Billy Bray - Cornwall's fiery Methodist preacher
Bray - Cornwall's fiery Methodist preacher
William Trewartha Bray was born in Twelveheads in mining country in 1794. He died in 1868 and is buried in the churchyard of the former church of St. Michael and All Angels in Baldhu, his grave marked by a handsome granite memorial obelisk. His father died while Billy was young and he was raied by his grandparents. As a miner, in both Cornwall and Devon, he was an ill-behaved drunkard. Married in 1821, he narrowly escaped death in a mining accident in 1823. Later that year he read John Bunyan’s Visions of Heaven and Hell, became a Christian and soon joined the Methodist group, the Bible Christians. Always an unconventional preacher, his sermons tended to break into song and dance. Ever a generous man, he adopted two orphans and raised the money to build three chapels, at Twelveheads, Carharrack and, the sole survivor, Kerley Downs. The latter is known as the "Three Eyes" Chapel for its three windows on each side. One of Bray's favourite sayings, which he used to justify his over-enthusiastic singing and shouting, was: “If they were to put me in a barrel, I would shout glory out through the bunghole”. Billy Bray's life was celebrated by the Devon folk singer Seth Lakeman in the song "Preacher's Ghost" on his 2010 album Hearts and Minds.
Baldhu Church and Billy Bray's obelisk
Billy Bray's 'Three Eyes' Chapel
Ed
Photographs
More in Miscellanea
Boundary Stones
I first learned about boundary stones when walking the Copper Trail in winter 2006. Thanks to Mark Camp, I was able to find an Altarnun parish boundary stone when walking between Five Lanes and Trebartha. In the summer I read about a project by Peter Davies and Blisland village to restore boundary stones on their part of Bodmin Moor, a project largely concerned with private property boundaries. They succeeded in finding and restoring 101 of 146 stones believed to exist in the parish. When walking on Manor Common I was able to find quite a number of these and keep comimg across many more on my Bodmin Moor walks. Here are two Manor Common examples.
Bridges - Prehistoric, Medieval and Modern
We have a remarkable variety of bridges in Cornwall, everything from the prehistoric age through to the modern era, though we do lack the kind of 21st century 'millennium' project bridges that places like Newcastle, London and Manchester like to boast about.
Christmas Lights at Mousehole and Newlyn
Lights at Mousehole and Newlyn