- Stourbridge Road
- Catshill
- Worcester
- Worcestershire
- B61 9LH
The Housman connection:
A Family Story in the Churchyard of Christ Church Catshill
Some of the most fascinating stories in our village are hiding in plain sight. At Christ Church Catshill, one family has left its mark on almost every part of our history. From the man who was first entrusted with the church, to the poet whose words still speak to us today, the Housman family has a connection to this place that goes far beyond the graves in our churchyard.
If you have ever walked through the churchyard at Christ Church, you may have noticed the impressive stone cross standing over one of the graves, the older headstones nearby, or the horse chestnut trees that have watched over the church for generations. Perhaps you have heard the name A. E. Housman, the celebrated poet and classical scholar whose family came from this part of Worcestershire. Perhaps you have walked past his statue in Bromsgrove High Street, or perhaps you have read some of his poetry.
But there is much more to the story that a famous name. Behind these monuments, trees and familiar surroundings is the story of a family whose lives were closely intertwined the the history of our church, and of a village that looked very different when its doors first opening in 1838.
A New Church for a Growing Village
To understand the Housman connection, we need to go back to the 1830s, when Catshill was a very different place from the village we know today.
The nineteenth century was a time of change. Traditional agricultural work was giving way to other trades, including nailmaking, which had become an important part of the local economy. Families lived and worked close to one another, often in small cottages, and the rhythm of village life was shaped by work, family, the seasons and the church.
The village was an assortment of shops, many ran from the living rooms of houses, or portable sheds along Meadow Road. The church was the centre point of the village, the heartbeat. In more recent years, the centre of the village has moved up the hill to where the shops are now located on Golden Cross Lane.
For many people, life was physically demanding, and there were few of the conveniences we take for granted today. Travel was harder, medical treatment was limited, and illness and bereavement were familiar parts of everyday life.
The church was much more than a building in which to attend a Sunday service. It was a place where families brought their children to be baptised, where couples married, and where loved ones were laid to rest. It offered a place to gather, to mark the important moments of life, and to find comfort and community.
Christ Church was built in 1838, designed by the Worcester architect Harvey Eginton. Its construction was supported by public donations and a contribution from the Worcester Diocesan Church Building Society. The church was consecrated on 6 December 1838.
Imagine Catshill at that time. There were no cars passing along the road, no modern streetlights, and no rows of houses stretching across the landscape as they do now. People would have travelled to church on foot, and the congregation would have included local working families, tradespeople and those living on the surrounding farms and estates.
The church would have become a familiar landmark, and an important gathering place for the community. Its bell ringing, services and celebrations would have marked the passing of the weeks and the changing seasons.
And the man first entrusted with this new church was the Reverent Thomas Housman.
The Reverend Thomas Housman
Thomas Housman was born in Leicester in 1795 and educated at St John's College, Cambridge. He was ordained into the Church of England and spent the earlier part of his ministry serving elsewhere before arriving in the Bromsgrove area.
In 1838, he became the first incumbent of Christ Church, Catshill. He remained in the post until 1864, when age and infirmity led him to retire.
His appointment was more than taking charge of a new building. He was entrusted with the spiritual life of a developing community, helping establish the church's place in village life from its very beginning.
Thomas was married to Ann Brettell, and the couple had a large family. In 1838, they moved into Clock House at Fockbury, a property associated with Ann's family. For the next three decades, the house effectively served as the vicarage of Catshill.
It is difficult to imagine what it must have been like to be responsible for a parish in those days. Thomas would have known many of his parishioners personally. He would have baptised their children, visited families in times of illness, conducted marriages and buried the dead. He would also have had to navigate the practical demands of running a church and maintaining its place in the wider community.
Yet Thomas was not a quiet figure who spent his days in the pulpit.
Accounts of his life suggest that he was a man of considerable presence. The Housman Society has described how he appeared to be the squire of Fockbury, and how his powerful presence and voice could make members of his congregation quake in their pews.
He was also involved in local affairs, serving on important committees in Bromsgrove. He was clearly a recognised figure in the community, and it is easy to picture him as someone whose arrival would not have gone unnoticed.
