By Ellie Jones, Cathedral Archivist
Once described as “a thick-set, bandy-legged man with puck-like nose and chin, but with a good-humoured expression of face, pleasant and affable manners”, William Carey was the 58th Bishop of Exeter for a fairly effective – but largely forgotten – ten years, from 1820.
William Carey was born in Worcester in 1769, the son of Richard Carey, a tradesman, and his wife Margaret. He had attended Westminster School from the age of 15 and eventually spent 13 years as head teacher there. At the same time the Duke of York put him in charge of educating the soldiers’ children at the Royal Military Asylum, Chelsea. After leaving Westminster he was vicar of Sutton in the Forest, Yorkshire for seven years, until he was promoted to Bishop of Exeter. He left Exeter for St Asaph, Wales, in 1830 where he was Bishop until his death in 1846. In his will he left everything to his beloved wife, Mary.
In 1823 the Exeter antiquarian Pitman Jones wrote to the Bishop seeking his support to preserve Broadgate on Cathedral Close, which Exeter’s Improvement Commissioners had recommended should be demolished. Jones was of the opinion that “This beautiful Gate is almost the last remaining vestige of the antiquity of the City: its other monuments of former taste and grandeur have been rapidly disappearing under the hands of innovation.” He suggests that the solution might instead be to remove the houses on either side of the gate to improve the view, remove danger, and accommodate increased traffic. The Bishop replies, with tact and a hint of surprise, that he had “been misinform’d, at least I have not heard nor can I imagine, that the Dean & Chapter have agreed that it should rest with me to decide” and indicates they had “with their usual readiness to consult the wishes and advantage of the inhabitants” given their consent and promised “a liberal subscription upon condition that the opening should be such as to afford a real benefit to passengers and to form a handsome approach to the Cathedral.”
Not much has been written about Carey, but according to George Oliver in his ‘Lives of the Bishops of Exeter’ (1861) “All concurred in opinion that he was exemplary in the discharge of his official duties”, and what more could you want?
This month’s In Focus event on Thursday 21 November will be a look back at the Bishops of Exeter every hundred years from 1924 to 1124.