Holy Trinity Catholic Church is sited in Hardwick Road, on the western fringes of the village of Hethe.

Edmund Campion — mission

Given the new patronage of the Catholic parish of Bicester and Hethe from January 2026, dedicated to Saint Edmund Campion, it is appropriate to begin this account of the parish's origins by reflecting briefly on the importance of Campion and other Jesuit priests to local Catholic continuity, through their nurturing of the Catholic faith in the Thames Valley — ministering to the spiritual needs of the lay faithful, often in secret, and at a time of extreme peril and personal cost.

Like other priests of the English College in Douai, who joined the Jesuit mission to England, Campion was committed to preach and administer the sacraments in a territory where it was now illegal to do so, following the 1559 Acts of Uniformity and Supremacy. No detailed itinerary of his journey survives but, during his mission of summer 1580, Campion must have visited around 60 gentry and noble houses in Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire (Hodgetts, 2010, p. 29). Enabled by the courage, cooperation and protection of the families involved, Campion used these houses to say mass and to preach, drawing eager congregations of Catholics from the surrounding countryside.

As an ordained priest, Campion was not alone in his mission across the three counties, himself remarking (in November 1580) that "we are well assisted by priests, whom we find in every place, whereby the people is well served and we much eased in our charge" (Hodgetts, 2010, p. 38). It may even be the case that Campion needed to fit in with an existing rota of priestly duties.

That multiple priests were active in the area is clear: in Bicester, for example, the Elizabethan State Papers of 1583/4 record the harbouring of six Jesuit priests or 'seminarists' (Stapleton, 1906, p.1); while in Godington, also part of the Fermor estate, and well off the beaten track, all four of the village farms entertained priests (Stapleton, 1906, p. 106). The 1580s as a whole witnessed intense and continued missionary activity by foreign-trained (but often English-born) Jesuit priests, including George Nichols and his companion, Richard Yaxley, who were executed at Holywell, Oxford, in 1589 (Hodgetts, 2010, p. 38).

Edmund Campion — a Fermor family connection?

Returning our focus to the district around Hethe, the village sat in a landscape where the Fermor family held substantial estates, running from Godington in the east to Idbury in the west, and centred particularly around Somerton and Hardwick.

Given the local importance of the Fermors in underwriting the Catholic cause in north-east Oxfordshire, Campion seems likely to have been harboured at the family seat of Somerton Manor in the summer of 1580 (Hodgetts, 2010, p.39), even though Thomas Fermor (1523-1580) died in August and his wife, Bridget, died in June that year (Farmer, 2026).

Edmund Campion — martyrdom

In July 1581 Campion was arrested at Lyford Grange, north of Wantage. His subsequent trial in November, and execution on 1 December 1581, saw him martyred for his faithful service and missionary zeal, and over the centuries that have followed, his sacrifice has inspired many. The witness of Jesuit priest-martyrs like Campion, in the 16th century, and the gentry lay faithful who supported them, helped preserve the foundations of English Catholicism through and beyond the Protestant Reformation, ensuring its survival until the lifting of penal restrictions between 1778 and 1844, ultimately giving rise to its 'second spring' in the latter half of the 19th century. Edmund Campion was among The Forty Martyrs of England and Wales to be canonised by Pope Paul VI in 1970.

Fermor family — continuing patronage at Tusmore

In 1606 Sir Richard Fermor (bef. 1580-1642/3) bought the medieval manor house at Tusmore (Lobel, 1959, p.336), which was soon to become the family's principal seat. Sir Richard's second son and heir, Henry Fermor (c.1610-1673), moved to Tusmore either before (Lobel, 1959, p.293), or not until, his father's death in 1642/3 (Stapleton, 1906, pp. 69, 74). The Fermors may have rebuilt and enlarged the house at Tusmore and added a domestic chapel, or possibly it was an already existing medieval chapel which attracted them to the house.

The Fermors kept a resident chaplain (Stapleton, 1906, pp.90-94), the first being Antoine le Grand (a Franciscan) in around 1695, with later appointments mostly drawn from the Jesuits. The chaplaincy served both the family and the Catholic farming communities which were sustained by Fermor employment and residence, across their estates in Godington, Hethe, Hardwick, Tusmore, Fritwell and Somerton. That Catholicism survived the Reformation in these parts of north-east Oxfordshire is therefore largely due to the patronage and steadfastness of the Fermor family.

In a later generation, William Fermor (1737–1806) of Tusmore was a significant mover in steering parliamentary efforts towards the Second Roman Catholic Relief Act of 1791, which relieved Catholics of certain civil and religious penalties.

Tusmore House, the seat of the Fermor family, was rebuilt in the classical style, and the park remodelled, in the period 1766-79 — view description at www.lostheritage.org.uk. During this time the free-standing family chapel was redecorated and became temporarily inaccessible to local Catholics. But mass at Tusmore soon resumed, to the benefit of household staff and estate workers, and continued until 1810 when William Fermor junior (1771-1828) moved out of the house, letting it out to Protestant tenants.