Whether his congregation found him intimidating, admirable or a little of both, Thomas made a lasting impression.
His grave carries an inscription:
"Here rests Thomas Housman, priest to whom was first entrusted this church, this God's acre, this parish."
Thomas was there at the very beginning. He was the first person entrusted with its care, and the community that grew around it.
A family home at Clock House
The Housman story is also a family story, and much of it centres on Clock House at Fockbury.
Thomas and Ann raised their children there, alongside other members of Ann's family. The house stood within the rural landscape surrounding Catshill and Bromsgrove, and its gardens and grounds would have provided a very different setting from the village streets we know today.
Thomas' connection to Clock House is particularly interesting because he was sometimes regarded locally as its squire, although he did not actually own the property. His position, family connections and standing in the community appear to have given him a presence that extended well beyond his duties at the church.
The house would later become closely associated with his son Edward and Edward's children, including Alfred Edward Housman, who would go on to become one of Britain's best-known poets.
For the Housman children, Christ Church was part of the world in which they grew up, a place where family occasions were marked and where the lives of several generations would eventually be remembered.
And it was here that the story of the most famous member of the family began.
A little font with a remarkable connection
One of the most intriguing objects associated with Christ Church is the small, portable font that has been preserved here.
According to the church's own history, it is reputed to be the font used by Thomas Housman to baptise his grandson, Alfred Edward Housman, on Easter Day in 1859.
A. E. Housman was born on 26th March 1859, and his baptism took place at Christ Church on 24 April that year.
A grandfather, himself a clergyman, welcoming his grandson into the Christian faith in the church he had helped establish.
There is something particularly special about objects like this. They do not always look remarkable at first glance. They may be small, plain or easily overlooked. Yet the stories attached to them can connect us directly to people who lived here more than 160 years ago.
The font reminds us that behind the name A. E. Housman was a baby brought to church by his family, just as generations of Catshill families have brought their own children here.
This author's connection to the Housman font
There is another, rather unexpected, chapter in the story of the Housman font, and one that makes the history particularly special to the person writing this article.
I was christened in the very same portable font that belonged to Housman.
My father was unwell at the time and unable to travel to Christ Church, so the christening took place in my parents' living room instead. The Reverend Andrew Vessey came to the house and christened me there, using the little Housman font.
Now, as I research the history of Christ Church and uncover the stories hidden within its walls, I find myself connected to this remarkable little object, which is an absolute honour.
And that, perhaps, is one of the loveliest things about researching the history of a place like Christ Church. The more we discover about the people who came before us, the more we sometimes discover about our own place in the story.
The churchyard: A place of family and loss
For all the happy occasions celebrated at Christ Church, its history also carries a deep sense of sadness.
The churchyard became the final resting place of several members of the Housman family. Their memorials stand together, telling a story of family relationships, changing generations and lives that were cut short.
Thomas' own memorial is perhaps the most striking. A Gothic churchyard cross, erected after his death, stands over his grave. Historical reporting from 1872 records that the monument was made by William Forsyth of Worcester. Mr Forsyth was also responsible for a smaller monument erected to the memory of Thomas' wife.
These memorials connect Christ Church to the work of the Forsyth brothers, James and William Forsyth, the Worcester sculptors and craftsmen whose work included church monuments as well as stonework at Eastnor Castle, Hindlip Hall, and other significant pieces of ecclesiastical stonework. A sum of £56 was paid to Mr Forsyth by Edward Housman for these stones.
Their craftmanship is part of the history of the churchyard itself. The stone memorials were not just markers placed in the ground. They were carefully made tributes, intended to ensure and to keep the names of the departed alive.
Thomas died at Lyme Regis on 24 January 1870, aged 74, having spent the final years of his life in retirement. His body was brought back to Catshill, and he was buried here on 29 January.
There is something moving about that return. After a lifetime spent serving the parish, he was brought back to the place with which his name would forever be associated.
