The Bells of Little Walsingham, Norfolk

Little Walsingham, or more specifically, Walsingham, is known as ''England's Nazareth'', having been a place of pilgrimage since the Middle Ages and is one of the four great shrines of medieval Christendom, ranking alongside Jerusalem and Rome. Each year over 250,000 people go on pilgrimages to Walsingham to ask Mary to prey to Jesus on their behalf. In 1061, during the reign of St Edward the Confessor, a widow of the Lord of the Manor at Walsingham Parva, Richeldis, had a vision of the Virgin Mary. The Virgin Mary appealed to her to travel to Nazareth and showed her the place where the Angel Gabriel had made the revelation of the fourthcoming birth of Jesus.
The church of St Mary and All Saints in Little Walsingham, sits at the edge of an estate. The church was built during the 14th and 15th centauries, primarily from flint (which is common for this part of East Anglia) and has stone dressings. The tower, with its lead needle spire is the only part of the original church that remains, having had to be rebuilt in 1961 when a fire destroyed most of the original church. The tower and bells survived and the 5 bells were rehung and augmented to 6 in 1987 by the Whitechapel bell foundry.
They are a heavy six, with the tenor weighing 19 and a half hundredweight and ringing the note of 'E'. The bells 'go' very well, but are very slow turning due to the large canon retaining headstocks on the back 5. Ringing the treble well is quite a skill as you have to stop yourself from ringing it too fast, or the back 5 won't keep up. The back bells, in particular 5 and 6, are very difficult to get up 'right' so it is good to keep them chiming at the bottom and slowly get them up; or, better still, have two people on the end of the rope even just to get them started.
The bells are rung from the first floor ringing room and due to a rather awkwardly placed cupboard, ringing on 2 and 3 is much easier if the doors are unlocked and opened.
Ringing here was taken during our summer tour of Norfolk.
6 bells, 19-1-23cwt in E.

[@adriansunman51]

My visit to Walsingham some years ago happened to coincide with that of some visiting ringers, and I had the chance of a ring, ringing tenor behind to Doubles. It was hard work but the bells were really lovely.

[@DeclanTheRinger]

st Mary and all saints church little walsingham norfolk has a really nice sounding ring of six

[@RingerLuca651]

nice but i prefer the 8 down the road

[@DeclanTheRinger]

where is it