Middle Littleton, St Nicholas

You can find Middle Littleton Parish Church on School Lane. It is in the sparsely populated part between Middle Littleton and North Littleton. On the North-west edge of the churchyard is a 13th-century tithe barn, one of the largest and finest in the country. Ringing takes place on the ground floor of the tower. The room isn't very big but has enough room to ring the six bells although it is a bit tight for space when ringing bell #3. There are windows on the South and West sides, a small door on the north side and double doors on the south side leading on to the nave.

I visited for the first time on Wednesday 8^th August 2007, ringing practice started at 7:30pm and ended at 9:00pm. There were 8 of us ringing, five of whom I had met before, including a young learner who did fine on what was for him a new set of bells. I rang up bell #3 but there was a problem with the treble. In the interest of safety we rang the bells back down again and a couple of folks went up to take a look at what the problem might be. It seems that there was a problem with the stay (a "Hastings" stay, I must find out what one is). So it was decided that we should just ring the back 5. I rang up bell #3 again.

To make this a little easier for the learner call changes were make listing the order of all 5 bells. We rang Plain Hunt on 5 (i.e. with the Tenor hunting) and Plain Hunt on 4. The others rang the full extent of Grandsire Doubles and I rang a few plain courses of Plain Bob Doubles. I rang down bell #3 to end the evening. Considering the inauspicious start, we ended up having a good evenings ringing.

The Bells

The tower has a peal of 6 bells.

Bell	Note	Diameter	Weight ?	Founder and Date
1			5-0-13	J TAYLOR 1947
2			6-0-25	M BAGLEY 1685
3			6-1-27	M BAGLEY 1685
4			7-0-25	M BAGLEY 1685
5			9-0-12	J TAYLOR 1947
Tenor	G		12-2-27	M BAGLEY 1685

There is some additional information provided by Worcestershire & Districts Change Ringing Association.