Survey Data
Reg No
31309028
Rating
Regional
Categories of Special Interest
Architectural, Artistic, Historical, Scientific, Social
Original Use
Church/chapel
Date
1840 - 1850
Coordinates
126465, 279491
Date Recorded
24/11/2010
Date Updated
--/--/--
Description
Detached four-bay double-height single-cell Catholic church, dated 1845, with single-bay three-stage tower (north-west) on a square plan. "Improved", 1896, producing present composition. Closed, 1978. Reroofed, 2001. Undergoing "restoration", 2010. Now disused. Replacement pitched slate roofs including pitched (gabled) slate roof to tower with clay ridge tiles, lichen-covered cut-limestone coping to gables on pinnacled kneelers with abbreviated finials to apexes, and replacement cast-iron rainwater goods on dragged cut-limestone eaves with cast-iron downpipes. Part creeper- or ivy-covered rendered, ruled and lined battered walls. Lancet window openings with drag edged dragged cut-limestone sills, and concealed dressings framing storm glazing over fixed-pane fittings having stained glass margins centred on leaded stained glass quatrefoils. Paired lancet window openings to chancel (east) centred on roundel with drag edged dragged cut-limestone sills, and concealed dressings framing storm glazing over fixed-pane fittings having stained glass margins centred on leaded stained glass ovals. Pointed-arch door opening to entrance (west) front below drag edged cut-limestone date stone ("1845"), concealed dressings with hood moulding over on monolithic label stops framing replacement timber boarded or tongue-and-groove timber panelled double doors having overpanel. Pointed-arch window opening to gable with drag edged dragged cut-limestone sill, and concealed dressings framing storm glazing over fixed-pane fitting having stained glass margins centred on leaded stained glass roundels. Square-headed "arrow loop" window openings to tower with cut-limestone surrounds having chamfered reveals framing storm glazing over fixed-pane fittings having stained glass margins. Pointed-arch openings (bell stage) in pointed-arch recesses with cut-limestone surrounds having chamfered reveals framing replacement louvered timber fittings. Full-height interior undergoing "restoration", 2010, with timber panelled choir gallery (west) on chamfered timber posts, Gothic-style timber panelled confessional boxes, pair of cut-white marble Classical-style wall monuments (ob. 1858; ????) between stained glass windows, stepped dais to sanctuary (east) with arcaded communion railings centred on stepped "predella" supporting cut-veined white marble Classical-style panelled high altar below stained glass memorial "East Window" (ob. 1915), and timber boarded or tongue-and-groove timber panelled polygonal vaulted ceiling with trefoil-perforated sanctuary lamp rose. Set in unkempt grounds shared with Mayo Abbey (founded 665; plundered 1204; sacked 1617; in ruins 1838).
Appraisal
A deconsecrated church erected by Reverend John Jennings PP (d. 1858; fl. 1841-58) regarded as an important component of the mid nineteenth-century ecclesiastical heritage of Mayo with the architectural value of the composition, one superseding an adjacent mass house derided as 'a low thatched house with a damp earthen floor, two small windows and a shattered door', confirmed by such attributes as the rectilinear "barn" plan form, aligned along a liturgically-correct axis; the slender profile of the openings underpinning a streamlined "medieval" Gothic theme; and the gently tapering tower making a pleasing visual statement as a picturesque eye-catcher in the landscape: meanwhile, aspects of the composition, in particular the high pitched roofline, clearly illustrate the continued development or "improvement" of the church at the turn of the twentieth century. A prolonged period of inactivity notwithstanding, the congregation having removed to the architecturally-inferior Catholic Church of Our Lady Queen of Peace (1978), the elementary form and massing survive intact together with substantial quantities of the original fabric, both to the exterior and to the interior partly redecorated as a film set for "Amongst Women" (1998; dir. Tom Cairns) where contemporary joinery; Classical wall monuments; stained glass installed by Reverend T.A. Jones CC (d. 1932; fl. 1919-24) complimenting the earlier Stephens Memorial "East Window" (ob. 1915); and a restrained high altar, all highlight the artistic potential of a church making a pleasing visual statement in a rural village streetscape.