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Ash Museum
Cemetery Chapel
Ash Museum
(ex Ash Cemetery Chapel)

The Ash Museum (onetime Cemetery Chapel), is located in the cemetery adjoining and to the west of St Peter's Church, Ash; not too distant from Ash Railway Station on the A323.

Since its discontinuation as a chapel of rest, the building has had many uses: museum, workshop, machine store and archival deposit for redundant Council files. When first visited in June 1998 (by the kind approval of Mr Brian Fuller, Clerk to the Council and who also permitted me to search the Parish Records), there was noted a fine example of a coffin cart (resting quietly after so many years of funereal effort) and the original organ (now restored), played no doubt at some of the bygone services.

In a conveyance dated 31st December 1887, the land on which the chapel now stands was purchased by the Burial Board for the Parish of Ash (exclusive of the Ecclesiastical District of Wyke) for £152.10. 0 from The Warden and Scholars and Clerks of St Mary College, Winchester for the purpose of a burial ground. The following year, the Board petitioned for the land to be consecrated, but before doing so were required to compensate Mr Luke Hogsflesh, husbandman, to surrender his yearly tenancy of the land and to divert a footpath. This Mr Hogsflesh agreed to do on the 26th January 1888, subject to receiving £15 as compensation and was permitted to recover his gate at the south-east corner of the land adjoining the highroad. To this day, the residents of Wyke may only be buried in the Ash Burial Ground by application, and paying the appropriate but disproportionate fee to that of Ash parishioners.

The east wall of the building supports particularly fine, stained glass windows, dedicated to the fallen of Ash, Wyke and Normandy during the First World War. This memorial window, with pointed head and about 7' 0" wide and 16' 0" high, is enclosed in dressed stone and comprises three smaller lancet shaped windows, each gloriously coloured. There are a further four decorative windows in other walls of the chapel and that of the west wall is a particularly fine one.

Click for an enlargement
click on photo to see an enlargement
 
The inscription of the memorial window (when photographed in June 1988) reads

PRESENTED BY H M CHESTER LL D (CANTAB) OF POYLE PARK
TO THE MEMORY OF ASH, WYKE AND NORMANDY
KILLED IN THE GREAT WAR 1914 - 1920
WHO DIED THAT WE MIGHT LIVE IN SAFETY

DULCE ET DECORUM EST PRO PATRIA MORI
 
The left hand window was inscribed:
JONAT [glass missing]
PRESENTED BY
TO THE MEMORY OF ASH WYKE
DULCE
 
The middle window was inscribed:
JOSHUA Joshua 10. 12
H M CHESTER LL D (CANTAB)
AND NORMANDY KILLED IN THE GREAT WAR 1914 - 1920
ET DECORUM EST PRO PATRIA
 
The right hand window was inscribed:
A [glass missing] 2 Chron 14. 15
OF POYLE PARK
WHO DIED THAT WE MIGHT LIVE IN SAFETY
MORI
 
Central beneath the window is a plaque that reads
Plaque - Ash Cemetery Chapel
 

SONS OF OUR LAND, LET THIS OF YOU BE SAID
THAT YOU WHO LIVE ARE WORTHY OF OUR DEAD
THESE GAVE THEIR LIVES THAT YOU MAY LIVE TO REAP
A NOBLER HARVEST ERE YOU FALL ASLEEP
The building is listed, and now, completely renovated and with proposals for appropriate refurbishment as a Museum, its future is assured.

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