LOWER BROADHEATH

Eileen Chapman

On 2nd June, 1857, a baby boy was born in what is now the parish of Lower Broadheath. The little cottage where he was born, then called ‘The Firs’, has magnificent views of the city of Worcester and of the Malvern Hills. Although the family moved back into Worcester before he was three, the future Sir Edward Elgar visited the area of his Birthplace (now a Museum) and the nearby Common throughout his life, and took as his title ‘1st Baronet of Broadheath’.

There have been small settlements in the area, at Eastbury, Peachley, Oldbury and Lovington, since the Iron Age. The Parish itself, however, is a modem one, with the Laugherne Brook providing the boundary on three sides. The name, Lower Broadheath, is used to distinguish the village from the other Broadheath, near Tenbury Wells, which is now known as Hanley Broadheath.

The Chapel of Ease, built in 1836 and used when the village was part of the parish of North Hallow, is now incorporated into the school. Broadheath’s own Church was dedicated in 1904. The driving force behind its construction was Admiral Britten, who loved in nearby Kenswick Manor (now a residential home). The magnificent ship - a 16th century galleon in full sail - on the Church weathervane honours this fact. The village hail, next to the Church, was built in his memory and opened in 1911.

An older place of worship, dating from 1825, is the Countess of Huntingdon’s Chapel on the Martley Road, which attracted as many as 180 worshippers a century ago. It was closed during the 1960s and is now being converted into a private dwelling. Nobody knows why the followers of Lady Huntingdon built a chapel here, when there was already a larger one in the city.

The village is a thriving one, with a lot of post-war new housing, a shop, three pubs and several local businesses. But the Birthplace Museum is still a quieter area, and one which Sir Edward would recognise - if he ever manages to return.

Copyright © 2000 Eileen Chapman

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Sir Edward Elgar, 1857 - 1934
Worcestershire History Encyclopaedia