The Reverend Basil Bourchier

Basil Bourchier was born at Steeple Morden, Cambridgeshire, on 13 February 1881, the second son of the vicar of that parish, the Reverend Walter Bourchier, Fellow of New College, Oxford. He was educated at Bloxham School (St Mary's Lodge Preparatory), Merchant Taylors' School (1892-99), and Queens' College, Cambridge (BA 1903, MA 1906). He was ordained deacon in 1904, priest in 1905, and served in in the parish of Hebden Bridge until 1908, followed by a year at St Anne's Soho. In 1909 he was appointed London Diocesan Home Missioner of St Jude-on-the-Hill, becoming the first vicar when the church was consecrated and the new parish created in 1911.

When the First World War broke out he went in August 1914 as chaplain to a Red Cross unit in Belgium. The unit fell into the hands of the Germans who persisted in regarding Bourchier asa spy. He was tried by court-martialand sentenced to death, but was reprieved and held as a prisoner of war until 1916. He later wrote: "Sentence to be shot at dawn was passed on me by a German commandant in charge of the district where I and my companions were taken prisoner; it was the greatest thrill of my life".

From the prison camp he returned to the Suburb and made St Jude's one of the most famous churches in the land.

The Daily Mail (17 March 1934), reporting his death, said:

"His voice was always raised on behalf of the underdog and the oppressed. He spoke vigorously for social reform and from his pulpit advocated the lash for those men who attacked women.

Nothing was without the orbit of his interests or his thoughts - what he thought he said. He inveighed against women's fashions, saying that the greatest offenders were women and often professedly Christian women who came to church in hats and garments which might have meant suffering to birds and beasts.

He was a great lover of the theatre, and perhaps he developed a little of the histrionic art in the pulpit, but he used it only that his words might carry greater weight, and that the message he had to give might fly the faster and receive the attention it deserved".

An anonymous correspondent added:

"I like to remember [him] when he was at the height of his fame when his appearance at any function was sufficient to invest it with the importance of a great occasion. There would be a stir at the door when his burly figure entered, and everyone would turn respectfully aside as he passed along, usually overcoatless and muffled in a thick woolen scarf. No need to ask for silence when he entered a platform. His deep, resonant voice would penetrate to the end of any building, and his every movement be followed by the admiring onlookers in the seats below".

Kathleen M. Slack in Henrietta's Dream: A Chronicle of the Hampstead Garden Suburb 1905 - 1982 recalls:

"A retired parishioner described Mr Bourchier as 'a very handsome man, more like an actor than a clergyman'. Another one remembered him as 'a fascinating man'; a third as 'a real sport' and a fourth as 'very popular with the ladies and with royalty'."

"His powerful sermons, not all of which were to the liking of all the members of his congregations, were always printed in full in the church magazine and showed him to be eager for the punishment of offenders; inveighing against vivisection, vegetarianism. spiritualism and performing animals. He was a strong supporter of Sunday games, horse-racing and professional boxing."

Evelyn Waugh had a rather different assessment of Bourchier, the 'preposterous parson', but there can be no doubt as to his success at St Jude's. For all Bourchier's "extravagant display", Waugh acknowledged, "I had some glimpse of higher mysteries'.

It has to be said Bourchier's ministry was to an extent an essentially personal and 'charismatic' one. When he left St Jude's to return to St Anne's, Soho as Rector in 1930 he took a large share of the (mainly non-local) congregation with him, including the organist, much of the choir, the 'artist in residence', and a number of church officials. The frequent royal visits came to an abrupt end, newspaper reporters were no longer in attendance, the church could no longer count on wealthy and aristocratic benefactors to supply its needs. St Jude's settled down to being an ordinary suburban parish church. The new vicar was soon writing about the great congregations and celebrations of the past as if they belonged to a distant age rather than a few months previously.

Bourchier's time in Soho was to be short. The story of his downfall is told by David Roe in Standing in the Wings (1987 ). Agreeing to retire "on health grounds" he preached his farewell sermon at St Anne's on 3 December 1933 "in an atmosphere charged with drama".

The Daily Mail reported:

"Helped painfully and slowly into the pulpit, with trembling hands and ashen countenance, he said 'I am passing into the shadow of death. It is my doctor's wish that I shall be brief. I cannot stay long, but I have no fear. God may take me today or tomorrow. Let them be no sadness of farewell as I embark.' Women members of the great congregation that filled the church sobbed with emotion'.

