The Bell in the Seamen’s Chapel of Lincoln Cathedral The submarine HMS Tasman was launched on 13 February 1945 but the Admiralty ordered it to be renamed HMS Talent in April 1945. This may have been because another submarine with the name HMS Talent was transferred to the Netherlands Navy in 1944 and renamed Zwaardvish. This meant that the name Talent was available. The bell from HMS Tasman was, therefore, redundant and was presented to Lincoln Cathedral as a memorial to George Bass. It is inscribed HMS/Tasman/1945.
George Bass (1771-1803), was born at Aswarby, Lincolnshire. He is is well known for his belief that a strait separated the mainland from Van Diemen's Land (now Tasmania) and this theory was confirmed when Bass and Matthew Flinders circumnavigated Van Diemen's Land. The passage between Van Diemen's Land and the mainland was named Bass Strait. The bell, which is hung from a bracket to the left of the altar and has a diameter of 13.50”, is an appropriate memorial to George Bass. It was a surprise to find that submarines have a bell! It is a very long standing tradition in the Navy for every ship to have a bell and today this is only hung in a corridor when the submarine is in port and it is used only for ceremonial purposes.
Chapel St Leonards Village Green
A bell has been cast by Taylors Eayre and Smith Ltd and hung in a concrete structure on the village green. Details as follows :
[Inscription band] [Vine leaf decoration] [TES] 2007 [Waist] THE CHAPEL/BELL [Reverse waist] MUMBY CHAPELL, 1571.../‘A SHIPPE WAS DRIVEN/ UPON A HOUSE.../ THE WIFE OF THE SAME DID CLIMBE/UPPE INTO THE TOPPE.../ AND WAS ALSO SAVED BY THE MARINERS’/ Diameter 24” weight 2 cwt 3 qr 20 lb The rather curious inscription refers to a flood on 5 October 1571 which is recorded in Raphael Hollinshed’s Chronicles of Englande, Scotlande and Irelande (1577) as follows : In Mumby Chapell the whole towne was lost except three houses. A shippe was driven upon a house; the sailors thinking they had bin upon a rocke, commited themselves to God and three of the mariners lept out of the shippe and chaunced to tek holde on the house-toppe and so saved themselves; the wife of the same lying in childbed did climbe uppe into the toppe of the house and was also saved by the mariners, her husband and child being both drowned. At that time Chapel St Leonards was known as Mumby Chapel as there was a chapel of Ease attached to Mumby. This same incident is referred to in Jean Ingelow’s well-known poem ‘High Tide in Lincolnshire 1571’.
The Closing Bell in Lincoln Cathedral The small bell which hangs in an elaborate wrought iron framework on the North East pillar of the central tower near St Hugh's Choir was given to the Cathedral by Robert Godfrey, Clerk of Works in January 1953. The bell was originally suspended from one of the gates at Sudbrooke Holme, a large country house situated about five miles from Lincoln on the road to Wragby.
In the early 1920s a number of attempts were made to find a purchaser for the house without success. Sudbrooke Holme was built by Richard Ellison circa 1759 and was eventually demolished in 1928. The contents of the house were sold during the previous year and the Lincolnshire Chronicle dated 10 December 1927 in a report of the auction states that 'two old call bells' were sold for £10 and also reports the sale of four pairs of wrought iron gates. A picture of these gates suggests that a bell was hung in the metal work of each of the main gates. The prices realised at the auction for the gates confirms that there were two main gates (£95) and two small side gates (£14 10s and £20). It appears that the gates had only been erected circa 1910 and were made by 'Frederick Coldron & Son Ecclesiastical and Artistic Iron Workers and Blacksmiths' of Brant Broughton. Both bells were purchased by Robert Godfrey who, in 1924 had bought the Lodge of Sudbrooke Holme. At a sale by auction on 10 May 1947 of a number of items from Sudbrooke Lodge 'a Coldron Hand wrought Floral Gate Bell and Bracket' was included and this would appear to be the second of the pair, the other being that given to the Cathedral. The bell is now used as a signal to visitors that the Cathedral is about to close for the night. Mr Godfrey died on 30 March 1953.
Created: 27/01/2009 (acah)
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