Church relic goes missing

Editor's note: This article was gleaned from the Aug. 2, 1973 edition of The Recorder. Joseph C. Pritchard was publisher.

An old chandelier said to be worth several thousand dollars is missing and presumed stolen from Christ Episcopal Church in Warm Springs.

The whole white brick church building, constructed during the 1850s when Warm Springs was one of the South's leading resorts, has not been used for regular services for about 50 years. It is vacant except for the annual service held to settle a question about the church's title.

Neither officials of St. Luke's Episcopal Church in Hot Springs which exercises control over Christ Church, nor the Bath County Sheriff's Department, which investigated the incident, could say how entry was made or when the chandeliers were taken.

But they speculated that the building was entered through a back door that it may have happened a month ago, perhaps longer. Church officials learned last week that the chandelier was missing and notified the sheriff's department.

Sheriff Frank M. Pritt Jr. said this week he had been unable to produce any leads as to what happened to the chandelier, and church officials hoped against hope that the valuable old oil-lighted relic could be recovered.

"Even though the chandelier was very high, whoever took it must have been very low," said the Rev. George W. Wickersham II, rector of St. Luke's. He expressed hope that whoever may have taken the chandelier would return it.

St. Luke's would like to relinquish control of Christ Church to the Bath County Historical Society, which has voiced an interest in the property for a museum. However, the deed to the church stipulates that it must be used for church services or title reverts to the descendants of the original owners. A search for the heirs has not yet proved conclusive.

Meanwhile, old Christ Church stands crumbling on a knoll above Route 39, its windows broken many times by rocks and it innards prey to vandals. In the aftermath of the chandelier's disappearance, all items of value have been removed from the church.