On the 25th of OCTOBER, 1816.
N.B.--This Ticket will entitle the Purchaser to a Medal.
[Illustration: Dudley Church 1791]
As many discrepancies have often appeared in print as to the cost of
the erection of the present Church of St. Thomas, Dudley, I am enabled,
through the courtesy of Ephraim Ball, Esq., of Halesowen, to lay before
the reading public some authentic information on this head, taken
from valuable documents now in his possession, which belonged to the
Churchwardens and Building Committee at that remote period. Mr. Ball's
subjoined letter to the _Dudley Guardian_, in 1871, effectually sets
that question for ever at rest.
We have also another very pleasant evidence of the liberality and care
for the spiritual wants of the parishioners displayed at that time by
the then Viscount Dudley and Ward, in erecting a new Gallery in St.
Edmund's Church, to enable the church going inhabitants to obtain some
sitting accommodation in public worship, during the very protracted
time occupied in the erection of the New Parish Church.
_Dudley, July 10th, 1815._