The writing on the wall –6

This is the fifth snippet from my work looking at graffiti in the church.

The clock room window and door surrounds are made of chalk, which is easy to cut smooth, unlike the body of the walls, which are rough plastered puddingstone.

The image here shows a small portion of the chalk surface, crammed with at least twenty graffiti.It’s impossible to know who carved them or when, except for the one enlarged below: GEORGE CHURCHMAN SEP 13TH 1865,
 

The box seems to have been drawn with a straight edge, and the corner arcs suggest wanting to make an impression. The very small arc in the corners by the date suggests they were an afterthought rather than being drawn before the text.

George Churchman was born in Wokingham in spring 1843 and in 1861 he was an 18 year old apprentice to a painter and plumber. So on Wednesday 13 September 1865, the date of the inscription, he was 22 and likely in the same trade.

The church underwent major restoration in 1864, with significant parts of it being rebuilt. Maybe some work requiring a painter or a plumber was still being done in 1865, in which case this rather proud inscription is another example of a tradesman working on the church leaving a permanent mark.
 

The last two digits of the date look odd – are they really 65? I wondered whether the 6 could be an 8 with a squashed top, and the 5 a distorted 6. But when you look carefully there are several fainter curved scratches behind the numbers and letters, which I’ve marked here. One intersects the 6, turning the top stroke into an apparent squashed loop and the other runs across the 5, closing the open curve.

Also not part of the inscription is the small box containing a B.
 

John Harrison (xxx 2026)