaft was leaning inwards, the base badly crushed. The foundations of the great octagonal adjacent column were severely undermined. The contractors worked overtime to shore up, then underpin the arcades. Only then were the remains reinterred and the Chancel floor sealed.

The structural repairs to the Chancel were paid by Winchester College as Post Reformation, they had purchased the living of the church (property & revenue) from Henry VIII after he had dissolved Southwick Priory. The same repair processs, financed by the parishioners, then commenced in the Nave.

Thus St Thomas’s was made structurally sound but bereft of its Vicar. Without these extensive repairs, it is unlikely to have become a Cathedral in 1927.