NOTES ON CERTAIN DISCOVERIES MADE DURING ALTERATIONS AT ORMSKIRK CHURCH.* By James Dixon, F.R.Hist. Soc. (READ 28TH NOVEMBER, 1877.) MANY futile attempts have been made to fix a date for the first erection of Ormskirk Church. This is not to be wondered at, seeing that in modern times it has presented one of the most singular appearances of mixture of styles, and no single style which it might be expected that any ecclesiastical structure would exhibit. The only positive date hitherto recognised in connexion. with it is A.D. 1273, in which year it is recorded to have been endowed. Hence, it has been customary to regard it as a foundation of the 13th century. But to those who have considered, that at the Domesday survey no such place as Ormskirk appeared to be known, and that the place was simply part of the manor of Lathom, (at one time the property of Orm, the Saxon owner also of Parbold,) it has appeared extremely probable that a church existed there even in his time. Hence comes the name of Orms Church, so often met with in early registers; and although the Domesday survey did not for this reason include the name of a non-existent parish, yet in later times, Ormschurch, in the manor of Lathom, by a new arrangement of parochial boundaries, became the name of the parish which has continued ever since. I am indebted to the Hon. Miss Bootle Wilbraham, sister of Lord Skelmersdale, for the sketches accompanying this paper, and referred to where the subjects are named; with her permission to use them in this or any other It is only right to say that they have been taken under considerable way. difficulty. It has been left to the present time, when a work of extensive restoration has been begun, to discover that a church did. exist here before the one of a 13th century date. There are remains brought to light of a Norman church, though (almost beyond a doubt) some little Saxon timber structure must have previously occupied the site. Yet these Norman remains have not turned up where I have long expected to find traces of something anterior to the Early English, as seen in the spire and S.E. angle of the church next the chancel. My outlook has been at the base of the tower and its adjacent parts. The curious arrangement of tower and spire, side by side, has long been a puzzle to investigators, though it admits of easy explanation; but there is still much remaining all through the building, now that the foundations have been laid nearly bare, which affords great room for speculation. Internally, the church has long been one of the most objectionable to the eye of taste; yet it is large in its proportions, and must have been an impressive building before being robbed of nearly every vestige of its once unquestionable dignity. It is only since I first decided on writing a few remarks, that the Norman discoveries have been made; and had they not appeared, it would have been impossible to determine with certainty the theory of a Norman church. An earlier one, if such existed, might have been supposed to have gone to complete decay; and with change of ownership in the Lathom estates, it would have seemed probable that a period elapsed, even down to the end of the 13th century, before any substantial edifice was reared on its site. Much sentimental opposition has been raised to the present alterations, but the excavations tell only too plainly how much a change was needed. It has been proved that the whole area of the church has long been little better than a common grave on a large scale, within walls and amid ruins of a departed splendour. Only about three feet of depth intervened between the recent modern floor and the rock, yet within this space very many, probably thousands of persons, have been buried, (I have tested the number carefully by the registers), by repeated turning over of the remains of those buried before. As many as twenty skulls have been found in one mass, just below a pew constantly occupied; and while I am writing this, a skull, which I reasonably infer is that of a young lady of a very ancient and wealthy family in the parish, lies less than six inches from the still undisturbed pavement of a chapel partially restored. It is exposed to view by adjacent removals; and this is only a sample. So common was burial within the church at one time, that it was the custom, about eighty years ago, if the weather was at all unfavourable, no matter who had to be buried, to dig a grave inside the church, and there the body was laid. There were no pews then in the nave; few in the aisles, and those not disposed in order; and not a single boarded floor, except in the galleries. Even gravestones were few, and the rest of the pavement was poor. The church had then clearly not much recovered. from the wreckage of the civil war period. All the vaults in the church, such as they are, are of very late construction; and even the Stanleys and other distinguished families around must, though buried in their respective chapels or other places of distinction, have been laid in the general composition of accumulating human remains. In one place a man was found buried in his clothes; in another, one wrapped in an old banner. [Many "Troopers" and "Dragoons" are named in the registers.] The third Earl of Derby was buried in the “High Chancel," with great ceremonial, but no trace of the spot has been found. There is not so much as a stone of the rudest description which can be said to mark it. Still when one reads in the register of burials of the "High Chancel," and the " King's Chancel," "My Lord of Derby's Chapel," "Mr. Scarisbrick's Chancel," "Mr. Gorsuch's "Chancel," "Mr. Aspinwall's Chapel," "Mr. Mossock's 66 66 "Chancel," "The Bickerstaffe Chapel," the Chapel of "Mr. Stanley of Moor Hall," St. Nicholas' Chancel," of "Mr. "Stanley of Cross Hall, his Chapel," of "Mr. Hill's Window," as a burial place, and such like distinctive spots, to the number of thirteen, the idea suggested is, that in these places or around their sites would be found-if only in mere fragments—some remains of former art and structural grandeur. Few such signs have appeared, however, and hardly anything has been left but the merest outlines of a large building which has doubtless possessed many special features of interest. The registers only are spared in anything like a complete state- but even Cromwell had a regard for registers-and they are so rich in interesting material that they serve to aggravate the disappointment felt, that what may have been more than an ordinary church at one period should have been so nearly all swept away. Of the few remains brought to light, indicative of a more ornate condition of the church than we have been accustomed to, the following may be regarded as the most interesting. On the north side of the main pier of the spire, below the recent floor, was found a square base with a quatrefoil moulding on its surface, which seems beyond a doubt to have been the base of a now lost font, belonging to the Early English enlargement of the building. (Pl. VI, fig. 2.) A portion of what may have been a Norman font, the predecessor of this, is inserted in the external wall of the eastern gable of the church. The base just named stands within the westernmost bay of the nave, on the south side of the church, and to the right hand within the entrance through the spire, the arch of which has been cut away to make a stair approach to the organ loft and south gallery. Its position quite agrees with the following quotation from Barr's Anglican Church Architecture: "The Font, for the public celebration of holy baptism, "must be of stone, and in ancient times was always placed |