History of the Church dedicated to St Helena

The Stained Glass Windows

By the Font - The John Smith Window.

The centre panel shows the baptism of John Smith in the font, which stands before it. The record of the baptism, 9 January 1580, is still held in the church. In the top left-hand panel the boy John is shown studying at Louth Grammar School, and at the top right learning the arts of war in a Willoughby pasture at about the age of 20. In between them is a portrait head of Sigismundus Bathory, Prince of Transylvania, who made Smith captain of 250 soldiers and awarded him the coat of arms seen below the centre panel with the emblem of the three Turks Heads in recognition of his having killed three Turkish warriors in single combat. To the left of the centre panel is a portrait of Princess Pochohontas, daughter of the Indian 'Emperor' of Tidewater, Virginia, who saved Smith's life in December 1607. She subsequently married an Englishman, John Rolfe. She however pined for her homeland, but died as the ship was sailing down the Thames and was buried at Gravesend.

To the right is the picture of Frances Howard, Duchess of Richmond and Lennox, whose first husband was a patron of John Smith and who herself was responsible for the publication of his major work 'The General Historie of Virginia, New England and the Summer Isles' in 1624.

At the bottom left of the window is the arms of the Virginia Company who made Smith President of the Council of Virginia, and on the right the arms of the New England Company who made him Admiral of New England.

The small panel in the other window by the font commemorates St. Helena, to whom this church is dedicated. She was the mother of the Roman Emperor Constantine and was the person who re-discovered the site of the Cross and Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. The panel depicts the first church on that site.

In the Chancel (south side) - The Virginia Windows

The Virginia Windows, the John Smith Window and the St. Helena Window were all gifts to this church from Philip L. Barbour of Kentucky U.S.A. He had a varied life in his younger manhood culminating in work for O.S.S. and in the post-war reconstruction in Germany.

He had a great gift for languages and translated some of the Russian classics. 'The Three Worlds of Captain John Smith' which he published in 1964 was the first major biography of the pioneering son of Willoughby, and he devoted his later years to the study of the early Virginia Pioneers. At the time of his death in 1981 he was finishing an edition of 'The Complete Works of Captain John Smith'.

The then Rector of Willoughby, Rev Alan Taylor, was responsible for the fitting of the windows in the Church, donated by Phillip L Barbour. He, with members of the village, arranged a luncheon for His Excellency the Governer of Virginia, Governer Robb and his Lady plus the American party who travelled to England for the launching of the Godspeed and the dedication of the new windows at St Helena.

The Eastern Window

The centre panel has as its centrepiece the arms of Robert Bertie, 1st Earl of Lindsey, 13th Baron of Willoughby. He was Lord of the Manor of Willoughby and John Smith's father was his tenant.

Top left - Robert Hunt. This panel depicts the first recorded celebration of Holy Communion on the American Continent in Sunday 21 June 1607. The Revd Robert Hunt was the first minister of the Colony and the Vicar of Heathfield, Sussex. John Smith described the scene as follows:- 'When I first went to Virginia we did hang an awning (which is an old sail) to three or four trees to shadow us from the sun, our walls were rails of wood, our seats unhewed trees till we cut planks, our pulpit a bar of wood nailed to two trees'.

It should be noted that the worshippers were obliged to have their arms at the ready in case of sudden Indian attack.

Bottom Left - William Crashaw. The scene shown here is of William Crashaw preaching to Members of the Council of Virginia, Lord de la Warr, shareholders and colonists. The date was the 21 February 1609 in the Temple Church in London. It has been claimed that there is no nobler sermon of this period expressing colonisation in terms of Christian Mission - part of the text is displayed in bottom right panel of the other window. He was born in Yorkshire in 1572, became a Fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge, and ordained in 1597. He was Rector of Barton Agnes in Yorkshire and from 1605 - 1613 served the Temple Church. He was the father of Richard Crashaw, the poet, and died in 1626.

Top Right - Matthew Sutcliffe. He was born c. 1550. He was a Fellow of Trinity College and became Dean of Exeter. He was a wealthy man who helped John Smith with funds for fitting out the New England Venture. Matthew Sutcliffe founded a college at Chelsea for polemical writing against the Roman Church but despite the support of King James it never became permanent.

Bottom Right - William Symonds. He was born c. 1556 and became Curate of Halton Holegate in Lincolnshire with Lord Willoughby as his patron. He was also familiar with John Smith. He became a preacher at St. Saviours, Southwark, and was the editor of the first account of the proceedings of the English Colony in Virginia which was published in 1612. There were six contributors to this volume of whom the most substantial was John Smith. The panel shows William Symonds reading proofs at the printers. He is thought to have died about 1616.

The Western Window

The centre panel is the arms of Peregrine Bertie Knight of the Bath. As a youth in 1599 he travelled to France with John Smith as his companion, thus being the occasion of Smith's first venture abroad. Peregrine was on his way to join his brother Robert on a continental tour. Smith only stayed with them for a few weeks. He later met the brothers again near Sienna in Italy where he found them 'cruelly wounded in a desparate fray, yet to their exceeding great honour'.

Top Left - Alexander Whitaker. He was minister at Henrico, a new settlement 55 miles up river from Jamestown. Born in Cambridge in 1585 he was educated at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge. He answered a call from the Governor of Virginia for 'four honest and learned ministers' and sailed in March 1611.

He prepared the Princess Pochohontas for Baptism and in the panel shown teaching her in his parish. According to Sir Thomas Dale she "renounced publicly her country religion, openly confessed her Christian faith stating she desired to be baptised". Alexander Whitaker was drowned in the James River.

Bottom Left - Samuel Purchas. He was born c. 1577 at Thaxted in Essex. He became Vicar of Eastwood near Southend in 1604. He is shown reading in his study there. Philip Barbour has suggested that his interest in exploration may have been due to meeting George Berkeley, a friend of John Smith, and also Andrew Buttel of Leigh. He obtained many of Hakluyts papers on his death and built upon it to produce 'Purchas his Pilgrimes', a massive work which is one of the major sources of our knowledge of the 16th and early 17th century voyages. He died in 1626.

Top Right - Richard Hakluyt. He was born near London about 1552 and from boyhood was fascinated with geography. He was ordained and began writing about voyages of exploration at the age of thirty. He is shown in the panel presenting a copy of his 'Discourse of Western Planting' to Queen Elizabeth 1 in October 1584. He wrote this book during a five year term of office as chaplain to the English Ambassador in Paris. The Queen rewarded him with a canonry in Bristol Cathedral. There is only one remaining copy of that book in the New York Public Library. Hakluyts Voyages was a profound stimulus to the early explorers of America. He died in 1616 and was buried in an unmarked grave in Westminster Abbey.

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