"That got 'em. Didn't it", he said as he returned to the Rectory and disappeared into his study, according to Roe, "leaving us all speechless and horrified". The next day he set off on one of his many sea trips to South Africa. But three months later on 16 March 1933, he died, aged 53,in a nursing home in Cambridge nursed by his 80-odd year old mother. Newspapers across the Empire carried the story of his last sermon again, interpreting it now as a prophecy of his death.

In his will he left £15,150 (about £850,000 today) with gifts of a statue and furniture to the King and Queen, the contents of his country house Wimpole Lodge, Royston to be sold to endow a new church in the Diocese of Lincoln, and £1000 to erect a chantry chapel dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary in the garden. He also left £50 for a doctor to make sure he was truly dead before the burial.

In 1937 Little Dean Street in Soho was renamed Bourchier Street in his memory. Jude's is full of memorials to him: the west end of the church was completed in his memory, his initials are to be found on the brass altar rails. After his death his leaving portrait, by the royal artist Maurice Codner, was returned to the church and now hangs in the vicarage. Another portrait, formerly in the south west porch, is presently in store, a third is on permanent loan to St Anne's, Soho. As Wren said of St Paul's, if you want to see Bourchier's legacy to St Jude's, "look around you".

A page from an album kept by an admirer - one of several in the church archives.

Evelyn Waugh and the 'preposterous parson'

The novelist Evelyn Waugh, author of Brideshead Revisited and the Sword of Honour trilogy, was confirmed at St Jude's on 29 June 1916. His family lived at 'Underhill' on North End Road, and his father was for many years a sidesman at St Jude's.

"St Jude's . . . was then in the charge of the Revd Basil Bourchier. Bourchier, a cousin of the actor-manager, Arthur Bourchier, and satirised as the odious Cyril Boom Bagshaw in A.S.M. Hutchinson's best seller, If Winter Comes, was an actor manque, one of those flamboyant, theatrical priests who in every age are to be found showily performing from the pulpit. Arthur regarded the man as a rollicking joke, enjoying the novelty of each weeks antics. Bourchier put a lot of thought into his dramatic effects: while his flock were taking Communion, a large red, electric cross was switched on over the altar; and the lesson was often acted out with impressive literalness.'

Selina Hastings Evelyn Waugh: A Biography 1994

'[Bourchier] was a man without pretension to doctrinal orthodoxy; a large, florid, lisping man, who was often to be seen in the stalls of London theatres in lay evening dress. No one could have been more alien to the ideals of Dame Henrietta Barnett and of the general run of the inhabitants of his parish. He was a man of wider claims. His name was constantly in the popular newspapers, giving his wayward opinions on any subject about which he was consulted. He professed an extravagant patriotism . . . He was anathema to the genuine Anglo-Catholics of Graham Street, Margaret Street and St Augustine's, Kilburn. His congregation was not exclusively - nor indeed primarily - local. Personal devotees flocked to him from all parts of London. His sermons were dramatic, topical, irrational and quite without theological content. . . .

Mr Bourchier was a totally preposterous parson. When he felt festal, whatever the season or occasion marked on the calendar, he dressed up, he paraded about, lights and incense were carried before him. When the mood took him he improvised his own peculiar ceremonies. Once he presented himself on the chancel steps, vested in cope and bearing from his own breakfast table a large silver salt-cellar. 'My people ,' he announced, 'you are the salt of the earth', and scattered a spoonful on the carpet before us. . . .

Despite all Mr Bourchier's extravagant display I had some glimpse of higher mysteries'.

Evelyn Waugh A Little Learning 1964

The red electric cross can be see in this early painting of the sanctuary by the Belgian artist Karel Verschaeren. It was a replica of one to be found in Milan Cathedral, and for 26 years hung in St Olave's Church, Hanbury Street before the stall of Bourchier's father who was Rector there. It came to St Jude's when that church was demolished in 1913 and remained here until 1932 when it was returned to Bourchier, now at St Anne's , Soho. It is, of course, usual to have an ever-burning red light before a church's principal altar.

