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Chapel Lane Great Barr Birmingham West Midlands B43 7BA
Tel: 0121 357 1390
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Our History
The earliest reference to a
‘Chapel’ at Great Barr is from around 1250 AD but there are strong grounds to
think that a building may have been on the present site since the 1100s. Then it was a Chapel-of-Ease to the local
Manor House and was part of the overall Parish of Aldridge. The Manor of Great Barr actually dates back
into Saxon times and it is possible that there might have been an early
preaching Cross at Barr for in the medieval records there is reference to a
‘Richard ad Crucem’ (Richard at the Cross) who lived at Great Barr. Such a cross
might date back to Anglo-Saxon times when the humble Chad and his followers
made Lichfield their centre in 669 AD and set out from there on many preaching
tours.
People from Great Barr would most likely have visited Lichfield,
especially after Chad’s death, when his tomb had become a place of pilgrimage. Bede described how ‘his sepulchre is covered with a wooden monument made like a small
dwelling house, having an opening in the wall, through which those who come
there for the sake of devotion are wont to put their hand and take thence some
of the dust, which when they have put it in water and given it to sick beasts
of burden or men to drink, the grievance of this infirmity being presently
removed, they return to the joys of desired health’.
Nearly 1,400 years later we are still here, Christians at worship and
inviting each and all to ‘Come follow Christ in the footsteps of
St Chad’.
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