About Us

William Hart Coleridge was the son of Luke Herman Coleridge, a physician, and was born at Thorverton, Devonshire.  His father died at an early age, and he was brought up by his uncle, Rev George Coleridge, headmaster of King’s School, Ottery, St. Mary.  He graduated from Christ Church, Oxford, taking two first classes.

At the recommendation of the Bishop of London (Dr Howley) he, now 35 years of age, was nominated to the newly constituted See of Barbados and the Leeward Islands.  In fact, his Diocese included all the islands of the Eastern Caribbean and Guyana.  He was consecrated on July 15, 1824 and arrived at Bridgetown on His Majesty’s yacht Herald; under the command of Captain J. Leeke, on a Saturday morning early in January 1825.  He was sworn in as a member of the Legislative Council on February 1, 1825.

During his episcopate, in Barbados alone, the number of clergy increased from 15-31, the places of worship, from 14 – of which HOLY CROSS, then known as Society Chapel, was one – to 35 the schools from eight – of which Society School was one – to 83, and the number of the children receiving their education in them from 500 to 7,000.

Whether as a checkmate played by the enemy of all good, or whether as a hard stroke of Providence sent to try him, a fearful hurricane in 1831 undid almost all his wonderful achievements in multiplying places of worship in this island, throwing down 15 of his newly-built churches, and reducing to ruins many of the old Parish churches.  With marvellous faith and courage he remained undaunted and with funds raised locally and by subscriptions from SPC and SPCK, he rebuilt practically every church that had been demolished, before he gave up the reins of office.  The Society Chapel was re-opened within two years of the hurricane, on July 30, 1833.

The Bishop, realising that it was not possible to get an adequate supply of clergy from England, had removed the Codrington Grammar School to the residence of the Chaplain of Society Chapel – formerly known as ‘Small Ridge” – but now referred to as the Chaplain’s Lodge, in accordance with the original intention of its munificent founder.  He organised it in 1830, as a training college, in the first place for clergy, and also as a place for higher lay education.

He took a warm interest in the well-being of the students individually, and he opened his house freely to them during the vacations,

He retired in 1842 after an episcopate of 18 years. 

Bishop Coleridge had divided his large diocese into three Arch-deaconries.  On his resignation each Archdeaconry was made a separate diocese.  The Diocese of Barbados was to comprise the Windward Islands together with Trinidad and Tobago.  The Diocese of Antigua was to comprise all the Leeward Islands, and the Diocese of Guiana the British possessions in Demerara.

The Venerable Thomas Parry, who was now Archdeacon of Barbados was appointed to the See of Barbados and was consecrated in Westminster Abbey on August 24, 1842.

During this episcopate, the idea that an act of reparation was due to Africa for the numbers of her sons who had been brought to Barbados as slaves, took shape in the minds of the Bishop and Principal Rawle.  It was proposed that students should be trained and sent to Africa as students.  In April 1852, the Mission House (an enlarged part of the Principal’s Lodge) was opened with six students, and among them was a negro – Mr J.A. Dupont – who served for many years as missionary in the Rio Pongas in West Africa.

In 1850 an ACT was passed – which came about mainly through the exertions of Principal Rawle – for the better education of the people, and the sum of 3,000 pounds sterling was placed at the disposal of an Education Committee to be appointed from members of the Legislature.

In 1851, there were 34 Clergy and 42 churches and chapels.  During Bishop Parry’s episcopate, marriage and burial fees, were abolished, and the sum of 743 pounds sterling was paid annually as compensation to those entitled to fees.  Boscobel Chapel or St. Philip-the-Less was built in 1860.

During this episcopate, a first move towards a church council was made, though it was called the Ecclesiastical Board and was only representative of the Clergy and Laity to an exceedingly limited degree.

He resigned and died at Malvern on March 16, 1870.

Dr Mitchinson was a scholar of the highest attainments, having obtained three first Classes at Oxford.   He ws also an accomplished musician. He was consecrated in Canterbury Cathedral on June 24, 1873; and was enthroned on Friday August 15.

During his episcopate, Codrington College was affiliated to Durham University.  This happened in 1875, when Rev W.T. Webb was Principal of the College.

From March 30, 1880 to the end of the year, he acted for Mr Deighton as headmaster of Harrison College with great satisfaction to everyone.