Nearby are the graves of his wife, Ann, and other members of the family, including his son Edward, Edward's wives Sarah Jane and Lucy Agnes, and other relatives. Their presence in the same corner of the churchyard gives us a glimpse of the generations who shared this place.
Family graves can sometimes tell us things that formal records cannot. They show us who was remembered together, whose lives overlapped, and where families chose to return to honour those they had lost.
For the Housmans, Christ Church was both a place of belonging and a place of farewell.
A family that knew grief
It is easy to look at the Housman family through the lens of its most famous member, but the family story is also one of personal loss.
A. E. Housman was just ten years old when he lost his grandfather. Two years later, A. E. Housman's mother, Sarah Jane, died on his twelfth birthday in 1871. The loss had a profound effect on him. His later poetry frequently returns to themes of death, grief, the passing of time and the painful fact that life does not always unfold as we would wish.
His father, Edward, later remarried, and the family continued its life at Clock House and elsewhere in the Bromsgrove area. But the deaths and changes within the family left their mark.
The family would often make the mile long walk to visit the churchyard with Edward and his new wife Lucy leading the way, and A. E. Housman would pay a poignant visit to his mother's grave.
In 1881, the Reverend's wife Ann passed away, and A. E, Housman was dutifully there amongst the mourners to see his grandmother laid to rest. And in 1894 his father Edward too was laid to rest at Christ Church, A. E. Housman again returned to be present. In 1907, Lucy Agnes "beloved mamma" was also laid to rest beside Edward.
The churchyard at Catshill was not an abstract place to A. E. Housman. It was a real landscape filled with family memories and the graves of people whose lives had been woven into his own.
For Thomas, too, the churchyard was the place where his responsibilities as a clergyman met the most personal realities of life. He had spent decades ministering to families through births, marriages and deaths, and he ultimately came to rest among his own family.
In the nineteenth century, death was a more familiar presence in everyday life than many of us experience today. Illness could take a child, a parent or a spouse, and families often had to find ways to continue with life while carrying that grief.
The church was there for those moments. It is a place to pray, to gather, to mourn and to remember. It is a place where sorrow could be shared rather than carried alone.
That role has not disappeared. Although our lives look very different now, the need for places of comfort and remembrance remains.
Six trees planted in memory of six children
Look around the churchyard today and you will find another part of the Housman story growing quietly among the graves.
The two horse chestnut trees in the yard are all that remain of an original group of six, planted by Edward Housman, Thomas' son and A. E. Housman's father.
According to the church's history, Edward planted one tree for each of his six children.
It is a simple but touching gesture. Each tree represented a child, and together they created a living memorial that would grow and change with the seasons.
When Edward planted them, he could not have known how many generations would pass beneath their branches. He could not have imagined that, more than a century later, people would still be looking at the surviving trees and asking about their story (as I have found myself doing).
Today, those two trees are reminders of a family that once walked these grounds, attended services here and watched their children grow.
They have outlived the people who planted them and the children for whom they were planted. Yet they remain part of the landscape, quietly linking the present day with the lives of the Housmans.
There is something rather lovely about that. A stone memorial records a name and a date, but a tree continues to live. It grows, sheds its leaves, blossoms again and provides shelter for the birds that visit the churchyard.
God's Acre: The poet and the churchyard
Of all the Housman connections at Christ Church, perhaps the most poignant is the link to A.E. Housman's poem God's Acre.
Housman became famous for his poetry, particularly A Shropshire Lad, but his work was not limited to one landscape or one set of experiences. His poems often explore the tension between the beauty of the natural world and the knowledge that human life is brief.
God's Acre reflects on the contrast between the living countryside and the stillness of a churchyard. While the surrounding land is full of activity, the ground where the dead lie remains quiet.
The poem begins:
"Morning up the eastern stair
Marches, azuring the air,"
It goes on to describe the activity of rural life, before turning to the churchyard:
"All the land's alive around
Except the churchyard's idle ground."
The contrast is striking. The fields are busy, the day is unfolding, and life carries on all around.
Yet the churchyard is a place of stillness, where those who once worked, loved and lived now rest.
