What happened to the clergyman?
On the wall of Saint Andrew’s Church in the Co Laois town of Rathdowney, there is a memorial tablet to a former incumbent. Such memorials to rectors are common, but a memorial to a rector who died in the Pyrenees must be something unique. The tablet gives no information regarding the circumstances of the unfortunate Mr Bredin’s death:
ERECTED
BY HIS WIFE TO THE BELOVED
MEMORY OF
THE REV EDWIN BREDIN A.B.
RECTOR OF THIS PARISH
AND FORMERLY CURATE
1865-1879
HE DIED 21ST JUNE 1879
AT CAUTERETS HAUTES PYRENEES
AGED 45 YEARS
HIS MORTAL REMAINS REST AT
BIARRITZ, FRANCE
_____________
“HE BEING DEAD YET SPEAKETH
BELIEVE ON THE LORD JESUS CHRIST
AND THOU SHALT BE SAVED”
Perhaps there would be some clue as to what happened in”Clergy of Ossory,” a weighty tome providing biographical notes on centuries of clergy. Its entry on Edwin Bredin has a paucity of detail.
1873—Edwin Bredin inst. July 17 (S.R.). Son of Rev. James B., R. of Myshall; T.C.D. BA. 1859, Div. Test. 1860; ord. D. 23 Dec., 1860 (Oss), P. Dec, 1861 (Cashel); C. Myshall 1861, C. Ratbdowney 1865-73, C. Rathkyran 1869; m. April 8, 1874, Mary, eldest dau. of Robert Field of Banbury ; d. 21 June, Exrix. Mrs Mary Fish Bredin
An Internet search provided little more by way of information. Bredin was not one of those rich clergy who could afford to pay a curate while he himself passed much of the year in the sunshine. The value of the living is recorded as being £115 per annum, not the sort of income that allowed one to be an absentee parson who lived in Biarritz.
Notes on the Goodreads website ,on the writer E.M. Channon, Bredin’s daughter, offer some clues about the family’s circumstances:
Born in 1875, in Rathdowney, Ireland, Ethel Mary Bredin was the daughter of the Rev. Edwin Bredin. Upon the death of her father, when she was four years old, Bredin and mother went to live with relations in England. She was educated at St. Leonard’s Ladies’ College, and for one year, at Cheltenham Ladies’ College. In 1904, she married the Rev. Francis Granville Channon, and settled with him at Eton, where he spent most of his working life. They had six children. Channon began to write and published after she was married, for the pleasure of it, and to supplement the family income. She retired, with Rev. Channon, to Bucknell, Shropshire, in 1932, and died there, in 1941.
Bredin was obviously not a man of such substantial private means that his wife could continue to live independently after his death, so how did he come to be in the Pyrenees in times when few clergy would have travelled outside of the country?
Cauterets is now a spa town and ski station, in Bredin’s time it was at the height of its fame as a spa; Napoleon III and the Empress Eugenie had visited some twenty years prior to his visit. The town had been reached by the railway in 1871 and its hotels had the elegance of the Belle Époque. But what took Bredin there?
Had he spent much of his modest income journeying in search of a cure? Had he suffered respiratory illness that might have found relief among the air and waters of the Pyrenees? Why did no-one think to record on the plaque why he had made that last fateful journey?
I was looking at the Tithe books for ’27 and it seems the parish was returning somewhere north of £412. It also seems his father held the position before him, and that he was his father’s curate. What’s odd in that area though is there are two parishes like nesting dolls with Rathsaran inside Rathdowney held by a chap named Nixon.
What is that data you reference. There’s great chunks missing. And some of the parishes don’t connect to anything. Are some subsets of St Patrick’s, or even the crown.
I has a decko at the place in France too. There’s a 19th century neo classical building in the town and it really doesn’t look like anything you’d normally see down thataways. More Swiss really, until you enter the upper town when it reverts to the norm of narrow lanes and pinched turns.
And generally on the topic. I was in the graveyard of the Whitechurch near Carrick-on-Suir and found a tomb to Georginia who died in Rome three months after getting married. She was well connected with what might be termed the 2nd rank in the upper reaches of the upperclass in England.