Waugh became a Roman Catholic in 1930, and his memories of Bourchier were recorded many years later. The 'wayward opinions' included a concern for animal welfare which would now be seen as prescient. He was actually succeeded by a 'genuine Anglo-Catholic' from Margaret Street, the Rev'd Edward Arundell - although it is clear that the latter was surprised when some from the congregation questioned his 'orthodox' explanations of liturgical practices they had accepted for years .

Evelyn Waugh and the 'preposterous parson'

The novelist Evelyn Waugh, author of Brideshead Revisited and the Sword of Honour trilogy, was confirmed at St Jude's on 29 June 1916. His family lived at 'Underhill' on North End Road, and his father was for many years a sidesman at St Jude's.

"St Jude's . . . was then in the charge of the Revd Basil Bourchier. Bourchier, a cousin of the actor-manager, Arthur Bourchier, and satirised as the odious Cyril Boom Bagshaw in A.S.M. Hutchinson's best seller, If Winter Comes, was an actor manque, one of those flamboyant, theatrical priests who in every age are to be found showily performing from the pulpit. Arthur regarded the man as a rollicking joke, enjoying the novelty of each weeks antics. Bourchier put a lot of thought into his dramatic effects: while his flock were taking Communion, a large red, electric cross was switched on over the altar; and the lesson was often acted out with impressive literalness.'

Selina Hastings Evelyn Waugh: A Biography 1994

'[Bourchier] was a man without pretension to doctrinal orthodoxy; a large, florid, lisping man, who was often to be seen in the stalls of London theatres in lay evening dress. No one could have been more alien to the ideals of Dame Henrietta Barnett and of the general run of the inhabitants of his parish. He was a man of wider claims. His name was constantly in the popular newspapers, giving his wayward opinions on any subject about which he was consulted. He professed an extravagant patriotism . . . He was anathema to the genuine Anglo-Catholics of Graham Street, Margaret Street and St Augustine's, Kilburn. His congregation was not exclusively - nor indeed primarily - local. Personal devotees flocked to him from all parts of London. His sermons were dramatic, topical, irrational and quite without theological content. . . .

Mr Bourchier was a totally preposterous parson. When he felt festal, whatever the season or occasion marked on the calendar, he dressed up, he paraded about, lights and incense were carried before him. When the mood took him he improvised his own peculiar ceremonies. Once he presented himself on the chancel steps, vested in cope and bearing from his own breakfast table a large silver salt-cellar. 'My people ,' he announced, 'you are the salt of the earth', and scattered a spoonful on the carpet before us. . . .

Despite all Mr Bourchier's extravagant display I had some glimpse of higher mysteries'.

Evelyn Waugh A Little Learning 1964

The red electric cross can be see in this early painting of the sanctuary by the Belgian artist Karel Verschaeren. It was a replica of one to be found in Milan Cathedral, and for 26 years hung in St Olave's Church, Hanbury Street before the stall of Bourchier's father who was Rector there. It came to St Jude's when that church was demolished in 1913 and remained here until 1932 when it was returned to Bourchier, now at St Anne's , Soho. It is, of course, usual to have an ever-burning red light before a church's principal altar.

Waugh became a Roman Catholic in 1930, and his memories of Bourchier were recorded many years later. The 'wayward opinions' included a concern for animal welfare which would now be seen as prescient. He was actually succeeded by a 'genuine Anglo-Catholic' from Margaret Street, the Rev'd Edward Arundell - although it is clear that the latter was surprised when some from the congregation questioned his 'orthodox' explanations of liturgical practices they had accepted for years .

Read more about Waugh and Bourchier in A Totally Preposterous Parson by Alan Walker

Available from the Church or Amazon.co.uk

The Stalingrad Sword

The Stalingrad Sword was made to commemorate the sacrifice of the Russian people in the Battle of Stalingrad of 1942 which marked a turning point in the war with Nazi Germany.

It was presented to Marshal Joseph Stalin by Winston Churchill in the presence of US President FranklinD. Roosevelt during the Tehran Conference on 29 November 1943.

The personal project of King George VI, the 50 inch sword was made by the Wilkinson Sword company, and its 36 inch double-edged blade was inscribed with the words "To the steel-hearted citizens of Stalingrad, the gift of George the Sixth, in token of homage of the British people" (with the same in Russian on the reverse).

