St Baruc’s Church

The little church of St Baruc’s on Barry Island is a daughter church of the main parish church, All Saints, and is named after the Dark Age Celtic Saint, Baruc, who supposedly gave his name to the town. The church is the only one in the world dedicated to this saint.
St Baruc’s Church opened as a mission church in 1897, initially under the rector of Sully, whose parish originally included Barry Island. When the congregation became too large for this church, a ‘tin mission church’ was erected in 1909, made of corrugated iron, which had previously been built in 1881 in the nearby town of Penarth as an overflow for St Augustine’s Church. It was located in Plymouth Road on Barry Island, and served the congregation until the 1960s. The congregation then moved back to the original building.
The modern chapel now has a small but loyal congregation, with a traditional ‘middle-​of-​the-​road’ style of worship.
Once a year, on 27 September, a service is held in the scant remains of the original mediaeval chapel dedicated to Saint Baruc, just above Jackson’s Bay, adjacent to Friar’s Road.
Baruc was a student of the famous Welsh Saint Cadoc, and spent time as a hermit on Flat Holm, in the Bristol Channel. It was on a voyage there that Baruc drowned, and his body was washed up on Barry Island. It is said his remains were buried in the chapel, although there is no archaeological evidence for this.