Marble Church, Bodelwyddan
Encyclopedia
Bodelwyddan
Bodelwyddan is a village and community in Denbighshire, Wales now bypassed by the A55 road. It has a population of 2,106. The village lies east of Abergele, south of Rhyl, and north west of Ruthin....
, is a prominent landmark in the lower Vale of Clwyd
Vale of Clwyd
The Vale of Clwyd is a tract of low-lying ground in the county of Denbighshire in northeast Wales. The Vale extends south-southwestwards from the coast of the Irish Sea for some 20 miles forming a triangle of low ground bounded on its eastern side by the well-defined scarp of the Clwydian Range...
in Denbighshire
Denbighshire
Denbighshire is a county in north-east Wales. It is named after the historic county of Denbighshire, but has substantially different borders. Denbighshire has the distinction of being the oldest inhabited part of Wales. Pontnewydd Palaeolithic site has remains of Neanderthals from 225,000 years...
, Wales
Wales
Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...
and is visible for many miles. It lies just off the A55 trunk road
A55 road
The A55, also known as the North Wales Expressway, is a major road in Britain. Its entire length is a dual carriageway primary route, with the exception of the point where it crosses the Britannia Bridge over the Menai Strait. All junctions are grade separated except for two roundabouts — one...
.
The church was erected by Lady Willoughby de Broke in memory of her husband, Henry Peyto-Verney, 16th Baron Willoughby de Broke
Henry Peyto-Verney, 16th Baron Willoughby de Broke
Henry Peyto-Verney, 16th Baron Willoughby de Broke and de jure 24th Baron Latimer was a peer in the peerage of England.Henry Peyto-Verney was born on April 5, 1773, the younger son of John Peyto-Verney ,14th Baron Willoughby de Broke and Lady Louisa North, daughter of Francis North, 1st Earl of...
. She laid the foundation stone on 24 July 1856 and the new church designed by John Gibson
John Gibson (architect)
John Gibson was an English architect born in Warwickshire.Gibson was an assistant to Sir Charles Barry and assisted him in the drawings of the Houses of Parliament....
was consecrated by the Bishop of St. Asaph on 23 August 1860 after construction at a cost of £60,000. The new parish of Bodelwyddan was created on 3 August 1860, from the communities of Bodelwyddan
Bodelwyddan
Bodelwyddan is a village and community in Denbighshire, Wales now bypassed by the A55 road. It has a population of 2,106. The village lies east of Abergele, south of Rhyl, and north west of Ruthin....
, Faenol and Pengwern
Pengwern
Pengwern was a Brythonic settlement of sub-Roman Britain situated in what is now the English county of Shropshire, adjoining the modern Welsh border. It is generally regarded as being the early seat of the kings of Powys before its establishment at Mathrafal, further west, but the theory that it...
, which until that date had been part of the parish of St. Asaph.
The church contains pillars made of Belgian Red marble, and the nave entrance is made from "Anglesey marble". It also contains elaborate woodwork, and in the tower can be found windows of stained glass
Stained glass
The term stained glass can refer to coloured glass as a material or to works produced from it. Throughout its thousand-year history, the term has been applied almost exclusively to the windows of churches and other significant buildings...
on the North and South sides, featuring Saint Margaret
Margaret the Virgin
Margaret the Virgin, also known as Margaret of Antioch , virgin and martyr, is celebrated as a saint by the Roman Catholic and Anglican Churches on July 20; and on July 17 in the Orthodox Church. Her historical existence has been questioned; she was declared apocryphal by Pope Gelasius I in 494,...
and Saint Kentigern, and is a popular tourist destination.
The church was in Flintshire
Flintshire (historic)
Flintshire , also known as the County of Flint, is one of thirteen historic counties, a vice-county and a former administrative county, which mostly lies on the north east coast of Wales....
until 1974, in Clwyd
Clwyd
Clwyd is a preserved county of Wales, situated in the north-east, bordering England with Cheshire to its east, Shropshire to the south-east, and the Welsh counties of Gwynedd to its immediate west and Powys to the south. It additionally shares a maritime border with the metropolitan county of...
from 1974 until 1996, and since then has been in Denbighshire
Denbighshire
Denbighshire is a county in north-east Wales. It is named after the historic county of Denbighshire, but has substantially different borders. Denbighshire has the distinction of being the oldest inhabited part of Wales. Pontnewydd Palaeolithic site has remains of Neanderthals from 225,000 years...
.
Churchyard
Immediately to the west of the church is Kinmel CampKinmel Camp
Kinmel Camp was an army training ground in what was once the grounds of Kinmel Hall, near Abergele, in Conwy county borough, Wales. The Kinmel Camp Railway served the camp from 1915 until 1964...
, which was a military camp located in the grounds of Kinmel Hall
Kinmel Hall
Kinmel Hall is a mansion near the village of St. George, close to the coastal town of Abergele, in Conwy county borough, Wales.The present chateau style house, the third on the site, was designed by W. E. Nesfield in the 1870s, and the adjoining Venetian Gardens were designed by his father, W. A....
. The camp was used by Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
troops during the First World War. The churchyard contains the graves of numerous victims of the Spanish flu pandemic
Spanish flu
The 1918 flu pandemic was an influenza pandemic, and the first of the two pandemics involving H1N1 influenza virus . It was an unusually severe and deadly pandemic that spread across the world. Historical and epidemiological data are inadequate to identify the geographic origin...
of 1918-19 in the camp. On 4-5 March 1919 a riot occurred in the camp when the ship allocated to return the troops to Canada was diverted to carry food supplies to Russia, and five Canadian soldiers were killed in the disturbances and four buried in St Margaret's Churchyard, the firth buried, Gunner John Frederick Hickman, is located in Dorchester, New Brunswick. A common story is that they were executed for mutiny, but this has been denied by the Canadian Department of National Defence.