Saint Peter & Saint Paul Church, Earl Shilton

Like the older parish of St. Peter’s in Hinckley, the church and parish in Earl Shilton owes it existence to one family – the Worsley-Worwicks of nearby Normanton Hall. What few Catholics there were in the village worshipped in the private chapel of the Hall at Normanton Turville – along the Earl Shilton to Thurlaston Road.

When it was realised by the family that there was a small but devout community in the village, land was donated in what is now Mill Lane and money was donated for the building of a church. The church opened at Easter 1907. The family’s private Chaplain, Father Grimes, took over as parish priest.

In November 1910 a school facility was added to the church, accommodating 53 pupils. It was intended to attract Nuns to teach in the school and consequently a small convent was built for their purposes in Mill Lane, later known as the Seminary flats. These buildings served a number of religious houses, in the following years, including the Dominican Sisters of the Congregation of King Wiliam’s Town, South Africa, the Sacred Heart Fathers and the Rosminian Sisters of Providence.

The most colourful character at the time was the third parish priest, Father Richard Barry Doyle, later a military chaplain and after the First World War a fundraiser for the church’s work in the Near East. In 1921 the stone marble altar from Normanton was transferred to the church.

As the parish expanded, so did the need for space. The old Methodist Chapel was taken over and used for services. The new church of St Peter and Saint Paul was designed in 1982 and was part of a development of housing known as the Cloisters. The presbytery was nearby. Interior devotional fittings for the church were the work of renowned local sculptor and artist Carmel Cauchi.

The parish priest of Earl Shilton also served the church of Our Lady and Saint Gregory, in Market Bosworth. In this regard, the late Rev Terry Fellowes, was a well-respected, esteemed and devout parish priest.