Inscription on Chelmsford Cathedral

Received: 13 October 2013

Hello Andrew.  I am trying to get the correct wording for an inscription found on the exterior of the Nave of St. Mary the Virgin’s cathedral in Chelmsford.  Can you help?  Thank you.

Al DeFilippo

Replied: 13 October 2013

Hello Al

When you mean the exterior of the nave (which is the main body inside in the church flanked by aisles) are you referring to the outside of the C15 building?  Also, what do you think the wording might be?

I have a very old book on St Mary’s Church Chelmsford as it was before 1914 so might, at a long shot, be able to help.

But I need a bit more to go on please.

Regards

Andrew

Received: 13 October 2013

Thank you Andrew.  At British History Online they list it partially as the following: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=122620

Cathedral Church of St. Mary the Virgin (Plate p. 42) stands in the town. The walls are of flint-rubble intermixed with some blocks of freestone; the dressings are partly of limestone and partly of Reigate stone; the roofs are leaded. The old details are all of the 15th or early 16th century. The S. and W. arches of the North Chapel and the W. arch of the S. chapel are of c. 1400–1410, indicating that at that period the plan included at least a Chancel, North Chapel, North Aisle, and South Aisle. Probably c. 1430 the South Chapel was added or re-built. The South Porch was added in the second half of the century, and c. 1489 the N. and S. arcades were re-built and a clearstorey added to the nave. The exterior of the nave is said to have borne the following inscription: "Pray for the good estate of all the townsheps of Chelmysford that hath . . . good willers and procorers of helpers to this werke and . . . them that first began and longest shall continowe . . . in the yere of our Lorde I thousand IIII hundreth [LXXXV]IIII." 

Al DeFilippo

Replied: 20 October 2013

Dear Al

Thinking about your query a little more I remembered that the Nave collapsed in 1800 and was rebuilt.  So the inscription would no longer exist.  I happened to be at Chelmsford Cathedral last evening (at a concert of The Sixteen directed by Harry Christophers) and looked up as I queued before the doors opened.  No inscription now exists it seems.  The Historic Monuments List – which you refer to – mentions the nave collapse later in the paragraph.

I attach an engraving of the damage caused at the time.

Regards

Andrew