Society handbells

Handbell Subscription (1833)

The ringers' archive holds the below subscription; a request to the "gentlemen of Saffron Walden" for a set of handbells while the tower was being repaired. This is was in 1832/3 when the upper part of the tower was renewed and the present spire added.

The subscription reads:

To the Gentlemen of Saffron Walden

As the Ringers of this town have been prevented from practicing the Art of Ringing upon the Church Bells through the tower being under repair, they have purchased a new Peal of hand Bells to practice upon, for fear the Ringing should decline; and as these Bells were a considerable expense to them, viz, upwards of £7-0-0, they beg leave to call upon the Gentlemen of Walden and hope that they will favour them by a Subscription.

The subscription was initiated with a contribution of 5s by the mayor and raised a total of £4-16-6. The collection was made by one of the ringers, William Rumble, with Richard Miller signing the completed document.

The first page of Richard's Miller's account book for 1829-40 has an entry that reads "Feb 14th 1833; Paid Mr. Mears for hand Bells as per Bill - £7 8s 0d. On the opposite page, an undated entry reads "sold Ashdon Ringers 14 hand Bells and Box to put them in for the sum of £2". It would seem that the bells of 1833 were acquired to replace a set of bells that the ringers thought were no longer up to the job.

Later references to the handbells

We have a record of the transfer of ownership of the bells from the old Company (pre-1881) to the Society in 1897. An entry in the minutes of 16 February reads "The handbells which formerly belonged to the Company were purchased by the Society for £3, from Messrs. F. Pitstow, E. Pitstow and J. F.Penning".

The minutes regularly make mention of the ringing of handbells in the club-house - especially on Great Ringing Day. The handbells came into their own during part of the Great War, when no ringing was possible after sunset due to "lighting restrictions...on account of hostile aircraft [Zeppelin and Gotha raids]". Bell News of 3 Dec 1915, reports that "On Friday evening, November 26th, at the residence of Mr AE Pitstow, on handbells, a quarter-peal of Grandsire Triples and 336 Bob Major. FJ Pitstow, 1-2; AE Pitstow, 3-4; F Pitstow (conductor), 5-6; F Dench, 7-8. First quarter-peal in Saffron Walden, and by all the band."

The first peal on handbells rung in Saffron Walden was in 1923 - this was followed by three more in the late 1930s.

The handbells today

It has been assumed that the Society's present set of handbells are those of 1833. We have seventeen bells - two full octaves (tenor No. 21 in D) with two accidentals - and they are kept in a custom-made box with gold lettering reading "Hand Bells of the Saffron Walden Ringers". Each bell has a founders mark of "H+S". Research suggests the likely founder to be Henry Symondson (sometime tuner for John Briant of Hertford the founder of Walden's back eight) who founded handbells between 1825 and 1839 probably in London. The dates match - but did Thomas Mears sell bells of other founders or did Henry Symondson work at Whitechapel under his own mark?

Unfortunately the bells are in a poor state of maintenance and are in need of significant work - they are rarely used.

Sources

• Handbell Subscription (1833) – ringers' archive [Misc 39]
• Richard Miller's Account Book (1829-40) – ringers' archive [A 3]
• Society Minutes (from 1881) – ringers' archive [M 1-4]