MOVING A CHURCH.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19529, 11 July 1925, Page 20

MOVING A CHURCH.

TRANSfFERRED STONE BY STONE. A village church in Lancashire is being moved stone by stone to a new site a mil© and a-half awav (says tho Daily Chronicle), ft belongs (o the deserted village of Grano, or ilaslingden Grano, through winch tho old highway runs from Bury to Blackburn. The new 'site is Holden Wood. _ Fifty years ago Grano was a thriving village; to-day it is a place of ruins and_ memories, with rootless nulls, an old hall standing empty, and rows of tonantless houses falling to pieces. This is duo to the progress of neighbouring towns. The Bury and District Water Board acquired the village about 30 voars ago for reservoirs, and eventually the whole of tho property except tho parish church and tho Wesleyan chapel passed into their possession. The local mills wero rebuilt at Ilaslingden and the work-people moved too. Grano "people havo only recently decided to take-their church away from the deserted village. A mission hall was built at Holden Wood; services wero hold there at night and at the parish church in the morning. Tho parishioners —nearly all mill workers • havo now raised over £I3OO towards the £6OOO it is estimated the removal will cost The last service held in tho church was conducted by tho Bishop of Manchester, when lie spoke words of encouragement to the people who had undertaken such a huge task. It is probable that the final cost of the removal will be nearer £BCOO than £6OOO. But, pays tTie vicar, it will cost less to remove the old church than to build a now one.

Though built in 1868, it did not become a parish church until 1885, only a few years before the turning-out of the village began. The original cost was £3OOO. The building is quite handsome for its period, and has one ancient relic, a bell said to have como from Whalley Abbey, a Cistercian house destroyed under Henry VIII. The builders are at work moving the pews and fittings to the old and ruined schoolroom across the road, where they will be kept until tint re-erected church is ready for them. This is probably the last use to which the old schoolroom will over be put. There are no people left in Crane itself to go to church, hut old people born in Crane tell tales of the illicit whisky still for which Crane was once notorious, and the cock-pit is yet to be found by those who kn o\v where to look for it. A ccntirv .ago the blacksmith of Crane was haled before the ma cist rates for forging pike hearts intended to avenge the "‘field of Petorloo.”