|
 Welcome to the Royal Arch in Staffordshire.
The Royal Arch is considered to be the completion of Pure and Antient Freemasonry and continues a Master Mason's journey to discovery. As such, it shares a unique partnership and close working relationship with the Craft.
Although the first three degrees (Entered Apprentice, Fellow Craft, and Master Mason) are governed by the United Grand Lodge of England, and the Royal Arch is governed by the Supreme Grand Chapter of England, in real terms we are one organisation.
The Provincial Grand Master and myself represent this unique partnership by working closely together across a wide range of joint activities that seek to attract, inform, develop and engage the members of our Province. Enjoyment remains at the very heart of all that we do!
With these things in mind, it is hoped that every Master Mason will give serious consideration to continuing their journey from Initiation in the Craft, to Exaltation as a Companion in the Royal Arch.
Michele Santopietro
Grand Superintendent
|
Joining the Royal Arch
History of the Royal Arch in Staffordshire
It is quite possible that in the early days of freemasonry the Royal Arch ceremony was worked in the Craft Lodges of Staffordshire without a separate Royal Arch Chapter being constituted. In the rough draft Minute Book of St Martin's Lodge from 1807 to 1810, it was found that brethren were proposed in the Lodge for exaltation to the Royal Arch and that the Lodge originally 'worked the Royal Arch as an integral and essential portion of the 3rd Degree'.
In the late 18th and early 19th centuries there may have been many other Royal Arch Masons exalted into other Craft Lodges.
The first Wolverhampton Lodge was constituted on the 28th March 1732 and by 1768 there were four lodges in the town. A century later, in 1842, there were 13 Craft Lodges in Staffordshire; the oldest of which, still surviving today, was the Etruscan Lodge No 285 Stoke on Trent, founded in 1803, and the next St Martin's Lodge No 115 (now No 98) Burslem, founded in 1805 on a Warrant originally granted in 1764 for a lodge in Wolverhampton.
It was only after "The Act of Union" in 1817 that separate Royal Arch Chapters were established to undertake the exaltation ceremonies; although it is true to say that this directive was very slow at being implemented.
In 1833 there were only two duly constituted Royal Arch Chapters in Staffordshire; St Martin's Chapter No 115, Burslem and possibly, the Charity and Concord Chapter No 182, Longton, which was founded in 1813. The Chapter of Fortitude No 427, Stafford, was added to these two in 1834. Thereafter there was a steady increase in the number of official Royal Arch Chapters added to the list. These are indicated below :-
419
539
418
624
482
546
1060
726
456
662
1941
|
St Peter's
Vernon
Staffordshire Knot
Abbey
St James'
Etruscan
Marmion
Royal Chartley Chapter of Fortitude
Dove
Dartmouth
St Augustine's
|
1842
1852
1857
1864
1865
1873
1875
1881
1887
1895
1896
|
Over the next 120 years new Chapters continued to be formed throughout the Province of Staffordshire so much so that as we enter the 2020's the list has grown to 37 Chapters with over 1000 membership.
|
