St. Peter's Goldhanger is one of hundreds of churches around the world that will be taking part in special celebrations this June to mark the bicentenary of the invention of the 'Ellacombe Chimes' – a remarkable device to enable all the church bells to be rung by one person.

The Rev Henry Thomas Ellacombe was curate at St Mary's Church in Bitton in South Gloucestershire 200 years ago. Fed up with his bellringers' "wayward behaviour" he created a system with a set of pulleys to allow one trusted person to ring all the bells.

Traditional bell-ringing is hard physical work and required one person per bell. This is because the bells are very heavy, and attached to a wheel, allowing them to swing through a full arc with the clapper striking the side of the bell.

Henry Ellacombe's invention involved letting the bells hang stationary, with a hammer positioned next to each bell. These were attached to ropes which were fed into a frame located in the vestry or bell-ringing room. The ropes were tensioned in the frame so that pulling a rope sideways for just twelve inches or so made the hammer strike the bell.

Bell-ringing was quite a sociable (and often competitive) activity, and bell-ringers would often practise during the week ands adjourn to a nearby pub afterwards. Bell-ringing competitions could also be accompanied by eating and drinking.

The Revered Ellacombe particularly deplored bell-ringers who, having practised during the week, failed to turn up at services – or worse, arrived the worse for wear for drink. In 1875 he noted of a bellringing competition in Slapton, "We blame the Vicar and churchwardens for allowing the bells to be so prostituted for the benefits of a publican's pocket."

His invention became popular, and over 400 churches are listed in the UK with Ellacombe chimes, though many are not in working order. Many more probably exist abroad, where they formed a practical solution to the problem of not having trained bell-ringers or church towers strengthened for full peals of bells (many chime mechanisms use the much lighter tubular bells).

However, operating the Ellacombe chimes is particular skill which few have, and this has contributed to their decline. Nevertheless, the chimes offer tremendous scope – not only can they produce traditional peals, but they can also play tunes, and a lot of music has been published to support this.

David Newman, who also runs the Goldhanger Past History website, has made this his passion, learning the basic skills on the xylophone before reviving the use of St Peter's chimes. His skills have been especially useful during the Covid crisis, as one-man operation of the bells fits within Covid safety rules.

St Peter's will be participating in an international celebration on June 26th to celebrate the bicentennial of this remarkable invention. Staring in New Zealand, chimes will ring over a seventeen hour period across the major time zones of the world, moving to St Peter's in Goldhanger, St Mary's Bitton (birthplace of the chimes), other English churches, and then moving to America and Canada.