Masonic Province of Hertfordshire
Chronicle and Banners
The Order of Knights Templar Priests goes back to the late 1700s as records exist in Ireland under the Irish Early Grand Encampment, of Knight Templars and various Craft Lodges, who got together to confer this degree. From 1812 there was in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, a Council of Knights Grand Cross of the Holy Temple of Jerusalem, which included Knight Templar Priest among its Degrees. This appears to have been operating, although gradually declining and almost becoming moribund until in 1884, there was only one known member left. He was Henry Hotham, and under the authority of one of the original Rules of the Order admitted nine Knights into the Order, thus saving it from extinction. The revived body conscious that there was still no ruling body, adhered to the Grand Council of the Allied Masonic Degrees (formed in London in1880), which gave a welcome to all unattached degrees. Thus was formed the Royal Kent Tabernacle, 'Time Immemorial'.
From 1895 the Order prospered and in 1924 the present ruling body, Grand College was formed in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. It subsequently moved to York, where it remains today as the headquarters of the Order. From small beginnings the Order is now world wide with over two hundred and fifty Tabernacles in the UK, Europe and, as far afield as the Far East, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Canada, Brazil and Bolivia. The Order is divided into Districts, each under the control of a Grand Superintendent appointed by the Grand High Priest.
Within the Holy Royal Arch Knight Templar Priests and Order of Holy Wisdom, within Hertfordshire, neither the High Priests office, the Hertfordshire district, nor any of the conclaves within the district has a banner. There are 6 conclaves in existence in Hertfordshire namely:
Hertfordshire Tabernacle No: 29
Halsey Tabernacle No: 177
Crux Roisia Tabernacle No: 192
John Owen Place Tabernacle No: 200
Southgate Tabernacle No: 216
James William Turner Tabernacle No: 222
​
​
Order of Holy Wisdom
In 2014 the Order of Holy Wisdom was resurrected as a separate but associated Order. The Order had fallen into disuse due to the complexity of the ritual and the regalia. An abbreviated ceremony is now being worked retaining the precepts and characterisation of the original.
For more detail of the Order of Holy Wisdom and Knights Templar Priests please visit their web-site.