Brockhampton All Saints Church

All Saints church in Brockhampton village in central Herefordshire is for many a quintessential glorious village church. It dates from 1901-1902 and built in the Arts and Craft style by architect William Richard Lethaby, it has all the delights of old England. A thatched roof, wild green verdant views all around, the sound of cattle and a robin chattering away.

But this church offers more social history for those with curiosity and intrigue. Brockhampton Estate was bought as a present for the daughter of Eden Dyer Jordan, a self-made American department store owner Alice Madeline when she married Arthur Wellesley Foster. On their deaths, Alice Foster decided to gift this new church to the estate and village and commissioned the notable Lethaby to design this church.

Lethaby, a Principal of the Central School of Arts and Crafts as well of a Professor of Design for the Royal College of Arts produced this rather wonderful church. Whilst the old church went out of commission and is now a private residence.

Its medieval character prevails in this new church with many romantic elements. But it is very much a building of the 20th century. There is plenty to admire here, plenty to be intrigued about including the fragment of old 15th century glass in the window. But don't miss the personal memories in this church by a woman Alice Foster who built the church for her parents but also had to find a place to remember her son.

Arthur Cedric Foster, a Second Lieutenant in the 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards died from wounds received in action at Neuve Chapelle in France on the 12th March 1915 - he was just 23 years of age. Like many of that time, places to remember and grieve were important when the Front Line seemed so far away. For Alice and her husband Arthur, Brockhampton Church was that place.