Last updated 05:32, Friday, 12 September 2008

THE report of the Solway History Society’s annual church trial (The Cumberland News, August 22), said that Greystoke Church had been twice a theological college, having been built for that purpose originally.

This is not so. It is an understandable mistake, as the word ‘college’ has several meanings, not just the modern one.

Greystoke Church was rebuilt in the late 14th century – its Norman tower, by then 300-years-old, had collapsed – and in 1383 it became the local church centre, with several priests living nearby to serve the district.

Their ‘college’ (the word ‘colleague’ is from the same basis) was where today’s racing stable is.

These six or so priests lived together, paid for by the endowments. Henry VIII abolished the set-up.

In the 1950s to ’75 or ’80 Greystoke ran a theological training scheme for students who stayed in digs there with locals as tutors. They did farmwork for their keep, but it was closed as non-standard by the central order from London.

JEREMY GODWINDrovers LanePenrith