Nearly seven years have now passed since it was decided to make an effort to build the Nave of Hexham Abbey; and more than six years ago the late Mr Thomas Spencer promised £15,000 for its erection. This sum has now increased to nearly £17,000. Various plans and amended plans have been submitted to the Committee. The final set, by Mr Temple Moore, has been accepted and passed by the Committee, and by the Bishop of Newcastle and Mr J W Spencer, as Trustees of the original donor. It is the clear and undoubted duty of the Rector and Churchwardens of Hexham to provide adequate church accommodation for the parishioners. The Abbey, at present, is quite inadequate to meet the requirements of the increased population and the increasing number of adherents to the church. Worshippers absent themselves from the Church because they say the church has no room for them. In spite of the courtesy of seat-holders and the untiring efforts of the Churchwardens, there is a pressing dissatisfaction, and an ever-growing amount of discomfort. Those who desire to reserve seats for themselves and their families have to wait, and want. Not a few who attend the church find their little parties divided in all directions and occupying the seats of others. All idea of expansion is absolutely precluded. Our church, as at present arranged, accommodates some six hundred persons. This is a mean provision for church people on a population of some eight thousand parishioners. The communicants alone at the Abbey last Easter Day numbered 540. May God the Holy Spirit so move all our hearts that with one heart and with one mind and with united effort, we may provide opportunity and welcome for all who desire to worship God within our hallowed walls. We appeal to all to co-operate with us in this holy work by sympathy, by prayer, by effort.
To extend the church by the erection of the Nave necessitates the restitution to its old and sacred purpose of the site, which for hundreds and hundreds of years was that of the Parish Church of Hexham. For a considerable period there have been interments on the site of St Wilfrid's Church, but though a long time, it is as nothing compared with the centuries which have rolled by since St Wilfrid founded the church. For some 50 years the old churchyard has been closed. Stones have lain for years in all positions, railings remain broken and neglected, and the ground is of irregular levels.
A careful Plan and Schedule of all the graves on the site of the proposed new Nave has been prepared. The Architect's special clause in the Specification of the proposed new Nave, dealing with the Treatment of Graves, reads thus:— “Before beginning to excavate the ground for the foundations of the various walls, piers, etc. the grave stones upon the site, and the graves, and all human remains, are to be carefully and reverently dealt with in the following manner:— The whole of the grave stones on the site of the Nave and Aisle are numbered in white paint to correspond with Plan No. 7, and the Schedule of inscriptions. These stones are to be carefully lifted, packed and protected as will be directed. Then carefully uncover each grave and reverently remove and re-inter the remains at a level which shall be not less than three feet below the floor level of the new Nave. The whole of the graves having been dealt with in this manner, excavate for the foundations of the various walls, piers, etc., to the depths and widths shewn upon the Drawings or as directed. All loose bones to be collected together and buried beneath the floor at a spot where their interment can be conveniently indicated. The soil from the excavations and that accumulated on the site from the deposit of debris of all kinds, to be removed to that portion of the churchyard marked A on the Block Plan.
“Grave Stones. — Those grave stones which are on the site of the Arcade, Aisle Wall, etc., are to be fixed on the face of the new Aisle Wall, as nearly as possible opposite to the several graves they now mark. Those which occur on the open areas of the Nave and Aisle are to be set in the paved floor of the same, each stone as nearly as possible on the site it now occupies.”
These words conclusively show that the desire is not merely to reverence the departed, but to greatly honour them. This part of God's acre will be consecrated to God's worship as it was in the centuries before those now departed even lived. These memorial stones will record, not merely their resting places, but their names as their descendants gather together in the great congregation to take their part in the Communion of Saints with those they have loved long since, and lost awhile.
Will it not be a privilege for us, the living, thus to honour the blessed departed. May there be nothing to disturb this spirit.