Church Micro 770 - St Mary's, Berkeley Multi-cache
Church Micro 770 - St Mary's, Berkeley
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Church Micro 770 - St Mary's, Berkeley is a simple offset cache requiring a visit to a churchyard which leads to a micro cache which (due to restrictions) had to be placed slightly away from the church. The cache is within 200 yards of the published coordinates.
The Minster Church of St. Mary-the-Virgin, Berkeley is an impressive 13th century church built on the remains of an earlier Norman church (of which the south door and the font remain).
The church features a wonderful collection of medieval wall paintings, including a doom painting above the rood screen. The great east window contains a stained glass memorial to one of the town's favourite sons, Edward Jenner, who discovered the smallpox vaccine.
Jenner's memorial is beside the altar and on the other side is a chapel which contains a wonderful collection of medieval memorials to the Berkeley family. Elsewhere in the nave, the tomb of Thomas Berkeley and his wife Katherine is notable for its extremely intricate carving.
During the English Civil War the Royalist forces defending Berkeley Castle used the church as an outer defensive perimeter for their defence of the castle. The marks of musket balls fired by the attacking Parliamentary forces can be seen on the outside of the oak west door. On 26th September 1645, the defenders of the church were eventually overcome and the Parliamentary army raised cannon to the church roof, overlooking the castle, forcing the castle to surrender.
A special feature of St Mary's is the sheer number of table tombs in the churchyard. One of these tombs is an early 18th century memorial to Dicky Pearce, family jester to the Earl of Suffolk. Pearce was possibly one of the last court jesters in England and died at Berkeley Castle after falling from the minstrel galley. There are some poignant inscriptions on many tombs including that of James Pain who died in 1807 at the age of 14 years and 10 days:
Kind reader stay and drop a friendly tear
Since neither age or illness brought me here
Kicked by a horse, I fell while in my bloom
And this hastened me to an early tomb
The detached tower was built in 1753 (at a cost of £740-0-0) and is therefore considerably newer than the rest of the church. It is built on the site of an earlier church, possibly Saxon, traces of which have been found in the garden of the neighbouring Jenner Museum.
The church is generally open to visitors every day during daylight hours and is well worth a visit...
...and should you make that visit: Where are there windows on one side and not the other? Where are the steps which lead to nowhere? Where are there two female gossips’ heads surmounted by a toad? (Answers on a postcard NOT required!)
Please be aware that there is very limited parking available in the immediate vicinity of the church.
Related website: St. Mary's, Berkeley
The coordinates given are not for the final cache but for a location in the churchyard.
At the given coordinates, in which year did [ H Ghostly ] make his mark? (Your GPSr may play up here so check the waypoint name). This is ABCD
The final location is a couple of minutes walk away at:
N51° 41.3(A+C)(A+C) W2° 27.5(A+D)(A+B)
Congratulations to Leonards193 on FTF (with their first FTF!)
If anybody would like to add to the Church Micro series, please contact sadexploration first so he can keep track of the church numbers and names to avoid duplication.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
TM: zntargvp (svefg terra obk)