Answered honestly, in the parish voice.

Any household resident within the ancient parish of Nether Knutsford — broadly today's Knutsford within the WA16 postcode — of any faith or of none, may apply. The 1830 deed of gift makes no distinction of persuasion.

A short note to [email protected] with a sentence or two on what has happened and what would help is enough to start. The trustees reply within five working days, usually with a request for a short telephone or doorstep conversation. We do not require evidence of income or any paperwork at this first stage.

The average Quiet Grant in 2024-25 was £86. The smallest grant we made was £14 (a replacement kettle); the largest was £240 (an emergency boiler call-out). We rarely award above £400 in any single grant.

The trust is a parish trust attached to an Anglican church. Our chair of trustees is a clergyman, and our meetings are held in the vestry of St John the Baptist Church, Knutsford. But Mary Wrench's deed of gift explicitly commits us to help 'without distinction of persuasion'. Beneficiaries have, over the years, been of every faith and of none, and we will never ask about your beliefs.

No. Grants are gifts, not loans. We never ask for repayment, and we will never write to ask for repayment in the future. Some recipients have, of their own accord, paid in to the trust in later years; that is welcome but never expected.

We do not fund debt repayment, rent arrears (the trustees signpost to Cheshire East housing support), political campaigns, religious mission, commercial ventures, or anyone outside the ancient parish boundary. We do not normally fund holidays, although we have, on one or two careful occasions, contributed to a respite week for a long-term carer.

Through the Sunday Doors visiting round, through the parish office at St John's, through Cranford Primary School's pastoral team, through the district nurses, through the GP surgery on Toft Road, through neighbours, and — occasionally and importantly — through hand-written notes slipped under the rear vestry door.

No, although the trustees use their judgement. We are, by Mary Wrench's deed, here for the relief of need in the parish, and need takes many forms — financial, emotional, situational. We do not ask for proof of income; the trustees decide on the basis of conversation.

For an emergency — a failed boiler in February, a child without school shoes on a Sunday evening — two trustees can agree a grant by telephone the same evening, and the money or the parts will be in place within twenty-four hours. For non-urgent requests, the trustees decide at the quarterly meeting (the second Tuesday of February, May, August and November), or by minuted email exchange between meetings if needed.

Yes, absolutely. The trustees and the Honorary Almoner are the only people who see your request. We never publish the names of those we help. Even our published distribution notes (such as the 2024-25 Winter Coal Fund note) carry only house numbers and streets, never names.

Please see the Volunteer page and fill in the short enquiry form there. We ask for two references and conduct a DBS check at our cost for any visiting role. New befrienders are paired with returning ones for their first three visits.

Nominations come to us through the parish office, district nurses, the school, neighbours, and occasionally from the household itself. Every nomination is read at the next trustees' meeting, and then a trustee makes a single introductory visit before the household is added to the Sunday Doors register. The visiting round currently includes 31 households.

The full accounts are filed each year with the Charity Commission and are open to public inspection at register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk. Summary reports for the last eight years are also available on our Annual Reports page.

Yes, and a small handful of parishioners have done so over the years. The standard form of words your solicitor will use is: 'I bequeath to Mary Wrench Charity, registered charity number 219988, of 10 South Downs, Knutsford WA16 8ND, the sum of £___ free of all taxes for its general charitable purposes.' Please do not feel you need to leave a large sum; the trust has been kept going for two centuries by very small ones.

Mary Wrench's deed of gift confines our work to one ancient parish, and the trustees of every generation since have read the deed strictly. We are small because the parish is small, and because the value we bring is, in our experience, in being known to the kitchens we visit. We have considered widening our work three or four times over the last century and have always decided against it. We do not plan to change that.