The Bell Foundry Museum

On May 11th, 1882, the biggest hell in the British Empire, a colossus christened Great Paul and weighing close on 17 tons, was proudly paraded through the streets of Loughborough in Leicestershire by the foundry workforce of John Taylor's, which had cast it, before setting off for London and St Paul's Cathedral. The journey took the vast hell eleven days, as it was trundled slowly along on a cradle by a hissing traction engine, with a procession of auxiliary engines, equipment and respectful attendants following behind. No doorway in St Paul's was big enough for the bell and a hole had to be knocked in the building to get it in. It slid into the cathedral along a specially made wooden ramp greased with tallow and black lead. Once inside it was hauled up with ropes to hang 125ft up in one of the towers, and there it booms away in sonorous majesty to this day.