The lettering was the work of M[aurice] C. Oliver (1886 - 1958) (third from the right), acknowledged as the foremost letterer of his day and the 'father' of modern English calligraphy. Oliver taught at the Central School of Art and the Hampstead Garden Suburb Institute. He worshipped at St Jude's and was a member of the PCC at the time the sword was made. We have several examples of his lettering in the church including the list of vicars at the back of the church and the guide to Starmer's paintings in the Lady Chapel.

Before it travelled to Russia the sword was displayed in Westminster Abbey. Evelyn Waugh evokes the scene in his Unconditional Surrender (1961) (part of the Sword of Honour trilogy):

"The civilians were shabby and grubby. Some munched 'Woolton Pies'; others sucked cigarettes made of the sweepings of canteen floors. Bombing had ceased for the time being but the livery of the air-raid shelter remained the national dress. As they reached the abbey church, which many were entering for the first time in their lives, all fell quite silent, as though they were approaching a corpse lying in state. The sword they had come to see stood upright between two candles, on a table counterfeiting an altar".

Waugh, who grew up in North End Road and worshipped with his father at St Jude's, was less than impressed with the sword which symbolized for him the modern, irreligious world and the spectre of communism.

The 2001 film Enemy at the Gates, set during the Battle of Stalingrad, stars Rachel Weisz who grew up on the Suburb. The title evokes Psalm 127: 5/6.

High Mass on St Jude's Day during the Second World War

Photographs by Ronald Procter probably taken in 1939 or 1940.

The final image of the blessing was sent as a card to parishioners on active service in 1944.

Walter Percival Starmer: war artist

Walter Starmer, seen here at work on the memorial to Michael Rennie, was born in 1877 in Teignmouth, Devon, the son of the Reverend Henry Starmer, a Congregationalist Minister. He trained at Norwich and Birmingham Schools of Art, and seems to have begun his career as a book illustrator with Gertrude M. Faulding's Old Man's Beard and Other Tales (1909).

In the First World War he served as a war artist recording in particular the work of the YMCA with the forces. Thirty water-colours are now in the collection of the Imperial War Museum, several of which were reproduced in Sir Arthur Yapp's The Romance of the Red Triangle [the emblem of the YMCA]. After the War he illustrated two volumes of Yapp's Piers Plowman school history series.

Y.M.C.A. IN A RUINED PARISH HALL IN FLANDERS, JUNE, 1916

Y.M.C.A. MARQUEE IN THE SHELL-SWEPT SOMME AREA

A REFUGE FOR THE REFUGEES

Y.M.C.A. HUTS UNDER SHELL-FIRE

Starmer met the first vicar of St Jude's, Basil Bourchier, in Arras in 1918 when the latter was serving as a chaplain to the forces. In 1920 he was commissioned to paint the Lady Chapel as a memorial to those who had died in the war, and then, in a series of further commissions, he went on to decorate the rest of the church.

As well as the Rennie memorial of 1942, Starmer recorded the Second World War with a drawing of St Jude's filled with furniture from local houses which had been damaged through enemy action.

Japan Tsunami Appeal

From Yukie Yagioka

Thank you very much indeed for your wonderful support for my appeal last Sunday. I am deeply grateful to you for all your kindness and generosity. The appeal was a great success and raised £756 and 40 pence. I really treasure the fact that you made these donations and the kind thoughts that accompanied them. All the money raised will be sent to the Japanese Red Cross through the British Red Cross (www.redcross.org.uk) after Sunday 27 March.

I do hope that the suffering of the people of Japan will soon be relieved. I pray to God for that.

I was so pleased you seemed to enjoy the sushi and I would also like to thank Miss Atsuko Takao who is a professional violinist. Her playing gave a more Japanese flavour to the event and she took time from her busy schedule to play for us for free. She will come and play again this Sunday.

I would like to make vegetable sushi again for this coming Sunday 27 March and this time I would like to give a small sushi pack to everyone including the children as a token of my gratitude and I hope this way to be able to return some of your kindness and generosity.

Thank you again for your kind hearts.

I look forward to your support this Sunday.

J. E. Raphael Memorial

Lieutenant John Edward Raphael (born 1882) was the only child of Albert and Harriette Raphael, of 5 Wild Hatch. He was educated at Merchant Taylors’ School and St John's College, Oxford, became a member of Lincoln's Inn and was called to the bar in 1908. He had some ideas of a political career; but his debut as Liberal candidate for Croydon in 1909 was not successful.