My Internet search was brief. A search for “Bredin” and “Rathdowney” brought the details of the value of the living. The area would have suffered significantly in the Famine, so by the post-Disestablishment era the parish was significantly poorer.
I had never heard of Cauterets until seeing the plaque. I am wondering if Bredin was a TB victim
I thought of Lourdes too, he might have very very High Church leanings. But tiz more likely he was an ill man and was prescribed a visit to benefit from the waters.
Would Lourdes have caught on by 1879?
I think Pau was the more popular destination among Anglican clergy of the
time. Perhaps Cauterets was cheaper!
Please see lancelot John Fish page on my website
he is the natural son of Rev John Dent Fish & Mary Field who married Edwin Bredin after the death of her husband Rev John Dent Fish.
Lancelot John Fish is step son of Rev Edwin Bredin and after he The rev Edwin Bredin Dies, lancelet John Fish also a curate and Rev later becomes Venerable lancelot John Fish bishop of Bath
but he goes on to be Chaplain of the Biarrittz church in France 1907 to 1909 where his step father is buried
I will include your details on my webpage soon for completeness
thank you for the information
regards
walter
Thank you for shedding light on the mystery.
Sorry I was unable to shed light on why Rev Edwin Bredin was in Biarritz in the first place. I will see what I can dig up in the months ahead.
Let me know if you find a nugget or two
Regards
Walter
I will try to draw the wills of people around him and see if any clues come out of that
Hi Ian
I don’t known if you can point me in the right direction, lancelets father Rev John Dent Fish had a stained glass window dedicated to him in the South Banbury Christ Church after his death. The church is deconsecrated many yrs later. I don’t know how to find out what happened to the stained glass windows of the church
i assume they may be saved and moved to other churches or used in another place?? don’t know
can’t imagine they would destroy the fine windows??
would you be able to advise me?
thanks
walter
South Banbury Parish church was deconsecrated in 1967, it seems only to have lasted 120 years.
http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/oxon/vol10/pp95-120
The diocesan office in Oxford could probably point you in the right direction in searching for the stained glass.
Ian
Thank you very much, i will follow that up
Regards
Walter
Hi Ian
Rev Edwin Bredin only left a letter of administration, no WILL I am afraid, IT READS
“BREDIN (Reverend) EDWIN, effects under £600
14 Aug 1879, Letters of Administration of the personal estate of Reverend Edwin Bredin late of The Glebe Rathdowney Qweens County Clerk deceased who died 21 June 1879 at Cauterets Hautes Pyrenees France were granted at the PRINCIPLE REGISTRY to Mary F Bredin of the Glebe the Widow of the said deceased”
I am afraid no clues to the reason for the circumstances why he was in France
I also wonder why his step son Lancelot John Fish was drawn to the place apart from the fact that his step father Edwin Bredin was buried there?
regards for now
Walter
If his wife remained in Rathdowney, perhaps he travelled in the hope of finding some improvement in a health condition?
I think you are right, last desperate effort for relief I think!
Henry Francis Lyte, writer of “Abide with me” left Brixham at the end of the summer of 1847 to die in Nice in November that year. Perhaps it was easier to cope with final illness in milder climes.
I have a rather poignant photo from the Whitechurch in Co Kilkenny. Where girl got married in summer and by that autumn was dead in Rome. I may have to photograph it again.
The girl was the daughter of the CoI rector.
ops, it seems I mentioned it above.
Hi Ian
Please see attachment i sent via email to you of the death of the stepson of edwin bredin, lancelot john fish who went to france as he had cancer and was hoping for relief
So he followed his stepfather to the same church
Regards
Walter
Looks like the church administration facilitated this kind of transfer to help their priests in a time of personal health crisis
I just realised i may be making a big assumption that the church would transferred the priest to this chapel, may equally be that the priest paid his own way?? how would he get a post in that region on his own??
not knowing the ways of the church not qualified to make that assumption, maybe you can set the record straight if you can please
walter
After the Church of Ireland ceased to be the Established Church in 1870, appointments to parishes were made by what was called a board of nomination, it comprised of the bishop, four elected clergy and an elected layman to represent the diocese and four laymen elected by the parish. The appointment would have been made by the board and it was obviously the case that both the diocese and the parish were in favour as it was necessary to secure seven of the ten votes.