Pictured above: Beth Thomas at Westbury Parish Hall
A building which has served the Westbury community for more than 150 years ‘could fall into ruin’ unless locals come together to save it.
Members of All Saints’ Church want to see the town’s Parish Hall – situated on Church Lane, just off Edward Street – play a bigger role in community life. Currently the building is in poor condition with dingy toilets and a tired kitchen. If action is not taken, the hall is in danger of closing and its current users such as Brownies, St John Ambulance Cadets and yoga groups could be forced to find a new home.
“Unfortunately, over time it’s really deteriorated in terms of its condition,” explained Beth Thomas of the White Horse Team Ministry. “It’s more than 150 years old and needs a lot of attention. We’ve been working for a long time to find a solution to bring it back up to scratch, but it takes us a lot of time and energy to look after the Grade I listed All Saints’ Church. We don’t have the ability, capacity, skills or time to do the hall justice. But we don’t want to lose it as a community asset. If it was in a better condition, we know it could be used a lot more.”
There is a scheme with planning permission to modernise the hall and make it into a modern multi-purpose community space, complete with a mezzanine, called the ‘White Horse Community Hub.’ But it will take the town coming together to make the dream a reality. The dwindling congregation of All Saints’ Church, many of whom are retired or work full time like Beth, doesn’t have the capacity to see the vision to its conclusion by themselves.
As a result, a steering committee working on the transformation of the hall has developed a new Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) which would see the community taking over from All Saints’ Church and spearheading the transformation of the building.
As a space managed for the community, by the community, more funding opportunities would become available to support the development and ongoing management of the hall from sources such as government funds and the National Lottery Community Fund, which are not available to the church.
Beth, who spoke to the White Horse News after sweeping the inside of All Saints’ Church in her own time, added, “After taking advice from various people we felt that making a separate charity to run the hall would be a better direction moving forward, it would enable people in the wider community to get involved. We would welcome a bigger team, a fresh pair of eyes and some new energy. There is a plan for the future of the hall but if the CIO wants to change anything, they can certainly do that. The plan is not written in stone, there’s flexibility for people to steer the future of the building.
“All Saints Church is Grade I listed and we have tens of thousands of pounds to spend on the roof, the windows and lots of other stuff to preserve this building. We just can’t manage the hall as well, really. It’s an additional stress. So we’re appealing to the community to help us secure the future of the hall. The alternative is we close it and sell it, or it just falls into rack and ruin.”
Many older Westbury residents will have attended school in the hall until it closed in the late 1960s. Built in 1873 by All Saints’ Church as a Sunday school room, Westbury Parish Hall went on to provide a backdrop to lessons for Westbury Junior School and the Laverton County Infants School. It became the parish hall in 1970 when a new modern school was opened on Eden Vale Road.
Since then, Brownies and Guides have played games, sung songs and done crafts in the Hall; St John Ambulance has taught cadets first-aid in the historic building and Westbury locals have de-stressed during yoga sessions there.
There is no membership fee for the CIO – All Saints’ Church is simply seeking support to ensure the continued use of the Parish Hall as an important community space.
Those who are interested in becoming members are invited to attend a meeting on Saturday 15th March at 10.30am in the Parish Hall, which local MP Andrew Murrison is due to attend.
If you would like to know more about the proposals for the Hall or how you or your organisation can help, please contact Beth Thomas by email beth@whtministry.org.uk or visit https://whtministry.org.uk/westbury-parish-hall-needs-your-help/
Below: Sunday school at Westbury Parish Hall in 1960 Picture credit: Westbury Heritage Society
Uncovering the history of Westbury’s Parish Hall
Liz Argent of the Westbury Heritage Society has researched the history of the Parish Hall, which originally served as a school, and has provided an insight into its past.
Liz said, “The school was donated to the town by Mrs Caroline Brown, the widow of Rev Stafford Brown, who had been the vicar from 1845 to 1847. Although the inscription above the porch says it was built as a Sunday school, it was used as a day school for girls and infants. It would have been known as the National School, run by the Church of England. The 1870 Education Act had just come into force when it was built, making it compulsory for children to attend school from the age of 5 to 12. It seems possible that younger children were also enrolled.”
After the formation of Wiltshire County Council in the late nineteenth century, education was gradually taken over by the local authority. The reorganisation was finished in 1925 when the local senior school was opened and the building then became part of the town’s mixed junior school. At that time there were also other buildings in use, as there was nowhere to accommodate all the children under one roof.
Liz added, “When a new junior school was finally built and opened in 1959 the top three classes from the infants’ school moved to the churchyard school. The infants (Reception and Years 1 and 2) had also been taught in different buildings up to this time. The first two classes remained in the building on Bratton Road. At this time children started school in the term of their fifth birthday, not everyone in September as now, so there were three intakes every year. Subsequently you could move up a class after one or two terms. Transfer to the junior school was in the September after you turned 7.
“The school had one classroom on the School Lane side with an office for the head mistress at the back of it. There were two rooms next to the playground, divided by a floor to ceiling wooden partition which could be pushed back to create one large room. The rooms were heated by coal burning stoves, which the teachers had to look after. The small door at the side led to a corridor with coat pegs. The toilets were in a separate block in the playground.”
Below: The churchyard school in the early 20th Century Picture credit: Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre, 3476/1/332
