The appeal to restore the historic bells of Bushey Parish Church has almost reached the halfway point.

Sue Morton and the bells ringers at St James’ Church have raised £30,000 out of the £80,000 needed to restore the eight bells, two of which date back to before the Great Fire of London.

Christopher Morton, who learnt to bell ring at the church, has written a poem to help in the appeal.

The poem reads:

The bells of St. James’s are broken and old, they've rung out for years (or so I am told!).

They welcome to church and celebrate marriage, they do so much work, you shouldn’t disparage.

The oldest of eight is the 7th you see, it dates all the way back to fourteen-fifty AD.

Then there's two more that were brought up the spire, the 5th and the 6th predate the great fire.

In 1880 the ring was completed, when the final five bells found themselves seated.

But the time has now come for mending and care, 'cos the bells of St. James’s are in need of repair.

They’ve slowly become much harder to ring, in time they’d fall silent - a terrible thing.

The actual bells are mostly ok, they just need a tune as they’ve started to stray.

But the clappers and headstocks, bearings and wheels, all of these items need mending for peals.

So please help our appeal and support in our aims to join with us and fix the bells of St. James’s.

If you choose to donate then please don’t forget, to do a gift aid form so the tax is offset.

To donate to help save the bells visit: www.gofundme.com/savebusheybells