Island Life Magazine Ltd February/March 2013 | Page 42

INTERVIEW St. Agnes CHURCH In the latest of his series, Mark Fox travels to West Wight to view the only thatched church on the Island, and one of only about 100 throughout the country. St Agnes Church sits in the far west of the Island at Freshwater, on one side looking out onto the fields of the surrounding countryside and on the other looking towards the community it serves. The arrival of the famous poet Lord Tennyson at nearby Farringford had attracted to this remote community an illustrious stream of guests which included Lewis Carroll, William Makepeace Thackeray and Edward Lear. 42 www.visitislandlife.com There are two memorial plates bearing the names of Tennyson and Thackeray in the church, giving witness to their connection to the church. Indeed the porch was the gift of Tennyson’s daughter Emily in memory of her mother. The thatched roof is the church’s most visible and unique feature. Alone among Island churches the roof is its distinguishing characteristic. It was the vision of the then Rector of Freshwater, the Revd A.J. Robertson. When plans for the church were first being discussed he drew a picture of the kind of church he wanted to see built on land given for the purpose by Hallam Tennyson, the poet’s eldest son. The architect, Isaac Jones, who was born at Carisbrooke, based his plans on that painting and local builders, the C & W White Brothers, were commissioned to erect the building. Much of the stone was taken from a nearby unoccupied farmhouse, which