Pulpit - St Lawrence - Eyam, Derbyshire - Wooden Church Artefacts on Waymarking.com

Jacobean pulpit in St Lawrence's church, Eyam.

The pulpit dates from Jacobean times, originally positioned by the north aisle but was subsequently repositioned to its current position by the chancel steps in connection with the 1868 reordering of the church. It is highly significant by virtue of its association with the story of the village. Mompesson* is likely to have spoken from the pulpit when outlining how the congregation should meet the plague. A chair in the chancel is dated, and would have been made to commemorate the event.

*"William Mompesson (1639 – 7 March 1709) was a Church of England priest whose decisive action when his Derbyshire parish, Eyam, became infected with the plague in the 17th century averted more widespread catastrophe.

In 1665 plague hit England, and a consignment of cloth bound for his village brought with it the infectious fleas which spread the disease. After an initial flurry of deaths in the autumn of that year it died down during the winter only to come back even more virulently in the spring of 1666. Mompesson, in conjunction with another clergyman, the ejected Puritan, Thomas Stanley, took the courageous decision to isolate the village. In all, 260 of the village's inhabitants, including his wife Catherine, died before the plague claimed its last victim in December 1666. Mompesson became associated with the plague and was not universally welcomed at his next parish, Eakring, Nottinghamshire."

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