Wotton-under-Edge Branch
Hawkesbury (St Mary the Virgin)

Name or Dedication: St Mary the Virgin

Location: Hawkesbury, Gloucestershire

Grid Reference: ST768869

This bell still hangs in Hawkesbury church but no longer for full-circle ringing, as it was rehung for chiming by Whitechapel in 1976. Whitechapel also drilled out the cast-in crown staple, quarter-turned the bell and renewed its fittings, hanging it with an iroko headstock and an iron chiming lever. It has plain canons and was tuned by hand.

Previously, the bell was hung with an elm headstock on plain bearings in a 14th Century oak three-bell frame, probably the finest example of a Medieval bellframe in the Gloucester Diocese. Its fittings included a Medieval stirrup-topped clapper, an inverted pendulum slider and keyed ironwork to attach its canons to the headstock. The tower itself also dates from the 14th Century, though its foundations are from four hundred years earlier.

Bells previously hung for full-circle ringing

Source: "Church Bells of Gloucestershire" (Mary Bliss & Frederick Sharpe, 1986).

Where the exact weight of a bell is known, it is given in the traditional way using the British imperial units of Hundredweight, Quarters and Pounds (cwt-qtr-lb) in which there are 28 pounds in a quarter, four quarters in a hundredweight, and 20 hundredweight in a ton (one hundredweight is equal to approximately 50.8 kilograms). However, if only an approximate or calculated weight is known, it is given to the nearest quarter of a hundredweight.

A bell's diameter is measured across its mouth (open end) at the widest point and is given in inches (to the nearest quarter of an inch), one inch being equal to approximately 2.54 centimetres.

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