Jack Raphael was a keen sportsman. He won 14 blues at Oxford: four for Rugby, three for cricket, three for swimming, and four for water polo. He won nine Rugby International Caps for England, and captained Surrey at both rugby and cricket.

At the outbreak of the First World War he joined the King's Royal Rifle Corps raised by his cousin, Sir Herbert Raphael, M.P. for West Derby. He died of wounds – received on June 7th at the battle of Messines – on June 11th, 1917. An officer who was with him when he was wounded writes: " I have seen gallant men in many parts of the world, under all sorts of conditions, but never in my experience have I been so impressed by such a magnificent display of sheer pluck and unselfishness as was shown by Lieut. J. E. Raphael."

A memorial service was held at St Jude's on June 24, 1917.

The monument (on the north wall of the church near the organ) by the sculptor Charles Sykes (the designer of the 'Spirit of Ecstasy' mascot for Rolls Royce cars), was paid for by Jack's mother in recognition of his close friendship with the vicar, Basil Bourchier, who had been a contemporary at Merchant Taylors'. It was unveiled on 26th October 1919 by Dr Nairn, the Head Master.

Interestingly Mrs Raphael was not a worshipper at St Jude’s, and only an occasional visitor to the Free Church. In a memorial note in the St Jude’s Parish Paper (January 1931) she is described as “not intimately associated with the teaching of either [church], but she was an earnest and eager enquirer into the Unseen, and always welcomed fresh angles of vision”. In fact she was a Theosophist and a contributor to the fund for the building of the new Theosophical Society headquarters in Tavistock Square which was designed by Lutyens. Lutyens’s wife Emily was a Theosophist and is said to have spent much of her husband’s income on promoting the movement.

Mrs Raphael bequeathed 5 Wild Hatch to St Jude's with the condition that it should not be not sold but used as a clergy house or rented to produce income for the work of the parish. The St Jude's Gazette for July 1938 records the sale of the house for £1850 (today about £93,000). "This sum will be invested for the Clergy Income Fund, and will thus be of great help to us in perpetuity. The house was always a considerable expense to us and to any priest who lived there, so we feel that its sale has fulfilled the purpose of its gift to the Church as a benefaction on behalf of the clergy."

The grave of J. E. Raphael in Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery, Poperinghe, Belgium.

The motto on both monuments is from Harriette Raphael's forward to her son's book Modern Rugby Football (1919): "If character be Destiny then his is assured".

We are grateful to Paul Wapshott of Derwen College, Oswestry for material in this post.


Read Lesley Bellew's Daily Express article about Harriette and John Raphael

The Calvary

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The magnificent crucifix on the east end of the church was unveiled on 12 April 1924 by the Marquess of Aberdeen and blessed by the Bishop of Southern Rhodesia. The occasion also marked the completion of Lutyens's 1909 plan for the church which had had only a 'temporary' east wall since the consecration in 1911. From 1916 until 1923 the smaller crucifix now in the 'Calvary Cupboard' in the south west porch had occupied more than one position there as a war memorial (see these copyright images).

The crucifix, which appears to have formed part of Lutyen's's original scheme for the church, is in the style of Velasquez. The first vicar, Basil Bourchier, wrote "I have never seen a figure which, carved out of the solid stone, is so full of life. The veins in the Saviour' s wrists are perfectly wonderful. We owe a great debt to the sculptor, who, regardless of wind, cold and weather, has been constant to his task practically every day for nearly nine months".

The cost was met by Miss Flora Spalding, a childhood friend of the vicar's mother, and was given in memory of her brother and sister, Harry and Louisa. Both ladies were Scottish, hence the invitation to Lord Aberdeen, quondam Governor-General of Canada and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, whose son, Lord Dudley Gordon, was a sydesman (sic) at St Jude's.

Miss Spalding died in 1930 bequeathing £100 to St Jude's for the upkeep and preservation of the Calvary "which sum has been invested [and] the income will be used as directed. All members of St Jude's will be filled with gratitude at this act of generosity." (St Jude's Parish Paper January 1931)

Ash Wednesday 2011

Ashed penitents leaving the morning service.

and in the evening . . .

Ash Wednesday

Mass and Ashing

1000 and 2000 in the Lady Chapel

From the Canons of the Church of England B6