Stained Glass of Percy Bacon & Brothers

North Chapel East: Annunciatn to the Virgin Mary. 1906.

North Chapel East. Annunciation scene. The Messenger Angel Gabriel.

North Chapel East. Annunciation scene. The Blessed Virgin Mary.

North Chapel East. Annunciation scene. The Blessed Virgin Mary detail.

North Chapel East. The scene behind the BVM. A window depicting two saints (possibly the disciples John and Peter).

North Chapel East. Tracery lights.

North Chapel East. Signature.

North Chapel East. Annunciation to the Virgin. 1906.

Posted 07 August 2026.

This two light window in the north aisle represents the Annunciation to the Virgin, the two principle figures standing in the usual elaborate Bacon niches of predominantly white glass. The window dedication reads:

Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the window is the scene behind Mary. Over her left shoulder we can see a depiction of the interior of a church. In a church window we see the figures of two saints, while above her, and seemingly opening to the outside world, a white dove descends. In the tracery demi-angels play musical instruments.

There is an almost identical widow by Percy Bacon in St Romald's Church, Romaldkirk, Co. Durham dedicated to Susan Barnes Abbott (d. 1911). She is also remembered in a window at All Saints, Childwall (north aisle 3 - see below). That the Abbotts and Shands were known to each other is not in doubt, so it is likely that Henry Abbott, being acquainted with the window at Childwall, commissioned Percy Bacon to execute an identical one at Romaldkirk to further commemorate his wife at the church where she is interred.

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North Aisle 3: Adoration of the Magi and Shepherds. 1911.

North Aisle 3: Adoration of the Magi and Shepherds. 1911.

North Aisle 3: Adoration of the Magi and Shepherds. 1911.

North Aisle 3: Adoration of the Magi and Shepherds. 1911.

North Aisle 3: Adoration of the Magi and Shepherds. 1911.

North Aisle 3: Adoration of the Magi and Shepherds. 1911.

North Aisle 3: Adoration of the Magi and Shepherds. 1911.

North Aisle 3. Adoration of the Magi and Shepherds. 1911.

Posted 07 August 2026.

A three-light window with simple tracery installed as part of the rebuild of the north side of the church in 1905, depicting the Adoration of the Magi and Shepherds in a standard arrangement with the central figures of the Virgin and Child. Above the Virgin a scroll reads; "We have seen His Star and have come to worship Him". The dedication reads:

There is some evidence that this window was damaged during air raids in the second world war and repaired in 1948/9, possibly indicated by the stylistic variances in the faces of the Magi and shepherds, and the lack of the trademark wide columns on the outer lights.

Susan Barnes Abbott (née Helmer) married Henry Edward Abbott, an electrical engineer from Liverpool, who for 16 years was a churchwarden at All Saints.² A brass tablet close to that window commemorates Henry Abbott (d. 1927). He is also interred at Romaldkirk.

The windiow is unsigned.

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1. Report for the installation of the window in The Builder 1911-12-22: Vol 101 Iss 3594 p755.
2. Brass tablet on north aisle wall in All Saints in memory of Henry Edward Abbott.