Bells from Jesuit inferno to be memorial to 2,500 victims in Santiago

Three historic bells from the Jesuit Church of La Campania in Chile are on their way home from Swansea.  It is believed they have arrived at the Falkland Islands, courtesy of the Royal Navy, and are awaiting a Chilean vessel to transport them on the final leg to Valparaiso.

The bells, which date from the 1750s, were shipped to South Wales after the church in Santiago was razed to the ground on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception (8 December) in 1863, with the loss of more than 2,500 lives.  They were originally going to be broken up in Swansea which had many connections with the copper ore trade in South America.  However, they were rescued by a local businessman and presented to All Saints Church in Oystermouth.  They were hung in the church tower until 1964, when it was feared the structure was no longer able to support them safely.

'We had a letter from the Chilean embassy back in October and they asked us, especially as the bells weren't in use, to consider gifting them to the people of Chile so that they could form a new memorial to the disaster in time for the 150th anniversary,' said Canon Keith Evans, All Saints' parish priest.

Since 1964 the three bells have been on display in the church's porch, until the decision was taken by the parochial church council that it was 'right and proper' for them to be sent home.  The decision was taken to donate the bells as a gift for Chile's bicentenary celebrations in 2010.  It is expected that the bells will be formally handed over at a ceremony in September.

The Jesuit Church de la Campana had a strong devotion to the Virgin Mary and the Immaculate Conception which had been solemnly defined as dogma by Pope Pius IX nine years previously.  The weeks of services running up to the Feast culminated in a solemn celebration on 8 December itself.  The church was lit by hundreds of candles and paraffin lamps and decorated with tapestries and drapes.  The fire started at the High Altar and quickly spread.  The priests were reported to have escaped through a door to the vestry but the congregation, made up largely of women and numbering up to 3,000, were trapped inside the inferno.  It did not take long for the entire church to be engulfed by the flames, sending the roof, dome and bells crashing down onto the helpless congregation below.

Read more on the All Saints' web site - link below.


 All Saints Church, Oystermouth