Steyning Museum: Pilgrims visit Steyning

A group of 28 students and teachers, including 5 of their children, from Wheaton University, Illinois U.S.A. visited Steyning Museum recently.

They had been studying the play by Christopher Fry 'The Boy with a Cart', based on the story of St. Cuthman. As part of their 6 week trip to the U.K. they visited the Church of St.Andrew and St.Cuthman and also visited Steyning Museum to learn more about the story and its history.

They started their visit by re-enacting part of the route taken by St. Cuthman and walked from Washington to Steyning along the top of the Downs. Father Mark met them at Chanctonbury Ring for prayers. They continued their pilgrimage into Steyning by admiring our wonderful, historic High Street and then having refreshments in Penfold Hall. Following this they visited our Parish church and then were welcomed into Steyning Museum.

The brief story of St Cuthman is from Saxon times when as a boy, Cuthman wheeled his mother in a cart using a rope around his shoulders to support the cart. They journeyed over the Downs and when they arrived in what we now know as Steyning the rope broke and Cuthman took this as a sign from God that he had to build a church and so our first wooden church was built in Steyning, probably on part of the site of our present Norman church.

Apart from thanking us all profusely their leaders said about Steyning Museum that 'like all the great museums, it has the quality of causing visitors to want to become lost in it for hours. I certainly did so want to lose myself there—and so did my children!'

Our pilgrims were a delightful, friendly group and we all enjoyed their visit very much.

Have you ever wondered about our town signs, or why the church is called St. Andrew and St. Cuthman? It is not every town that has its own legend.

Come along to Steyning Museum and find out more about the story of St. Cuthman. www.steyningmuseum.org.uk