The sign over the entrance to the Whitechapel Foundry tells us that it has been making
church bells since 1570, and before then under another name.
This makes it the oldest manufacturing business in Great Britain.
Sadly, it has just announced it will be closing later this year so our recent Bardwell Bellringers visit there in early March was extra special.
Bardwell Ringers at Whitechapel
In the unbelievably small confines of the site, we were taken through the whole process of bell manufacture. We learned how they make the moulds and then cast them in bronze, a mixture of tin and copper, with a high proportion of tin to make the bronze harder which gives the bells a better sound. Every bell is tuned to several frequencies, usually five, on a tuning lathe. It is clearly a skilled job and takes about a day of trial and error to get it right. Next door was the area where the bells are finished and fitted with their clappers and hanging accessories. There was a good collection of bells on view ready for despatch – three were bound for Bangkok! To overcome space problems, a large pit has been dug to enable large bells to be cast. The largest and most famous of these must be Big Ben in 1858. The tour concluded with a look at handbells, which accounts for 25% of Whitechapel’s business. It was altogether an entertaining
and fascinating tour.
After this cracking start to the day, we headed to the Mayflower pub in Rotherhithe on the south side of the River Thames for lunch. This was a great choice of pub: the excellent food and a nice pint of IPA made for a great atmosphere in historic surroundings. This was where the
Mayflower ship started its journey to the New World in 1620.
After lunch we had arranged to ring at St Mary’s church, Rotherhithe – a nice ring of eight similar to our own ring at Bardwell. The ringing room was roomy and light. To me, as a beginner, the bells seemed easy to ring and it felt really good that I could ring as part of a group in a different bell tower.
Next we went to St Mary’s in Bermondsey. Again it was a nice big ringing room with room for the several non-ringers who came to watch the fun. We had to enter the ringing room through a trap door which had to be closed so the ringer on the tenor bell could stand on it, which explained why it was so heavy. I didn’t find these bells so easy to ring initially but everyone else seemed to get the hang of them straight away so it was clearly just me! As a new ringer I found the whole experience a real buzz and gained lots of confidence from the fact that I could ring
in a strange tower and make a good fist of it.
Our day concluded with a good laugh when we were accosted by a group of young women on a hen party.
They demanded that one of us proposed to one of the bridesmaids (purely as a joke, we all hoped!) – and so one of our eligible ringers, Nick, obliged. We don’t know if he got her phone number!
A really fantastic day organised to perfection! When’s the next one?
Tim Cavell – Rookie Bell Ringer
This article first appeared in the July 2017 edition of Tower Talk – the free quarterly magazine by ringers, for ringers. To read the rest of the edition, or to subscribe for future copies, please see here!