Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

In October 1953 my father the singer Gordon Parfitt died aged 40 too early in what would have been a wonderful musical career – I was 9 months and my sister 2 years.Later we were both to be pupils at Christs Hospital, in part because of these sad family circumstances, as with so many of those who find themselves at the school.
This year to my surprise and delight the Royal Society of Musicians have suggested to the Friends of the Musicians Chapel that my father should be inscribed in their book of remembrance at their annual service. Their chapel is in St Sepulchre’s Church Holborn now known as the Musicians Church but also so closely associated with CH, furthermore the Friends have as their patron that eminent Old Blue Sir Colin Davis - which seems to have brought so much of my past full circle.
This annual service of dedication for musicians is on April 20th 2010 at 6pm in what will be the splendour of the newly restored St Sepulchre’s and is being arranged by the Birmingham Conservatoire.
I am sure others will have similar stories of how things come full circle.

I am sorry that I am "Tied up" for April 20th, (Not literally !)
I would have loved to have been at St Sepulchre's, as it is due to my Father working (As a City Policeman) in that Parish, which enabled me to obtain a Scholarship to CH.
It therefore holds a special place in my esteem.
I was also actually BORN in the City --- not many of us !!

I remember when we used to go to St Sepulchre's for St Matthew's Day that the bust of Malcolm Sergeant (was it?) always used to be crowned with a laurel wreath, which had recently been put there by the promenaders, because the Last Night of the Proms is usually at about the same time of year as St Matthew's Day. Also the RAF Benevolent Fund's collection day coincided and they would be collecting outside the church.

On the subject of 'full circle' I can offer two examples. The first is that, whilst researching my family history, I found a relative who had been employed as a Messenger in the Counting House. When he died, leaving seven children, three of his daughters were educated at Hertford. He had been born in the City of London and the address given was in Green Dragon Court which is right by the steps leading down from London Bridge Station to Southwark Cathedral where I was later licensed as a Reader. The other example, also from family history, concerns my husband's family. We had always known that they originated in Ireland, but nobody had been able to trace exactly which part of Ireland or when they left. Eventually I got hold of the Mormons CDs of the 1881 census and found that my husband's 3 x great grandfather had been born in Kerry, which just happens to be the only part of Ireland that I had ever visited (Frances Mercer and Mary Thompson aka Chemi-T lived there), so on my next visit I attempted to follow up the family history locally. I wasn't very successful, but that is another story! It added a certain poignancy to the fact that the first time I visited Mercer she had greeted me with the words 'Welcome home!' It has always been a bit of an oddity that although my husband has the obviously Irish name, my own Irish ancestry is closer than his - one grandparent each side born in Co Tipperary; I guess the names Conroy and O'Brien are Irish enough though!