The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1914-03-14
A CHESHIRE SHRINE
OUR LADY OF HILBRE A PLACE
OF PILGRIMAGE IN THE
MIDDLE AGES.


fisherman of the Wirral coast and by
summer visitors to Hoylake and West
Kirby, has been recalled to the public
mind by the decision of the Lancashire
and Cheshire Historical Society to
carry out excavations in the hope of
discovering the old cell of the Bene-
dictines and the well which adioined
it, both of which have long since been
covered by the sands.
Now the property of the Mersey
Docks and Harbour Board, life-boat
station and the site of one of the old
est coast lights in England, Hilbre
was great place of pilgrimage in the
thirteenth and fourteenth centuries,
and centre of monastic life away
back in Saxon days. That it was an
cient even then, and place of habita-
ton in prehistoric times, is suggested
by the discovery in it's sands of flint
implements and calcined stones such
as the cave men used for cooking in
the stone age.
Dedicated to the Blessed Virgin.
When it's chapel of st. Hildaburgh-
from whom it takes it's sadly corrupt
ed name-was founded there is no
certain evidence, but that it was exist
ing at the time of the Norman Con-
quest is certain, apart from the find
ing in 1853 of ninth or tenth century
cross of red sandstone, and in 1854 of
an eleventh century gravestone.
When the Domesday Book was COM
piled, Robert de Redolent, who had
come from Normandy in the train of
the Conqueror, was in possession of
good deal of the fair lands of Wir-
raj, and amongst them the island of
Hilbre, which was then a portion of
the parish of st. Bridget, at West
Kirby.
Robert gave it to the Abbot and
monks of the monastery of st. Evreul,
in Normandy, and the grant was con-
firmed by William l. in 1888. In the
following century it seems to have
passed into the possession of the Earl
of Chester, who made it subject to
the Abbey of Basingwerk, in Flint
shire, which he had erected for one of
the military Orders, that English pill
grims to Holywell might be protected
from the onslaughts of the Welsh,
who, not without reason, resented the
coming of the English to their country
even for religious purposes. Basing-
uorI ro+oinod ifo dominion FOR n hOrf
half a century and then transferred
the island and it's cell for thirty
shillings year to the Benedictines of
st. Werburghs, Chester, whose fine
church is now the Protestant cathe-
dral of the ancient border city. The
Benedictines re-dedicated the settle
ment and it's chapel to Our Lady, and
attached it to the parish of ST. Os-
valid, at Chester. In the year 1915
we find them appointing vicar for
West Kirby so that by that date, at
the latest, the cell on Hilbre Island
had become subject to them.
Antiquity and Origin Of the Shrine.
An old legend tells us that when
Richard, the youthful son of the first
Earl of Chester, was making a pill
grimage to Holywell, he was set upon
by the Welsh, and driven to take ref
uge in Basingwerk Abbey, which was
so closely besieged that the young
noble had little hope of escape with
his life. Acting on the advice of one
of the monks of Hilbre, he sought the
intercession of st. Werburgh, at whose
prayer the waters of the Dee rolled
back and formed a sandy causeway,
still known as Constable's Sands, over
which the Baron of Halton, Constable
of Chester, marched to the rescue of
his lord. Thenceforward, the shrine
of Our Lady of Hilbre was one of the
most popular places of pilgrimage in
England.
Consumed in the Ruin of the "Refor-
nation"
At the Reformation" the cell of
Hilbre, together with the mother
house at Chester, was suppressed by
the virtuous Henry WILL, and it's bell,
which was said to have originally
come from st. Oswald's, Chester, was
transferred to st. Oswald's, Bidston,
where for nearly four hundred years
it has called Protestant congregations
to worship.
The island itself became tenanted
by Sir Richard Thimbleye, Lincoln
shire knight, one of those happy or
unhappy men who have left no his
tory. In course of time it passed into
the possession of the Trinity Brethren,
and eventually to its present owners.
It is divided into three parts, only the
middle one of which, covering liz
acres, is inhabitab1e, it's population
numbering ten.
It's light has acted as a beacon for
ships using the Irish Sea for at least
seven centuries, for it is recorded that
in the reign of Henry VIII, John, the
last Earl of Chester, contributed ten
shillings a year for its maintenance.
Being patient is the hardest work