FEATURE
Church tribute
to 'Little Jane'
A
model church, which took more
than three years to build in
the back garden of a house at
Queen Bower, provides a lasting
memorial to a young Brading girl who died
at the age of 14 more than 200 years ago.
The model was painstakingly constructed
by Richard Dollery, who was inspired by the
story of Jane Squibb, also known as ‘Little
Jane of Brading’.
Richard began building the church in May,
2010, but explained: “The story actually
starts in 1799, the year Little Jane died. A
year before she passed away the local priest
Legh Richmond sent all the children from
his bible class in the churchyard to learn an
epitaph off a gravestone. Little Jane returned
and repeated the verse she had been given
to learn, but then also recited the verse on
the adjacent gravestone.
“The priest was very impressed, and
noticed how she had changed and become
more religious just on the back of learning
the verse. Sadly, shortly afterwards Little
Jane became ill and died of tuberculosis, but
subsequently touched the hearts of many
because of the priest’s careful recording of
what had happened.”
When Richard heard the story of Little
Jane, he found her grave in Brading
churchyard, which he now tends regularly;
rewrote and published Legh Richmond’s
original book about Little Jane, included
illustrations, and then set about building
the model church in her memory.
Richard said: “The church was all built of
mainly reclaimed materials. Fortunately
there was already quite a lot of St Helens
stone in my garden. There are about 3,500
slates on the church roof which were
cut down from normal sized slates, and
other pieces were cast as matchbox-sized
individual blocks from cement, with about
1,000 used for the tower and its buttresses.”
The church’s arched windows took many
hours to build, sometimes over the course of
four or five days, as did the interior pillars.
Often during the construction, Richard
demolished part of the church and rebuilt
it in his quest for perfection. He smiled:
“Originally it was not going to be as big as
it ended up, and I thought it would only
take a couple of months to build. But as it
stands on a concrete foundation, it probably
weighs about seven tonnes in all, so I don’t
think it will be going anywhere. I also put a
time capsule underneath the construction,
which hopefully will be there for centuries
to come.”
Richard has now started building other,
smaller churches, saying: “I know similar
projects have been made from cardboard
or matchsticks, but I don’t think there are
many in stone and cement as I build them.”
*The verse that meant so much to Little
Jane still stands on a gravestone in Brading
churchyard, now almost illegible, badly
weathered and lichen encrusted. It reads:
It must be so – Our father Adam’s fall,
all.
And disobedience, brought this lot on
we be,
All die in him – But hopeless should
.
Blest revelation! Were it not for thee
t, whereby
Hail, glorious Gospel! heavenly ligh
fort die;
We live with comfort, and with com
e the tomb
And view; beyond this gloomy scen
A life of endless happiness to come.
www.visitilife.com
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