A lovely image capturing the original St Mary’s Church on New Road.
During the twentieth century, the church began to fall into a state of disrepair and the upkeep of the bricks and mortar, together with the problems of heating and leaks, led the congregation to regretfully consider building a modern church in its place.
The last vicar of the old Church, James Bates, who had previous experience in the building business, put forward a plan of selling the old Church and surrounding prime land to new town developers, in return for a new Church to be built by them for the Parish. This was eventually agreed and the last service to be held at the old Church was on 22 October, 1989.
