AS the bells ring out across sheep-dotted fields from the tower of an English country church, the scene appears for all the world like one unchanged for centuries.

But all is not what it seems.

St John the Baptist Church in Layer-de-la-Haye has bells dating from the time of Henry VIII and it is a safe bet the peal that sounds today was heard even further back in the mists of time.

But the bells fell silent for more than 100 years after the great Essex earthquake of 1884.

The end of two world wars, five coronations and man’s arrival on the moon were all greeted by silence as the quake had damaged the bell tower and the wooden medieval frame.

With bells weighing half-a-tonne or more, setting them in motion by standing underneath and yanking violently on ropes would have been dicing with death.

The only way to get a noise out of the bells was to strike them from the outside with a hammer – an unsatisfactory state of affairs which, by the time the Sixties rolled around, parishioners had begun to talk about setting right.

With the arrival in the village of enthusiastic would-be ringer Brian Keeble, in the Eighties, the campaign to raise the necessary cash began in earnest.

Thanks to bequests and donations, including £5,000 from the former Essex Water Company, the restoration project was completed in February 2001.

Mr Keeble became the tower captain at the helm of an enthusiastic new team of ringers, but died seven months later, aged 55.

The work he helped achieve will be celebrated this summer as the bell tower opens to the public every Sunday afternoon in August.

The Gazette was granted a sneak preview under the supervision of parishioner Martin Piper.

A narrow spiral staircase leads from the floor of the 12th century church up to the small room where the team of ringers perform.

From here, the visitor climbs up via a ladder to where the six bells – some ancient, some modern additions – hang in awesome splendour above.

There is then a surprise in store, as a second ladder leads up to where the original timber bell-frame still sits in the position it has occupied for at least 450 years.

Very few of its type exist and it was retained out of historical interest when the new metal bell-frame went in.

The old medieval bell-clappers have been taken out and attached to the ends of pews in the church.

The final leg of the tour – which is not for the faint-hearted – leads up yet another ladder on to the roof of the church, where there is a commanding view of work on the massive expansion of Abberton Reservoir.

Such scenes of frenzied construction activity in an otherwise idyllic rural setting appear a clash of old and new, but then the bell tower itself is far from a relic of history.

Mr Piper said: “We have got a band of ringers now ringing nearly every week, including four youngsters aged under 16 who started in their last year of primary school.”