ECHO reader Paul Schwamborn is correct about St Boniface being patron saint of Germany and the Netherlands.
However I think there may have been some inaccuracies in the Echo article that he mentions.
I have not seen the article, but the historian HPR Finberg in his book The Formation of England 550-1042 tells us that St Boniface was formally known by his baptisimal name of Wynfrith of Exeter (not Winnifred). Wynfrith went on to become a monk at a monastery in Nursling, Hampshire.
He devoted his later life to the conversion of the heathen peoples of central Europe after departing from England in 716 AD, after which he was given the name Boniface by Pope Gregory II.
There is currently a Winfrith Way in Nursling. Maybe, this is in memory of Wynfrith or the Nursling monastery?
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