Church Micro 10355...Ryde - St Mary Traditional Geocache

This cache is dedicated to my father Wilson George William Wilson who was born in a house around the corder from this Church. He attended this church and also went to the adjoining school. He left the Island and England for Australia when he was in his early teens. We have now come the full circle and move to the Island and made it our home. 

When dad died, his ashes were brought back to his beloved Island and are buried in the Ryde cemetery

The town’s Roman Catholic church, St. Mary's, is located in High Street. It was built in 1846 at a cost of £18,000. This was provided by Elizabeth, Countess of Clare. The church was designed by Joseph Hansom inventor of the hansom cab.

St. Mary's Catholic Parish, which was built and endowed by Elizabeth Georgina Burrell, Countess of Clare (1844-46), is one of the finest early Victorian Catholic churches in the south of England and one of the oldest in the Portsmouth Diocese. It was designed by Joseph Aloysius Hansom (of Hansom cab fame), and built by Thomas Dashwood of Ryde, who also built Holy Trinity Church in Dover Street. St. Mary's is one of the Foundation Churches of the Diocese; at one time being used as the Pro-Cathedral before St. John's at Portsmouth was completed. In fact the first ordination for the Diocese, that of Fr. Pierce William Greene, took place at St. Mary's on the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul, 29th June, 1883.

The church was commonly known as the "Basilica"; partly because of its grandeur in the mid nineteenth century, when the few Catholic Churches that existed were small and modest by comparison. It was also inspired by the Countess of Clare's visit to Santa Maria Maggiore Basilica in Rome, for her first High Mass as a Catholic on the feast of the Birthday of Our Lady in 1841. She was said to be so impressed with the basilica that she decided that when she returned home to Ryde, she would build a church dedicated to Our Lady.

St. Mary's (in the Southwark Diocese until 1882) was used as a southern base, particularly by Bishop Grant in the 1850s and 1860s when travelling around such a large Diocese was such an onerous task. The coats of arms of the early Bishops of Southwark and Portsmouth can still be seen on the north wall of the sanctuary.

For more information about this beautiful church, check out the official site.

**************************************
For full information on how you can expand the Church Micro series by sadexploration please read the Place your own Church Micro page before you contact him at churchmicro.co.uk

See also the Church Micro Statistics and Home pages for further information about the series.
*************************************