rel 15 St. Peter’s Church Stoke baptisms 1813 -1835.

Following the end of the First World War every village, town and city in the land discussed a memorial to those who had given their life in the Great War. Some created civic memorials in front of town halls some were erected in Parks and Churchyards and others took other forms of remembrance. At Penkhull it was agreed that this should be in the form of a Rood Screen.

It waas this national movement to remenber those who died that prompted Penkhull Church to consider which was an appropriate  memorial and worthy of the sacrifice of so many lives and the desire to express thankfulness to Almighty God for allowing Britain to achieve victory.

Plans were drawn of the proposed designed and distributed to every household within the parish. The scheme costing £950 well over £275,000 in today’s money. A Mural Tablet, it was said would be situated near to the Rood listing the names of those who had made the ultimate sacrifice. The plan also included new choir stalls. It was thought that if every household promised to contribute just one guinea that the scheme would become a reality. The project was ‘to the Glory of God, in memory of the brave fallen and as a thank-offering’. As a result volunteers would visit each home to collect their weekly donation of just 3d a week for twenty weeks, such was the poverty in the 1920s.

The 1840s witnessed a huge growth in Anglican church building within industrial towns, Stoke being just one of them in an attempt to increase the number attending Church of England rather than the Methodist Church whose growth continued undiminished. As a result in districts of Penkhull and Trentvale more people moved into the area and raised the necessary funds two churches before their consecration in October 1842.
For Hartshill, Herbert Minton had already undertaken at its own expense the building of Holy Trinity. At Penkhull, it had been proposed to erect a church by subscription which the Rev Thomas Webb Minton, the son of Thomas Minton the potter consented to endow the church with £1,000 (later to become £2,000) the interest of which would help to pay for a permanent priest and so another step would be made towards the completion of the building. Both were consecrated in October 1842 and still remain an active witness to the worship of God.

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