He once acted for five consecutive months, as Chaplain of the Westbury Cemetery, and he mentioned several abuses that he noticed – (1)  disregard of punctuality; (2) the heartlessness and indifference of surviving relatives, especially in the case of infants, the little coffin taken under the arm of some indifferent person; (3) pauper funerals consisting solely of the hearse containing the black wooden shell with never a single mourner.

A speech of Bishop Mitchinson, which perhaps more than any other, gave great offence was a speech delivered by him on the occasion of the Conferring of certain degrees on distinguished members of the community.  His Lordship animadverted upon “the lack amongst the upper classes in the community for that higher culture, which develops breadth of thought and largeness of view, and the absence of which exhibits itself in an odious self-complacency and narrow prejudice, the offspring of besotted ignorance”, and he went on to compare Barbadians generally to “the white snails of Hans Anderson, who living under burdock leaves, upon which the raindrops pattern, flattered themselves that the world consisted of white snails, and that they were the world”.  Some readers may see a resemblance to the strictures of one of his successors; Bishop William James Hughes, as he delivered his now famous “Smite” sermon from the Cathedral pulpit in January 1951.

Bishop Mitchinson resigned the bishopric on June 30, 1881.

On May 1, 1882, Dr Herbert Bree a priest of 30 years standing, was consecrated Bishop of Barbados in the Chapel of Lambeth Place.

During his episcopate, the following measures were passed by the Legislature:

(a)     A Bill to make better provision for the discipline of the Clergy

(b)     A Bill to declare the statue of the Curates to be that of Vicars or Perpetual Curates and           to define their districts;

(c)     A bill to establish a Dean and Chapter for the Cathedral Church of Saint Michael;

(d)     A Pension Act which included the clergy among the other public officers.

The West Indies were declared a separate Ecclesiastical Province in 1883.

In 884 Bishop Bree appointed a negro priest – the Rev E.S. Thorne – as rector of St Joseph, despite the unanimous protest of his counsellors.

In 1898, Bishop Bree left Barbados for England, where he died of cancer in February 1899.

Barbados had its first translated Bishop in December, 1899 when the Right Reverend William Proctor Swaby, D.D. was translated from British Guiana to become the 5th Bishop of Barbados.

Bishop Swaby was a disciplinarian and he attacked relentlessly the indifference of the Clergy to the various Parochial    Organisations.  In season and out of season, he impressed on the clergy the duty of giving religious instructions in the Day schools.  He required an ACT or Log book to be kept in every Church.  He also insisted on the rural deans making periodical visitations of the churches and reporting to him.

During the episcopate, the Anglican Church Act was amended to allow for the election by the Synod of a Bishop in the case of a vacancy and to provide for the contingency of a Bishop becoming incapacitated for his duties.

A meeting of the Provincial Synod was held in Barbados in 1905.

He was elected Archbishop within a few days of his death.  He is buried beneath the Choir Stalls of St Michael’s Cathedral.

ALFRED BERKELEY

1917-1927

The successor to Bishop Swaby had to be made according to the Amendments made to the Anglican Church Act, which were made on December 21, 1911.  These amendments gave to the Synod the power of electing the Bishop by a two-thirds Vote for both Clergy and Laity, or by the same two-thirds Vote of delegations the appointment to a Committee of Bishops, of which Committee the Primate of the West Indies must be one.

At this its first election, the synod found itself with two persons nominated for the vacant Office of Bishop, and on the fifth ballot, the Reverend Alfred Pakenham Berkeley, M.A. Rector of St Michael, and Dean of the Cathedral was elected.

He was consecrated in St. Michael’s Cathedral on August 12, 1917.

Matters of finance were always a strong point with Bishop Berkeley, and while he was Dean of the Cathedral, he raised the salaries of two additional Curates, and purchased a building as a Church House.  So as Bishop, he soon began to put the finances of the Diocese on a sound footing, while at the same undertaking also, on behalf of the diocese new enterprises.  Not only did he set about to put the Pongas Mission Fund on a sounder basis, but also the Clergy Widow and Orphan Fund, and he set about creating an Emergency Fund and a Sisterhood Fund.

It was during his episcopate that the Centenary of the Diocese was celebrated.  The Centenary was to be not only an occasion of rejoicing, but it was also to be an occasion of penitence and spiritual revival.

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