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David Ford, History EditorTours > Winchester > St. Maurice's Church Tower

Tour the City of Winchester
by David Nash Ford BA, Editor, History on Britannia

St. Maurice's Church Tower

Only the Norman tower remains of St. Maurice's Church in Winchester, standing on the edge of the Cathedral churchyard. The rest of the building was torn down in the late 1950s, but this was mostly an unsightly 1842 extension. Its position shows that its stands on the site of an early Saxon church guarding one of the entrances to the Episcopal precinct.

Peaceful today, the edifice houses a fascinating series of open-air information boards tracing the history of the city. During the Commonwealth, however, the church is known to have been the scene of a something nearing a riot. John Woodman, the solicitor in charge of the confiscation of Royalist property, led an attack on the Humphrey Ellis, the Chaplain of the Corporation, while he was at prayers. It was the climax of a long-term quarrel between two of the city's leading public figures. Ellis was forced to leave the building and managed to escape the mob.

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