The move to Hardwick and the end of The Fermors

Across the district, more capacity for worship was needed than the Tusmore chapel could alone provide, and this was available at Hardwick Manor House, also part of the Fermor estate — view description at www.heritagegateway.org.uk. The Manor House's attic chapel had been in use since at least the era of persecution (1580-1625) and, by the 1730s, was increasingly relied upon by the local Catholic population. When William (junior) moved out of Tusmore in 1810, the chapel furniture was transferred to Hardwick Manor House.

Also in 1810, the Reverend Samuel Corbishley took charge of the Hardwick-Tusmore Mission, living at Hardwick. On his arrival in September, he decried the current state of record-keeping, and proceeded with zeal to take a census of the Catholic population across the whole district, for the better exercise of his mission.

Corbishley served the Hardwick-Tusmore congregation until his death on Christmas Day 1830. He was interred at the Church of St John the Evangelist, Banbury, where his memorial plaque can be seen on the west wall.

William Fermor (junior) died in 1828, marking the end of the Fermor male line of Tusmore, and the estate was inherited by (Anglican) Captain John Turner Ramsay of Croughton, at which point the Catholic chaplaincy of Tusmore became extinct and Catholics were no longer welcome to worship on the estate, including at the Hardwick Manor House chapel. Hereafter, mass was said from house to house in Hethe and Hardwick.

Ramsay's attitude to the local Catholic population was clearly still antagonistic in August 1839 when he distributed a public notice, requiring the attendance of Hardwick residents at St Mary's (Anglican) Church, under pain of eviction for non-compliance.

Opening of Holy Trinity Church, Hethe, 1832

A new mission priest, Father Alfred Maguire, was appointed within a week of Corbishley's death at Christmas 1830, and promptly purchased a piece of ground lying between Tusmore and Hethe, with the next year spent constructing a new chapel. Maguire published a heartfelt national appeal for funds to build a Catholic chapel at Hethe in the 1832 edition of the Catholic Directory, although £500 of the £800 building cost was paid for by a Mrs Jennings of Somerton (Grant, 2000, p. 34-35 - presumably Catherine Jennings née Collingridge). The new Holy Trinity Church, Hethe, was opened on 22 May 1832, by that stage sorely needed by local Catholics.

Local newspaper titles were few in number until the 1840s, and none of the extant county newspapers of 1832 (Jackson's Oxford Journal, Bucks Gazette, Northampton Mercury) managed to cover this momentous event in local Catholic history. However, James C. Blomfield, local historian and Rector of Launton, writing in the 1890s, describes how the Hethe appeal and opening were reported in a contemporary issue of the Catholic Magazine:

Hethe's was the fourth new Catholic place of worship in the county following the Second Catholic Relief Act of 1791. Only Catholic chapels at Mapledurham House, at St Clement's Street, Oxford (Chapel of St Ignatius), and at Old Heythrop (St Mary's Church), pre-date Hethe.

But under the 1791 Act, all Catholics were still required to register their place of worship, and the name of their priest, with the local magistrate (Quarter Sessions). A registration certificate of 1839, signed by parish priest, Father Alfred Maguire, for the then relatively new chapel at Hethe, survives in Oxfordshire History Centre collections — reference QS1839/2/A12/4:

Church building

Explore our Church building page for more information about the interior artwork and furnishings of Holy Trinity, Hethe.

A plot of land for a new graveyard, adjoining Holy Trinity Church on its east side, was acquired a few years after the chapel opened, with the first burial taking place on 29 February 1836.

The deceased was John Broadway, aged 65, Surveyor to the Duke of Buckingham at Stowe, who suffered a fatal accident in the Duke's library, as reported in the Bucks Gazette newspaper:

John Broadway's gravestone was recorded in Lewis Chambers' 1917 survey of Hethe churchyard, but may not be the earliest inscription, as it may have been erected after the later deaths of his wife (1880) and son (1851).

Graveyard records

Explore our Graveyard records page to view plans and panoramas of the graveyard at Holy Trinity, Hethe, and transcripts of its monumental inscriptions.

Registers of baptisms, marriges and burials

Historic registers for the Catholic parish of Hethe survive from 1809 onwards (baptisms), 1856 onwards (marriages), and 1836 onwards (burials).

Registers

Explore our Registers page for more information about Hethe's registers of baptisms, marriages and burials, and to view digital images. (Note that digital access also includes Bicester registers).

Records of the graveyard

A survey (transcript) and digital interactive plan of memorials in the graveyard are available.

A range of historic manuscript sources record the monumental inscriptions in the graveyard at particular points in time:

• 1917 survey
• mid-to-late 20th century plan
• 2025 plan

Graveyard records

Explore our Graveyard records page to view plans and panoramas of the graveyard at Holy Trinity, Hethe, and transcripts of its monumental inscriptions.

The historic photographs below of Holy Trinity Church, Hethe, have been sourced from:

• Birmingham Archdiocesan Archives (postcard images) - ref: PC/P175/1-3
• Oxfordshire History Centre (Bowne image) - ref: POX0135738

Further study of available sources can provide more information on the Catholic history of Hethe, the Fermor family, and their geographical context of north-east Oxfordshire.