IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Gay Street, WELLINGTON, TA21 9EY

A wall of brick, probably quite old, has a course of what appears to be slate set into it. An early form of damp proofing?

Looking along Taunton Road as it heads into Wellington.

Looking along Taunton Road as it approaches a roundabout.

The B3187 to Taunton leaves Wellington along this tree-lined stretch.

Designed by C.E. Giles and built 1855-6.

Many older gravestones have been lined up against the boundary wall. The graveyard was in use from Mediaeval times.

Naturally the presence of a mole or two in the graveyards does cause some concern, but it's good to know they are abouts. St John the Baptist church was actually St Mary the Virgin church from its founding in, perhaps, the twelfth century. Somewhere along the line (and it's not recorded anywhere) the dedication was transfered to St John the Baptist. It's possible the name changed after the Reformation.

The church underwent two major restorations in 1848/50 and 1938, and in 1986/7 the Victorian pews were removed and the nave and chancel refloored. In the east window of the Lady chapel is the church’s rarest feature, a Lily Crucifix carved on the centre mullion, but perhaps its most famous feature is the impressive monument in the north chancel aisle to Sir John Popham who was Chief Justice of England under Elizabeth I and James I. He was, perhaps, Wellington’s most famous resident and lived in a substantial mansion in the town. The first organ was placed in the church in around 1700 and the present instrument was last rebuilt in 1997 at a cost of £60,000.

A narrow residential street near the centre of Wellington.

There has probably been a place of worship on the site of the Parish Church of St John the Baptist, Wellington since Saxon times but the present building is mostly in the Perpendicular style of the 15th century.