Old Cathedral and Church of St Michael

The building of Coventry's cathedral must have been a beautiful sight, the whole of the region, a wonderland for the lovers of the outdoors. The river running through the city, its tributaries between the small hills, the abundant wildlife, small forests, local meadows full of wild flowers, horses straining with great loads of logs for scaffolding, the last few yards, the teams of great shire horses straining against the chains and ropes to pull the logs uphill. People would stop work and gaze at the creation in their sight. The masters of stonemasons, along with William Botoner and his brother Adam, the walls amidst a forest of scaffolding. Around lay many unsquared stones brought from the quarry, rough, piled tier on tier, others placed on the bankers being turned out by skilful craftsmen, only part finished. Whenever there was a stiff breeze, the workmen clinging, clasping every ladder or pole, none too tightly tied, the building swayed with breeze. The building rose higher and higher until it rose to the cup stone. Here a kind of box, planked at the bottom and sides, had been constructed on the scaffolding for the safety of the workmen, whilst finishing the top of the spire, and setting the weathercock, of great weight, and golden plumage. It truly was a wonderful sight.

I don't know if this is in the area you are looking at, if not move it to St Michaels topic, Helen, it is from a 1950's book, Warwickshire by Tudor Edwards

Not quite the same area Anne but close. New Street was to the right of the camera but the other picture was taken from the other side of that road.

Is that the ground where the Herbert is?

The road was widened and there's a forecourt and steps but I think that the camera is roughly where the door to the Herbert is now.

Philip, you will like these. Some excellent images and info turned up recently via FB. Thomas Swarbrick built one of his largest organs in 1733, to complement the one in Holy Trinity of the previous year. It was presumably in the west gallery. and contained three string stops as a novelty. which were removed in 1763. Rebuilt by J.C. Bishop in 1835 for £534 and moved to an east gallery. The early photograph shows it on a platform at the west end, to which it was moved in 1849. Dismantled and stored in 1885 for a church restoration, but a new organ was built by Willis in 1887 for £1760. Much of it came from the organ exhibited by Willis at the Inventions Exhibition of 1885, though some pipework went to Canterbury. Herbert Brewer had been appointed organist the previous year.There was Barker lever action to Great and Swell and tubular pneumatic to pedal. It possessed 14 thumb pistons and Swell sub and super octave couplers. Despite all this it was hand blown for about twenty years. In 1911 J.C. Lee of Coventry overhauled the organ, and added Swell strings, two more Great diapasons three prepared-for stops and a few other things, for £700. In 1918 St Michael's (one of the three or four largest parish churches in England) became the Cathedral, and the organ remained unaltered until destroyed by bombing in 1940.

Nice pics, Neil. There are a lot of images looking at the apse but only a few looking to the west. Here's a nice zoomable one with the organ.

St Michael's stained glass.

This collection of faces caught my attention because they appear to have been painted by the same hand. I found this on Google.

There is supposed to be a group at a university that are trying to make sense of the glass from St Michael's. They have an uphill struggle because the medieval glass was already jumbled before the glass was removed to protect it during the war. The faces are delightfully varied and very human, rather than the idealised, saintly versions from Victorian windows.

Here's a link to a webpage about the conservation of the stained glass

Lady Chapel

Here's a good Now & Then. During the 70s it seems the section that is now the Blitz Museum was a rather snappy Cafe!

Sometimes I see things written about our history that make me unsure whether to laugh or cry! An old "friend" of ours has written something extremely controversial on another forum - 4th message from the bottom on this page of the Coventry Message Board. The message reads: Dutchman, right from before the war Coventry has been getting it's history wrong. The cathedral is not the building the Bottomlys built in the 14th century. After the dissolution and Coventry weather, the cathedral was falling apart, great stones were falling from the steeple, so in 1886 a silk ribbon designer called ADAMS got together formed a committee, raised funds, and restored it to its former glory. He was called upon to lay the first stone on its foundations. And two messages later, to confirm.... yes Coventry Cathedral was built from the foundations upwards in 1886 time and the book that proves it was in Cladstone's Library at Hawarden long before Coventry's Herald newspaper. You can google Hawarden if you wish to confirm, regards Kaga. On the next page comes a response in agreement.... According to british-history.ac.uk it was rebuilt between 1883 and 1889 so as you say was less than sixty-years old when it was finally destroyed. That page actually says: "The last major restoration was carried out between 1883 and 1890 under the direction of J. Oldrid Scott. This included the external re-facing with Runcorn stone of spire, tower, clerestories, and chancel, and the strengthening of the tower foundations." Now, I'm always willing to have my mind changed and learn something new, but I'm still convinced that our Old Cathedral was only heavily renovated in the 1880s, not completely rebuilt. One only has to walk around to ruins to confirm this - 14th to 16th century remains are everywhere you look, and most definitely do not appear to be "new" work! In fact, to think that the whole cathedral (still just a church at the time, of course) could possibly be taken down and rebuilt in a single decade, would surely stretch even the most vivid imagination!