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From: "Lilly Andrews" <>
Subject: Unidentified subject!
Date: Sat, 7 Nov 1998 17:14:15 -0000


I have a little mystery that I was hoping someone might be able to help me
research. I live in a small village, Scarrington, outside of Nottingham.
Our C of E church has 3 bells dating from the fifteenth century. No one
can figure out why such a tiny village would have 3 such fine, old bells.
They have Latin inscriptions in medieval black-letter script interspersed
with shields and crosses. On one bell, the shield is of the Kempe family;
it is known that Cardinal John Kempe was the powerful Archbishop of York
until 1452. So one guess is that the cardinal might have given financial
help to provide the bells, but if so, no one knows why. The Kempe shield
is known only on one other set of bells, at Thorne in east Yorkshire. Not
too far away is Beverly, the town of Scarrington's patron saint; so another
guess is that there might be some connection there.

Can someone give me a suggestion of where I can do further research on this
or the topic of old bells in the UK in general? I'm still rather new to the
research game.

Many thanks.

Elizabeth Andrews

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