Baddesley Clinton lies some eight miles to the north of Warwick, in the Forest of Arden. The beautiful moated manor house dating from the 14th century was purchased by John Broome, a wealthy lawyer, from the de Clintons in 1438. His son Nicholas died in 1517 and the manor passed to Sir Edward Ferrers, who had married his daughter Constance.
The Ferrers family remained loyal to the Catholic faith throughout the vicissitudes of the next few centuries. Edward Ferrers’s great-grandson Henry (1549-1633) was a lawyer at the Middle Temple. In 1586 he rented the house to the staunchly Catholic Anne Vaux. She and her sister Eleanor Brooksby commissioned Nicholas Owen to construct various “priest holes”. These proved their worth in 1591 when a raid was made on the house but failed to find a number of Jesuits hiding there, including Fathers Garnet and Gerard. Henry Ferrers eventually returned to the house and lived out his days there, heavily in debt, as a “Church Papist” rather than an actual recusant.
The family at Baddesley Clinton seems to have avoided actual involvement in the Civil War. Edward Ferrers, who inherited it in 1712, married an heiress.
In 1830 the estate was inherited by Marmion Edward Ferrers at the age of 17. In 1867 he married the artist Rebecca Dulcibella Orpen. Two years later her aunt Georgiana, Lady Chatterton and her second husband Edward Heneage Dering came to live at Baddesley Clinton. Following Marmion Ferrers’s death in 1884, his widow and the now widowed Edward Dering married in 1885. Dering paid off all the debts on the estate before his death in 1892. Rebecca Dering continued to live at Baddesley Clinton until her death in 1923.
The estate was then inherited by Ferrers’s great nephew Edward Ferrers (1881-1934). On his death the estate was inherited by his younger brother Cecil who in 1940 sold it to a distant relation, Thomas Walker, who changed his name to Ferrers-Walker. His son inherited the estate in 1970, selling it a decade later to the government who subsequently made it over to the National Trust.
The medieval Church of St Michael lies some 250 yards from the manor. It contains the gaily painted early-16th-century tomb of Edward and Constance Ferrers. It of course finally became Anglican after 1559.
A Catholic chapel was originally built in the village of Baddesley Clinton c. 1800 and was staffed by Franciscans. In 1850 the Poor Clares came from Bruges in Belgium and took over the various buildings round the chapel which were in a poor state of repair.
In 1870 the old chapel was demolished. The new church of St Francis of Assisi was built to the design of Benjamin Bucknall of Swansea (1833-95). Bucknall worked initially for William Leigh at Woodchester Mansion. He followed his patron by converting to Catholicism in 1852 and was inter alia responsible for the Catholic churches of St George, Taunton (1860) and St Wulstan, Little Malvern (1862). He also designed the neighbouring convent, school and presbytery at Baddesley Clinton.
The new church was opened on 4 October 1870 by William Bernard Ullathorne OSB, Bishop of Birmingham.
It is a well-designed modest building in red brick with stone dressings. The style is 13th-century French Gothic. The roof is steeply pitched. The plan of the building comprises an aisleless nave with a projecting west porch and a shallow sanctuary. Above the porch are three lancet windows and the front is surmounted by a hexagonal timber bellcote. The east end of the building is continued by the Sisters’s Choir, which forms part of the convent.
The convent closed in 2011. One Poor Clare, Sister Felicity, continues to live in The Hermitage near the church.
The interior is broad with a wagon roof resting on timber brackets. Much of the stained glass is by Hardman. The triptych at the east end of Our Lady with the infant Christ and the Three Magi with St Francis on one side and St Clare holding a monstrance on the other is by Rebecca Ferrers née Orpen. The original stencilled decoration was painted out c. 1970 “in the spirit of Vatican II”, another ornament lost.
In the year 2000, Father John Sharp arrived in Baddesley Clinton as parish priest of St Francis. He had been originally ordained as a priest of the Church of England, serving at one stage as Chaplain of Queen’s College, Cambridge before being received into the Catholic Church in the 1980s. He spent an initial period as diocesan archivist. He eventually retired to Horbury in Yorkshire in the summer of 2021.
He was the instigator of the remarkable scheme of Byzantine-Romanesque murals which now cover the sanctuary of the church, reminiscent in some ways of the 12th-century mosaics adorning the apse of Santa Maria in Trastevere in Rome. The artist Martin Earle devised and executed the painting scheme. The parishioners commissioned and paid for the murals which were painted during 2020 when most of the country was locked down.
Christ in Glory is represented on the east wall, holding in His left hand the Gospels with the words “Ego vobiscum sum omnibus diebus usque ad consummationem saeculi” from Matthew 28:20 (“and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world”). He is flanked by St Peter and St Paul – earlier versions by Rebecca Ferring were destroyed c. 1970. They are flanked by two local martyrs, Blessed John Sugar and Blessed Robert Grissold, executed in Warwick in 1604.
The frieze above has the following words from the Te Deum: “Te Gloriosus Apostolorum Chorus… Te Martyrum Candidatus laudat exercitus (“The glorious company of the Apostles praise Thee… The noble army of Martyrs praise Thee”). Above this frieze the painting of the Adoration of the Magi by Rebecca Ferring is now flanked by angels appearing to shepherds offering lambs. Above this scene is the Hand of God shown in blessing. The stars of the firmament are carried over to the ceiling of the sanctuary.
On both north and south walls are depicted Seraphim. On the north wall are the three angelic visitors at the Oak of Mambre with Abraham and Sarah offering cakes and a calf. The carpenter St Nicholas Owen is depicted as are Eleanor Brooksby and Anne Vaux holding a model of Baddesley Clinton Hall. Below, St Francis is shown preaching to the birds.
On the south wall, Abraham offers his son Isaac as a sacrifice, Melchisedech offers bread and wine and Abel is shown offering the firstborn of his flock – all mystic signs of the Eucharist. St Wulstan (c. 1008-95), Bishop of Worcester (in which diocese Baddesley Clinton was) is depicted. Below, Noah herds animals into the ark.
At the apex of the chancel arch is the Lord’s Cross surrounded by the angels of the apocalypse. Stylised representations of Bethlehem and Jerusalem are shown.
It is wonderfully encouraging that work such as this is still being completed ad maiorem Dei gloriam today.
This article first appeared in the February 2022 issue of the Catholic Herald. Subscribe today.
This page is available to subscribers. Click here to sign in or get access.
Areas of Catholic Herald business are still recovering post-pandemic.
However, we are reaching out to the Catholic community and readership, that has been so loyal to the Catholic Herald. Please join us on our 135 year mission by supporting us.
We are raising £250,000 to safeguard the Herald as a world-leading voice in Catholic journalism and teaching.
We have been a bold and influential voice in the church since 1888, standing up for traditional Catholic culture and values. Please consider donating.