Halifax Minster - The Interior Part 2

 

Frosterley marble used for the altar steps in the chancel

Continuing my exploration of the interior of Halifax Minster, the walls of the north aisle are again adorned with a variety of wall memorials that include ‘white on black’ varieties made with white Carrara marble and what I think is probably Carboniferous Limestone, with alabaster used for some of the simple memorials. 

 

Wall memorials along the north aisle

 

I just took a few general photographs of these and crossed back to the south side of the Minster to have a quick look at the Holdsworth Chapel, where the highlight was the grave slab of Thomas Haldsworth (d.1709) and members of his family. 

 

Views of the Holdsworth Chapel

 

Next to this is the simple wall memorial to the preacher Oliver Heywood (d.1702), which was erected in June 1906. Unlike the other memorials that I had see in the Minster, this is made with a polished granite that looks like it could be the Scottish Kemnay granite from Aberdeenshire. 

 

The memorial to Oliver Heywood

 

Moving further along the south aisle, the memorial to William Rawson (d.1828) is described by Pevsner as a “Relief of the Good Samaritan”, without actually mentioning Rawson – who was a partner in Rawson’s bank. According to Malcolm Bull’s Calderdale Companion, this was made by Richard Westmacott Junior, who Pevsner describes as the maker of the memorial of his nephew, John Markland Rawson. 

 

The memorial to William Rawson

 

Continuing to the Wellington Chapel, which was rededicated in 1951 to the Duke of Wellington’s Regiment, but I didn’t take much notice of the stone used - gritstone from the Rough Rock – for the walling and the arcade. 

 

The arcade of the Wellington Chapel

 

A war memorial slab is set into the flagstones and its distinctly green colour suggests that this is made of volcanic green slate from the Borrowdale Volcanic Group in the Lake District, although I didn’t take a close look at it and just took record photographs
 

The war memorial slab in the Wellington Chapel

The altar at the east end of the chapel is made of limestone, but I again didn’t closely inspect the stone but, enlarging the photograph that I took, the paving that immediately surrounds it looks like it contains some crinoid ossicles, which is a characteristic of Derbyshire ‘fossil marble’. 

 

The altar in the Wellington Chapel

Moving into the chancel, the floor has a chequerboard pattern, with squares of white Carrara marble and Carboniferous Limestone, which is probably from Belgium. This combination is quite commonly seen in later Victorian churches and mediaeval churches that were restored during this period and the floor was probably laid during Sir George Gilbert Scott’s restoration of 1878. 

 

The flooring and altar steps in the chancel

 

The steps to the altar are made with another Carboniferous Limestone, this time Frosterley marble from County Durham. It is characterised by an abundance of solitary corals, Dibunophyllum bipartitum, which I have seen in a few churches and at the Hob’s House landslip at Monsal Dale in the Peak District National Park. 

 

A detail of the Frosterley marble used for the altar steps

Set into the paving of the chancel, which is very probably flaggy sandstone from the nearby Elland Flags formation, is a memorial to George Horsfall Frodsham (d.1937), who was the Bishop of North Queensland from 1902 to 1913 and the vicar of Halifax from 1920 until his death. 

 

The memorial to George Horsfall Frodsham

 

Being conscious that I still had to complete my British Listed Buildings Photo Challenge, which would entail a good walk around Halifax, I just took a few record photographs of the nave, the arcades and a few details of the columns. 

 

Views of the arcades and columns

 

I had a very brief look around the Rokeby Chapel, which was built in memory of William Rokeby - the vicar from 1502 to 1521 and the Archbishop of Dublin - and has inscribed slabs commemorating Mary Midgley (d.1704), which also has a coat of arms in shallow relief, and John Waterhouse (d.1732), his wife Ellen and their children.

 

Memorials to Mary Midgley and John Waterhouse and his family

 

Making my way back along the north aisle, I stopped briefly to take a photograph of another ‘white on black’ wall memorial to John Waterhouse (d.1847) and his wife Grace (d.1849), which has intricately carved crocketed pinnacles, cinquefoil arches, floriated capitals, a coat of arms and carved heads, but are not mentioned in the reference sources that I have access to. 

 

The memorial to John Waterhouse

 

I finished my brief look at the interior of Halifax Minster, which took just 30 minutes, at the west end of the north aisle where I noticed a reset block with chevrons, which would have come from the original C12 church. The Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture in Britain and Ireland notes that the fieldworker found four of these, although many more are mentioned in the literature. 

