Bell Tower - Church of St James the Great, Stocks Green, Castle Acre, Norfolk, PE32 2AA
Posted by: 
greysman
N 52° 42.139 E 000° 41.158
31U E 343649 N 5841668
The church of St James the Great stands in the middle of the village between the ruins of the Norman castle and those of Castle Acre Priory. The tower holds a complete Taylor ring of six bells.
Waymark Code: WMVREJ
Location: Eastern England, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 05/23/2017
Views: 0
The village of Castle Acre is a major tourist attraction in Norfolk. The church dedicated to St James the Great stands in the middle of the village between the ruins of the Norman castle, to the east, and those of Castle Acre Priory, to the west. This Grade I listed parish church is largely C14th and C15th but there are some details from c.1300. It was restored by Ewan Christian, architect (1814–95). Built of rubble flint with squared knapped flint and cut stone dressings, lead roofed aisles, with green slate nave and chancel roofs. It consists of a west tower, a five-bay nave with clerestorey, north and south aisles, a north porch, a three-bay chancel, and north vestry.
The Perpendicular four-stage west tower has two angle buttresses to each face. Mounted on a moulded stone plinth the angle buttresses has five off-sets, the sixth stage above become angle clasping buttresses with tracery panels. A battlemented tracery panelled parapet surrounds a flat roof. The Perpendicular moulded arch west door has a large two-stage four-light embattled transom window with traceried upper panels above it. The sounding chamber has two quatrefoil sound-hole openings to each face with the bell stage having four two-light Perpendicular windows. There is a single, small clock face on the east face in the fourth stage and the north-east buttress contains a turret staircase, access to the upper stages of the tower. There is a complete Taylor ring of six bells in the tower.
The bells in the church tower are rung from a balcony in the tower which is reached by a short spiral stair in the north wall. There are six bells, a complete Taylor ring, of medium weight, quite easily going despite the long draught. As there is a problem with the bell frame and its supporting timbers the number of ringers allowed on the balcony at any one time is limited to twelve.
The following is a table extracted from Dove's Guide for Church Bell Ringers showing the weights in kg, and the sounding notes of the bells.
Bell Weight Note Dated Founder
1 180.98 E# 1952 John Taylor & Co
2 208.65 D# 1952 John Taylor & Co
3 247.21 C# 1952 John Taylor & Co
4 286.67 B# 1952 John Taylor & Co
5 387.37 A# 1952 John Taylor & Co
6 553.38 G# 1952 John Taylor & Co
John Taylor & Co. was the bell founding company in Loughborough from 1849 until 1977. It was a family run business and Paul Lea Taylor was the founder when these bells were cast.
Words from British Listed Buildings, Simon Knott's Churches of East Anglia, and Pevsner's Norfolk 1 Buildings with amendments from own on site observations.
Coordinates are for the tower.