NO . XIII
THE CATHOLIC REGISTERS OF ISLEWORTH, MIDDLESEX , 1746-1835 CONTRIBUTED BY JOSEPH S. HANSOM HISTORICAL NOTES BY JOSEPH GILLOW
IN The Catholic Handbook by C. Dolman (Burns & Lambert , 1857 ) there is a statement that the Catholic baptismal registers of Isleworth date as far back as the year 1675. Nothing is known of such early registers by the Rev. Eric F. Green, the Rector, who has given me facilities for copying and collating the following ones, commencing with an entry in 1746. On 17 Nov. 1758 the Vestry of Islington decreed that Mr. O'Flaherty , who, from the nature of the notice, and his extensive establishment shewn in the registers, must have been the tenant of Shrewsbury House, must close the chapel. The Rev. Richard Kendal was threatened with prosecution unless he quitted the parish. * It was stated at the time that the room had been in use as a chapel for thirty years, which would carry us to the year 1728. This may possibly have been only a verifiable date ; and a chapel elsewhere, and at an earlier period, is possible. As the recovery of earlier registers may still be hoped for, it has been determined to number the following books,-second and third. There are more modern ones . Besides the Middlesex parishes of Brentford , Hayes , Sunbury , Teddington , and Twickenham ; there are referencesto Surrey ones, as Barnes, Esher, Kingston , Mortlake , Richmond , and Wandsworth . More distant places, as Reading in Berkshire and Stoke -Poges in Buckinghamshire , may be explained by the Wheble family having relatives at Richmond , and the Clark family at Hounslow , which is a chapelry , part in Heston and part in Isleworth parishes. Whitton is in Twickenham . Mr. Gillow provides the following . J. S. H.
-
HISTORICAL NOTE ON THE CHAPLAINCY
The Earls of Shrewsbury long possessed a seat at Isleworth , co. Middlesex , nine miles west-south - west of London on the western bank of the Thames, between Brentford and Richmond . When the family ceased to occupy the mansion in or soon after 1761 , a portion of the premises was reservedfor the chapel and priest's house , and thenceforward was known as Shrewsbury Place. The chapel was but 40 by 16 feet, and was badly constructed and scantily supplied. " It continued to serve the requirements of the mission until it was replaced by the chapel erected by Mgr. Weld , who converted the old one into the sacristy . The new chapel, in the Romanesque style, consisted of a nave and galleries designed to accommodate about 200 sittings , and this gave place in 1909 to the present church in Twickenham Road, which was consecrated to Our Lady of Sorrows and St. Bridget on Oct. 6, 1910. The first chaplain on record isRev. John Matthews alias Williams, a member of an old Catholic family seated at Heath House, Buriton , co . Southampton, of which Henry Matthews , gent., was a Catholic non -juror in 1716. Mr. Matthews became an alumnus
"
The Rev. Dr. Burton's Life and Times of Bishop Challoner, i . 373. notice to Mr. Kendal is dated 20 Nov. 1758 .
The