Early in the summer of 1788 considerable fissures were observed in the north-western pier of the tower, which continuing to increase, Mr. Telford was employed to examine and report the cause. On inspection, it was discovered that the foundations had been undermined by graves heedlessly made too near the walls, and that the pier, in consequence, had given way; that the tower and the whole of the north side of the nave were in a most dangerous state, and the chief timbers of the roof decayed. He recommended that the tower should be immediately taken down, the pier rebuilt, and the other parts of the fabric properly and substantially secured. This reasonable advice through ill-judged economy was fatally rejected, and a stonemason employed to cut away the infirm parts of the pier, and to underbuild it, without lessening any of the incumbent weight of the tower and bells. The workmen accordingly commenced, and proceeded in their operations for two days; but on the third morning, July 9th, 1788, just as the chimes struck four, the ruinous pier gave way, the tower was instantly rent asunder, and falling on the roofs of the nave and transept with a tremendous crash, involved those parts in one indescribable scene of desolation and horror. Many portions of the building still remained standing but so great was the panic occasioned by the catastrophe that they were all immediately taken down, with the exception of the present chapel. The collegiate establishment of St. Chad consisted of a dean, ten secular canons, and two vicars choral, and was founded soon after the subjugation of Pengwern, in the 8th century, by Offa, king of Mercia, who, as tradition states, converted the palace of the kings of Powis into his first church. In Edward the Confessor’s time, this church held twelve hides of land, which it retained at the compilation of Domesday. Between the years 1086 and 1326, other considerable possessions were acquired by the college, so that at the dissolution their revenues amounted to the clear yearly sum of £49 13s. In 34th Henry VIII. on the apprehension of a dissolution, the last dean, Sir George Lee, granted a lease of the deanery, (with the exception of certain tithes previously disposed of) to Humphrey Onslow, Esq. for sixty-one years, at a rent of £10, and a payment of £4 6s. 8d. to a curate to celebrate divine service in the church. On the dissolution of colleges, 2nd Edward VI., the crown leased the collegiate property to George Beston, Esq. for a term of twenty-one years; and two years afterwards, without any notice being taken of that gentleman’s interest, it was appropriated to the Free Schools, in which it is now vested. The living, though properly a curacy, has long been styled a vicarage, and is in the patronage of the crown. The incumbent is always the mayor’s chaplain. This parish is by far the largest in the place, comprising very nearly half the town, and a great extent of the surrounding country.