A SCULPTURE of the Virgin Mary has floated 75 miles downstream on the river Wye in a demonstration calling for a halt to the pollution of the river.

The wooden sculpture started its voyage in Hay-on-Wye on Monday, August 15 and finished in Monmouth four days later.

The four-foot-tall sculpture of the Virgin Mary, dubbed as ‘Our lady of the waters,’ travelled through Bredwardine, Moccas, Hereford, Marden, Lugwardine, Holme Lacy, Hoarwithy, Sellack, Ross-on-Wye, Goodrich, and Whitchurch.

Mounted on two canoes made into a canoe-catamaran, the Virgin Mary sculpture was accompanied by the sculptor, Philip Chatfield, along with Callum Bulmer, and Vicar of Cleeve Nigel Thomas, who paddled the figure across the five days.

Deputy head of Monmouth School and his wife, who are both Atlantic rowers, rowed the sculpture on the final stretch into Monmouth. Other canoeists and wild swimmers accompanied the canoe-catamaran for part of the journey.

Many events took place along the way, starting with music being played in Hay. Trumpets and saxophones being played, Georgian chants, feasts, and morning coffee were just a few of the events that kept canoeists and bystanders entertained.

Before the voyage began, Father Richard Williams of Hay-on-Wye, who came up with the idea said: “A unique occasion nationally, it is both a spiritual act of faith and courage and also a moment of rallying for those people of goodwill and love for creation to unite together in a common purpose.

“There is so much division in the world, but this is a marvellous opportunity to celebrate something good and to help restore it to what God and nature would have it be.

“We cannot possibly say that we love God, who is unseen, if we fail to love that which is seen, the river Wye, a much-loved product of the Creator’s hand.”

The impressive Virgin Mary sculpture was sculpted by Philip Chatfield, who nearly drowned on the Maria Assumpta, a brig that sank off Padstow in 1995 with the loss of three lives. He has since carved stone statues for Tintern Abbey and St Mary’s Church, Monmouth and elsewhere.

The sculpture will eventually be sited in a hillside shrine at Capel-y-ffin, where, in 1880, the Virgin Mary was said to have appeared to two boys of ten and 11, one of whom said to the other: “if that thing comes any nearer I am going to hit it with my stick!” Further voyages may be undertaken in future.

The demonstration was carried out across the five days to raise awareness and to call for concerted action to cleanse the river Wye.

It is believed that biodiversity in the Wye has declined due to pollution from chicken farm slurry, overflow of sewage, excessive use of fertilisers, run off from arable land and soil erosion.