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St Mary
Magdalene, Sandringham Sam Mortlock, who is a kind man,
tells us that Sandringham church is so encrusted with
royal associations that it is impossible to view it as
one would any other parish church. On reading this,
my old friend the late Tom Muckley spluttered that the
reason it was impossible to view it is that it is so full
of tourists, although Mortlock has the answer to that
problem too, reminding us that while visiting the Estate is
a joy in Spring and Summer, the best time to visit the
church is probably a wet morning in early February.
It was a
hot morning in early August. I'd arrived here by bike
from King's Lynn, thinking to get inside before all the
crowds arrived. I'd already been to the churches at
Castle Rising (but too early for the opener) and lovely
West Newton, a church I have a particular fondness for.
West Newton church sits in the Estate's largest and
prettiest village, a mile or so from the House, but
Sandringham church is in the heart of the Estate, a short
walk from the House but enclosed in its own
tree-surrounded churchyard. I turned down the long drive
towards the House, checked with three police motor
cyclists beside the village green that the church was
where I thought it was, and cycled on past the war
memorial and the ticket-booths.
One of the Estate staff was walking
towards me along the path from the church. After asking
me to get off my bike (actually, what he said was 'would
you kindly dismount, sir?') he told me that they didn't
open the church until eleven, and they didn't even unlock
the gates until then. It was only just gone ten o'clock,
and he apologised, and seemed sympathetic to my plight,
but of course he didn't offer to open the church early. I
dare say that's not the sort of thing they do at
Sandringham, I bet the whole place runs like clockwork.
He went and sat in the ticket office and waited for the
crowds, and left me standing by the locked lych gate.
This was irritating, because I had
plans for the day ahead and I couldn't afford to lose an
hour. And there was something I already knew about
Sandringham church - it is attended, and they don't let
you take photographs inside. I don't know why this is. My
main memory from visiting the church more than forty
years ago is that there is a lot of silver, lots and lots
of silver. Perhaps they don't want people photographing
the family silver. Or perhaps they don't want people
taking selfies in the royal pew. Or maybe it is for
security reasons. Or most likely, they just want you to
buy their postcards. Whatever the reason, it isn't
allowed. Actually, the internet is awash with photographs
taken inside Sandringham church, but it is always the
same one, the shot up the chancel towards the silver. I
expect this is the one photograph people get to take
before the polite cough, the hand on their arm and the
'I'm terribly sorry sir, but photography is not permitted
within the church'.
If I had thought I would be allowed
to take photographs inside then I might have waited - I might
- and even knowing that I wouldn't I was still tempted,
because the church is not just the sum of Teulon and
Bloomfield's successive restorations. It has one of
Norfolk's best sequences of early 16th Century stained
glass saints, twelve of them in the upper lights of two
of the windows. I don't suppose an exception would have
been made for me to photograph them - although I couldn't
help wondering if it might if I asked nicely -
but they were the main thing I was interested in.
But as photography of the
interior was unlikely to be permitted to me, as
the Estate staff would probably put it, and as it
seemed daft to wait an hour just to take some
closer exteriors, I took a shot from through the
locked gates which will have to be enough for
now, and I headed on to Dersingham. Behind me,
the Estate began to gear itself up for another
day of tourists. Many of these seemed to be
Chinese, and I heard several people asking where
the church was as I pushed my bike past the
watchful eyes of the man in the ticket office,
back to the road. I
had read somewhere that there was now a lot of
interest amongst the Chinese in the British
Royals, so it wasn't surprising that so many of
them were making it up here from London. Perhaps
they wanted to know where the church was so they
could see the font, which would be interesting to
them for several reasons, not least because it
was where Diana Frances Spencer, the future
Princess of Wales, was christened in 1961. Maybe
they even wanted to photograph themselves
standing beside it, but of course they were going
to be disappointed.
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