Generous  benefactors

The Catholic Church in North Norfolk is founded on the generosity of two ladies: one of whom (Kate Deterding) directed her gift to a specific Church: St Joseph’s in Sheringham and the other (Mrs Lyne-Stephens) left her wealth to the Catholic Church, the main beneficiary being the magnificent Our Lady and the English Martyrs in Cambridge, the small change from which helped to fund Our Lady of Refuge in Cromer. Her posthumous work in Cromer was added to by Sir Hubert Jerningham. One or two other “outside” donors are also included here.

Mrs. Yolande Marie Louise Lyne-Stephens, who died in September 1894. Part of her estate provided the bulk of the funds to cover the initial cost of building the Church Our Lady of Refuge. She was the daughter of Jean Louis Duvernay; and was born France in 1813. She appeared as a dancer at Drury Lane on 13 February 1833 in a ballet called The Sleeping Beauty and introduced to England the dance with castanets called La Cachuca in the ballet of The Devil on Two Sticks at Drury Lane on 1 December 1836. She was one of the greatest dancers in Europe, but retired in 1837. On 14 July 1845 she married Stephen Lyne-Stephens of Lynford Hall, Norfolk (born 1801) at Putney. He died in 1860. She died at Lynford Hall on 2 September 1894 and is buried in the Mausoleum at Roehampton in Surrey. Her collection of pictures, objects of art and old French furniture was sold for £113,557 at Christies.

Jerningham, Sir Hubert
Sir Hubert Jerningham, born 18 Oct. 1842; died 3 April 1914, wrote to the Bishop promising £600 towards the cost of the presbytery in Cromer aqd the Bishop was therefore able to sign a contract on May 4th 1903 for the construction of a presbytery at a cost of £1070, with the same architect and builders as for the Church. He was a regular visitor to Cromer from his home at Berwick but he had long standing connections with Norfolk through his cousins at Costessey Hall. His home was Longbridge Towers in Northumberland. He was educated at the University of Paris and entered the diplomatic serviced in 1866, retiring in 1879. Two years later he was elected liberal MP for Berwick-on-Tweed, and sat until 1885. He acted as colonial secretary for Honduras, 1887-1889, and Mauritius 1889-1892. In 1893 he was promoted to be Lieutenant-Governor for his services during the cyclone of 1892 in Mauritius, made a KCMG and Governor and Commander-in-Chief of that colony. In 1897 he was transferred as Governor of Trinidad until 1900. He was the author of several works, notably Reminiscences of an Attache, Norham Castle and West to East. He married 1874, Annie, daughter of Edward Liddell, of Benton Park, Northumberland.

Catherine [Kate] Louise Deterding was a very different benefactor primarily in that her effort was directed during her own lifetime and in secret. Furthermore, it is impossible to establish why she donated money to build the church when she was not a Catholic at the time: indeed she remained a non-Catholic until a few weeks before her sudden and untimely death. Kate was the third daughter of Alfred de Windt Neubronner, Consul General of Siam and Agent for the Perak Government and was born in Penang, a beautiful island off the coast of what is now Malaysia: an ancestor had settled in Malacca in 1789 where Christianity has flourished since the time of St Francis Xavier. Kate was a member of the Dutch Reformed Church. Henri Wilhelm August Deterding, the son of a Dutch sea captain and born on 19 April 1866 in Amsterdam, married Kate in July 1894. Henri, a banker, had left Holland in 1884 to work for the Netherlands Trading Company and in 1896 joined the Royal Dutch Company for the Working of Petroleum Wells in 1896. They came to Holland in 1899 and Henri became Managing Director of the Royal Dutch Petroleum Company in 1900. In 1902 the family moved to England where in 1907 Henri assisted in the formation of the the Royal Dutch Shell Group. In 1907 he bought the Kelling Estate as he enjoyed game shooting and started to rebuild the house. Henri was a regular traveller between London and Den Hague by the Harwich to Hoek van Holland ferry. On 21 February 1907 Kate implored her husband not to travel by repeated telephone calls. That night the Berlin, the ferry was lost as it approached the Hook with many of it passengers drowning. Kate, whom it is believed had funds of her own, considered that a church should be erected in Sheringham comparable with her holiday home and began negotiations with Father Carter.

 

 

 

 


Fowke, Philip
Donor of stained glass window showing St Joseph on his death bed. Philip Fowke had been one of Edward Watkin’s companions at New College who were influential in Watkin becoming a Catholic. Philip had joined the Consular Service and was on leave from Korea with his wife Edith Maria Gladys in 1928 and staying in Sheringham with the Watkins where she experienced a miscarriage and died. Philip left the Consular Service to look bafter his two children: Francis and Catherine and donated the window showing the death of St. Joseph which is inscribed Orate pro anima E. M. G. Fowke May 26 1928 RIP.