The poem was written about the churchyard here at Catshill Christ church.
He had been baptised at Christ Church. He knew the village and its surrounding countryside. His family members were buried here, and the churchyard was part of his personal history.
When we read God's Acre, we can imagine the same sort of rural landscape that would have surrounded Catshill in his childhood: fields, workers going about their day, and a churchyard set apart from the movement of the living world.
The poem also invites us to think about remembrance. The people buried in a churchyard are no longer able to take part in the life going on around them, but they have not vanished from the story. Their names remain. Their families remember them. The landscape carries their history forward.
A cherry tree has been planted in the churchyard in memory of A. E. Housman in remembrance of another poem, Loveliest of Trees. The original tree was donated by the Japanese branch of the Housman Society in 1976, continuing the tradition of marking the family's connection to this place through something living.
It is a fitting tribute to a poet whose work has travelled far beyond Worcestershire. His words are read around the world, yet here in Catshill we can still walk through the churchyard that inspired him as a young child.
The cherry tree makes that connection visible. It brings together poetry, nature, memory and the history of our village in a single place.
More than a famous name
It would be easy to think of Christ Church as simply the place where A. E. Housman was baptised. That is an important part of our history, of course, but it is only one chapter.
The wider Housman story tells us about the people who helped establish the church, the family who lived nearby, the children who grew up in the surrounding countryside and the generations who returned here to remember their loved ones.
Thomas Housman was the first incumbent, entrusted with the church and the parish at a time when Catshill was developing into the community we recognise today. His son Edward planted trees for his children, leaving a living memorial that survives in part to this day. His grandson Alfred Edward was baptised here and later wrote poetry that continues to make readers think about love, loss, nature, and the passing of time.
The Forsyth brothers' craftmanship can be traced through the stone memorials in the churchyard, while the portable font preserves a tradition connecting us to one particular baptism in 1859.
And all around us, the church itself remains.
The building has changed over the years. Its chancel was rebuilt in 1887, and generations of people have worshipped here since Thomas' time. The village has changed too, growing and adapting as new families have made their homes here.
But the churchyard still holds its familiar landmarks. The cross over Thomas' grave still stands. The surviving horse chestnut trees continue to grow. The cherry tree remembers the poet and his words.
These are not just interesting historical details. They are reminders that a church is made up of people and their stories, accumulated over generations.
A Christmas reflection
At Christmas, we often think about family, home, traditions and the people who matter most to us. It is a time when memories can feel especially close, whether we are celebrating with loved ones or remembering those who are no longer here.
The Housman story seems particularly fitting at this time of year.
Thomas spent his life serving a community, helping people mark the most important moments of their lives. His family found joy here, but also experienced the sadness of losing loved ones. The churchyard became a place where those memories were preserved, and where future generations could come to remember.
A. E. Housman's poetry reminds us that the beauty of the world and the sadness of life often exist side by side. The fields continue to flourish, the trees grow and the seasons turn, even as we say goodbye to people we love.
Christmas offers its own message of hope in the midst of that reality. For Christians, it is a celebration of the birth of Jesus and the promise of God's presence among us. It reminds us that the story of faith is not separate from ordinary human life, but is lived out through families, communities, joys and sorrows.
When we look around Christ Church, we see more than an old building. We see the work of those who came before us, the lives they lived, the people they loved and the memories they left behind.
The Housmans are part of that story, but they are not the whole story. Countless other families have passed through these doors, brought their children to be baptised, stood here to exchange wedding vows, or gathered in the churchyard to say their final goodbyes.
Each has added something to the life of this place.
So, next time you walk through the churchyard, take a moment to look a little closer. Notice the old stone cross, the trees and the graves gathered together in the corner. Think about the little font inside the church and the baby who was baptised there in 1859. Perhaps remember the words of God's Acre and the poet who grew up among these fields.
And spare a thought for the Reverend Thomas Housman, the man first entrusted with this church, who could never have imagined how many generations would follow him.
Christ Church has stood here since 1838. Its story is still being written, and we are fortunate to be part of it.
Photograph credit to Dom LeGros