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© D. Sharp Montpelier Street, Brighton, where the Enraght Family took lodgings after their eviction from the Bordesley Vicarage, St Michael & All Angels Church, is visible at the top of the road. |
After the Enraght Family's eviction from the Bordesley Vicarage in March 1883, the family took lodgings in Montpelier Street, Brighton, where they spent just over a year in the Anglo-Catholic Parish of St Michael and All Angels, Brighton to convalesce and wait for another Official Parish appointment to continue Fr Enraght's ministry. [44].
While living in Brighton, Fr Enraght and his family were financially supported by the English Church Union's Sustentation Fund.
St Michael’s was known to Fr Enraght, a few years earlier in October 1874, while living in Portslade, he was invited to assist the Vicar of St Michael & All Angels, the Revd Charles Beanlands at the Celebration Service to mark the 12th Anniversary of the Dedication of St Michaels & All Angels.
The Yorkshire Gazette reported in August 1884, ‘It had been thought that through ill-health he is prevented from work, but Mr Enraght informs the World that he is assisting his old friend Mr Wagner’.
The Daily Chronicle newspaper reported in 1884, that Fr Enraght had served as a Curate in Brighton, after being evicted from his Bordesley Vicarage.
As a ‘retired’ priest, Fr Enraght would have been able to officiate, with the Bishop's and Wagner's permission, at many of the services at St Paul’s and at the Church of the Holy Resurrection (Fr Wagner's ‘over-spill’ church behind the very popular St Paul’s in West Street).
The Church of the Holy Resurrection in Russell Street, was next to a brewery and amongst the overcrowded houses in the narrow backstreets behind St Paul’s, built in 1876, closed in 1910, and demolished in 1968 to make way for Brighton’s Churchill Square Shopping Center.
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| copyright © Royal Pavilion & Museums, Brighton &
Hove Church of the Holy Resurrection, Brighton, built in 1876. This building was known as Brighton's 'underground church', the church was 132 feet long, 49 feet wide and 69 feet high at street level with a further 24 feet excavated down below street level to the church's ground floor. Fr Wagner wanted a very tall church built on this site, on the scale of St Bartholomew's Brighton, but because Brighton Council put a height restriction on the church's design of 69 feet because of 'Ancient Lights' . Fr Wagner said, ' If we can't go up, we will go down' . The choir gallery on the left was at street level, entry to the church was down a staircase at the opposite end of the nave. (redundant in the 1910 and became a warehouse, it was demolished in 1968 to make way for Brighton's Churchill Square Shopping Centre) |
St Paul’s and the Church of the Holy Resurrection were less than half a mile from Fr Enraght’s home in Montpelier Street.
In June 1883 Fr Enraght travelled to Birmingham from his Montpelier Street, Brighton home, to assist in fund raising for St Alban’s the Martyr, Highgate.
"He urged them to do all that lay in their power to free St Alban’s from heavy debt which crippled its work, and expressed a fervent hope that one of the many laymen in the country whom God had blessed with great riches would come forward, and of his abundance ease the burden which lay upon the shoulders of Birmingham Churchmen. The offertories for the building fund amounted during the day to £402". (£400 in 1880 is equivalent in purchasing power to about £40,000 in 2025 - Bank of England Inflation Calculator)
The account of this visit is from the Brighton Gazette 21 June 1883:-
"At St Alban’s Church, Birmingham, on Sunday last, the Rev. R. W.
Enraght preached morning and evening to over-flowing congregation.
Almost every member of the late congregation of Holy Trinity, Bordesley,
was present at one or other of the services. In the evening Mr Enraght
exhorted his friends, in their great trouble, to remember the duty of
thanksgiving for the provision made for them in St Alban’s Church – a
church which did not exist when he first came to the neighbourhood a few
years since".
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"He urged them to do all that lay in their power to free St Alban’s from heavy debt which crippled its work, and expressed a fervent hope that one of the many laymen in the country whom God had blessed with great riches would come forward, and of his abundance ease the burden which lay upon the shoulders of Birmingham Churchmen. The offertories for the building fund amounted during the day to £402". (£400 in 1880 is equivalent in purchasing power to about £40,000 in 2025 - Bank of England Inflation Calculator)
The Illustrated London News reported on 4th October 1884,
‘the Revd R. W. Enraght formerly Vicar of Holy Trinity, Bordesley,
visited Birmingham last week, and was presented by his old
congregation with a silver communion service; a chalice and cross
handsomely inlaid with precious stones; a communion bag and a cheque
for £150. Mr Enraght preached to large congregations at All Saints’
Small Heath and at St Alban’s Birmingham'.
In November 1884, the Enraght family left Montpelier Street, Brighton, for Bromley by Bow, which was reported to be, 'the poorest Parish in the East End of London'.
Nine years later in January 1893, Fr Enraght returned to Brighton from his East London Parish for the Anniversary Festival of the English Church Union (Brighton Branch). At the Annual General Meeting held in Brighton’s Royal Pavilion, Fr Enraght gave a lecture on ‘Sacerdotalism, Sacramentalism & Ritualism’.
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| copyright © Royal Pavilion & Museums, Brighton &
Hove (Edwardian Postcard) Group of Idols and other Objects condemned as illegal and removed from the Church of the Annunciation, Brighton, Sept 1st 1903 |
The Church of the Annunciation in Walsingham Street, built in 1864, was another of the ‘Revd Arthur Wagner built Brighton churches'.
The Church Association was still very much active in Brighton in the early 1900s.
Highly popular postcard views of Brighton’s Royal Pavilion, Brighton Piers and the seafront could be purchased by Edwardian tourists, the above photograph is a very strange subject matter to be sold as a Brighton 'Greetings' postcard !!!
The Public Worship Regulation Act, that was used to prosecute and imprison Fr Enraght in 1880, also deemed all the religious items in the above Brighton postcard illegal for display in an Anglican Church.
The Public Worship Regulation Act (1874) was kept on the Statute Books for 89 years until it was finally repealed in the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction Measures of 1963 (No.1)
The Church Association was still very much active in Brighton in the early 1900s.
Highly popular postcard views of Brighton’s Royal Pavilion, Brighton Piers and the seafront could be purchased by Edwardian tourists, the above photograph is a very strange subject matter to be sold as a Brighton 'Greetings' postcard !!!
The Public Worship Regulation Act, that was used to prosecute and imprison Fr Enraght in 1880, also deemed all the religious items in the above Brighton postcard illegal for display in an Anglican Church.
The Public Worship Regulation Act (1874) was kept on the Statute Books for 89 years until it was finally repealed in the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction Measures of 1963 (No.1)
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