Outline History

St Mark’s Organ history & Notes  

There are records in BIOS (British Institute of Organ Studies) mentioning a small organ in the church in about 1861,this may be an old Bishop instrument and there is a very old photo of it in the church records probably taken about 1865 showing a small organ in approximately the same position as the existing one. 

In a newspaper interview in 1923 with Mr. James Charles Goadby (Parish Clerk of St. Mark's) it was reported that "The earliest musical instrument in the church...was a barrel organ containing about a dozen religious tunes, which stood in the corner at the west end of the church. Sometimes it was possible to play this instrument, but occasionally it would go on strike and refuse to give out a single note. For a time Mrs. Lawrence, of Rugby, played the harmonium in the gallery, and another variation was introduced by the village schoolmaster, Mr. Truslove, who accompanied the services on the fiddle".

The Organ had a 3 stop Great and nearly the existing Swell specification. The stop Jambs are reversed to normal organ building convention probably to allow west side tuning access and get the Great to line up with the case in the restrictive arch. This eliminates complex stop control cross linkages that would be needed within the action. 

A cleaning and overhaul  was done in 1924 by the local Rugby firm of E.H. Hall and probably the addition of; 4’ Great flute and the 8' Swell  Celeste. 

The original blowing mechanism was by hand pumped bellows right up to about 1955, this was due to the fact that the ‘Organ Blower’ was a Mr F. Cole who had served in that position since the Christmas time 1916. (His starting salary at that time was 15 shillings per quarter - just under 7 pence per Sunday service).  The Rector, Archdeacon Leonard Stanford, in the 1950's, did not want to upset him by allowing electric blowing until he felt he could not manage the job.  

An electric blower was installed in about 1955.  This was a Taylor blower having a high speed single-phase 2-pole induction motor, during its long start up time it would significantly dim the church lights as in the starting period  the high motor current gave a low voltage to the filament lamps!

In 1962 the Organ was cleaned again and extended by the re-formed firm Nicholson’s of Malvern with the addition of 3 stops on the Great;

Principal 4’, Nazard 2⅔ and Fifteenth 2'. 

The three new stops were put on the back of the Great soundboard by modifying the 4’ Flute slide by use of a 3-slide clamp. This had the effect of significantly narrowing the tuning passage board, which runs across the organ immediately in front of the Swell Box. However, the extra 3 stops made it a much more versatile instrument and the Nazard is very useful for generating ‘solo’ sounds, using the Great against the Swell.

Originally, the instrument had a simple unbalanced swell control with a stepped ratchet lever mechanism, this was replaced by a balanced swell mechanism and an RCO pedal board, in the 1962 rebuild. To get the Swell Box control treadle in, significant modifications were needed to the pedal tracker linkage with large offsets to achieve pull down alignment. 

In about 1965 soon after the South Aisle extension was built, powerful fan type radiators were installed in the church with a new central heating system. This had a disastrous effect on the original Swell Chest and significant cracking took place making it virtually unusable. 

According to Nicholson's records a brand new Swell Chest was made and installed in 1966.