A visit to St Mary Magdalen to discuss parish records with the Parish Priest Fr Adrian McKenna provided a wealth of interesting local historical information.

And included some gardening: planting some saplings.

Planters : Fr Adrian McKenna, Kevin Connolly and Tish Deacon

Above is the gravestone of John Francis Bentley (30 January 1839 – 2 March 1902), though the inscription is now longer legible. But note the motif on the near end of the stone bears a remarkable resemblance to the Bentley Motor’s motif, the company not founded until 1919.

Bentley was an English ecclesiastical architect, whose most famous work is Westminster Cathedral. In 1894 he was commissioned to design the Byzantine Revival design and travelled to Italy to study some of the great early Byzantine-influenced cathedrals, including St. Mark’s in Venice.

In 1874 he married Margaret Annie Fleuss; they had 4 sons and 7 daughters. and lived in Clapham.

It is thought that his grave was placed on top of an ‘unknown pauper’.