St Swithun's features in an unusual adventure

Recently Swithin Fry from Gloucestershire wrote to us to find out about our sites dedicated to St. Swithun. His aim? To create a video diary of his journey to seek out as many Swithin's and Swithun's as possible, so he can track the lineage of those with the unusual moniker.

As you can hear from Swithin's outstanding video diaries, he was delighted to find the church open and since that first exploration the church has revealed more and more information. Most fruitfully, it led to meeting and interviewing the local Brent-Smith family, who let us in on the fact that St Swithun was the patron saint of apple growers. 

Swithin's work is inspiring - it shows exactly how we feel when we turn the handle and push the door of an old church for the first time and I've loved watching each film.

During our conversation I arranged to meet Swithin at St Swithun’s in Worcester, the wonderful church which is at the heart of our 2017 annual appeal. We are currently fundraising to regenerate the beautiful Georgian site into a sound and arts centre.  

There couldn't be a better place to plan for more video diaries and recordings. But in the meantime take a break and watch Swithin's video, I hope you enjoy your virtual visit to Brookthorpe as much as I have.

If you'd like to help find more connections, write to Swithin at [email protected]. As he put it to me when we spoke today, "Despite all my years of interest in the name, I've never met another Swithin in my life!" 

Patrick Joel - Volunteering Officer