The Venerable Bede says that in his day the tomb of St.Chad was in the
form of a small wooden house, with an aperture at the side, through
which the faithful might put their hands and obtain dust, which, mixed
with water, was used as a cure for both sick humans and animals.
In 700 Bishop Headda built a church to contain the tomb, and as the
stream of pilgrims continued after the Conquest, a Norman church was
constructed in the twelfth century. This second church, however, lasted
only about a hundred years before it was replaced by the present Gothic
Cathedral, which had a larger East End, including a Lady Chapel, to
facilitate the flow of pilgrims.
Walter de Langton, who became bishop of Lichfield in 1296, had a marble
shrine erected behind the High Altar. Some of the saint's bones were
kept in a portable shrine, called a feretory, his head was venerated in
the Chapel of St.Chad's Head and other relics were displayed from the
gallery in the South Choir Aisle.
Numerous miracles were attributed to St.Chad's relics. The earliest is
recorded by the Venerable Bede, who recounts that a mentally deranged
vagrant took shelter in the church where the saint was buried and left
it the next morning restored to sanity. These evidences of his sanctity
did not save his shrine from spoliation at the Reformation. At first
Bishop Robert Lee persuaded King Henry VIII to allow the tomb to remain
undisturbed, but it was not long before the lure of the gold and gems
were too much for the king's officers and it was broken up.
It is possible that St.Chad's relics still lie behind the altar at
Lichfield, but a certain prebend Dudley took away four pieces of bone
for safe keeping, and these were treasured by recusants until the
consecration of the Roman Catholic Cathedral at Birmingham. In 1841 they
were enshrined there above the High Altar. The Feast of the Translation
of St.Chad is observed in the Midlands on the Thursday after the Fourth
Sunday after Easter
(
Bowen,
Wall).
St. Chad's church, Lichfield
http://www.saintchads.org.uk/home.htm