 

A block of reset C12 masonry with chevrons

 

Halifax Minster - The Interior Part 1

 

An impost in the south aisle

Entering the porch of Halifax Minster, having spent 15 minutes photographing its exterior, I stopped briefly to have a look at the grave slabs that, according to the Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture for Britain and Ireland, Peter Ryder considers to be C12.

 

A grave slab in the porch

Once through the door, I found myself in a part of the Minster that is used as a shop and picked up a leaflet that highlights some of the main points of interest to a general visitors. Having a quick look around me, before going to explore the church, I was quite struck by the scale of the church and immediately realised that I would only have time to photograph its principal elements and details that immediately caught my eye.

 

Points of interest highlighted by the guide

 

Looking back at the south door, several wall monuments from the C17 to C19 are made mainly with white or veined Carrara marble from Italy, with some of these attached to a simple slab that are made of stone that I think may be Carboniferous Limestone from Belgium or the Republic of Ireland, which are essentially unfossiliferous and when polished were marketed as ‘black marble’. 

 

Wall monuments surrounding the south door

 

I have seen very many of these ‘white on black monuments’ during my exploration of mediaeval churches, but I have never been able to get close enough to examine any of the materials used for them. Historic England (HE) or the church guide don’t mention the wall monuments and Pevsner describes them as “Nothing outstanding and much minor”, with only five being highlighted. 

 

Various wall monuments

 

One of these is the memorial to John Markland Rawson (d.1826), with the inscription recording that he perished with other seamen when the pinnace of HMS Owen Glendower was swamped in Simon’s Bay at the Cape of Good Hope and it incorporates a sail and an anchor in its design. 

 

The monument to John Markland Rawson

 

It was made by Richard Westmacott the Younger, who produced the pediment frieze at the Royal Exchange – the restoration of which I supervised as a site manager with Triton Building Restoration Ltd. back in 2000, several years after I left the company that I co-founded. 

 

The Bishop Ferrar memorial

At the west end of the south aisle is the monument to Robert Ferrar, the Bishop of St. David’s Cathedral in Wales who was born in Halifax and was burned at the stake on 13th March 1555 at Carmarthen, during the reign of Queen Mary I. 

 

A detail of the Bishop Ferrar memorial

The monument was made in 1847 by Joseph Bentley Leyland, a sculptor from Halifax who seems to be best known as being a friend of Branwell Brontë, the brother of the Brontë sisters of Howarth, and dying as an alcoholic in a debtor’s prison, having failed to live up to his potential. From the couple of photos that I took, I can see that the monument is made of a limestone that I suspect could be Caen stone, but I would need to take a much closer look. 

 

A view east along the nave

 

The 5-bay nave, which Pevsner dates to c.1437, has tall arches to both arcades with octagonal columns, except for the westernmost column to the south arcade which for some unknown reason is considerably larger and has an irregular shape. 

 

The font

 

The spectacular spire shaped C15 font cover is nearly 8 m high, but Pevsner, Historic England (HE) and the church guide make any mention of the font itself and, based on the simple octagonal design that I have seen in many churches, I presume that it has a similar date. 

 

The steps up to the base of the tower

 

Entering the base of the tower up the 6 steps, the like of which I had never encountered before during my visits to very many mediaeval churches in South Yorkshire and the surrounding counties, I was very surprised to see so much floor space – especially since in very many churches, this area is used as a storage space and there is hardly enough room to swing a cat. 

 

The chest tomb of Charles Musgrave

 

Set into the centre of the tower is the chest tomb (1880) of Charles Musgrave, archdeacon of York in the C19, with his effigy carved in white Carrara marble, which Pevsner states was made by William Day Keyworth of London.

 

A detail of the effigy of Charles Musgrave

 

Halifax Minster - The Exterior Part 2

 

A restored head stop on the south aisle

Continuing my brief look at the exterior of Halifax Minster, which is built with coarse grained Rough Rock, I stopped to photograph the very weathered grotesque on the south-east corner before continuing along the south aisle of the chancel. 

 

A grotesque on the south-east corner of the chancel

 

Looking at the windows and the acanthus leaf like decorations to the parapet of the 5-bay chancel, it appears that this and the Rokeby Chapel were built during the same phase of building c.1533. At its west end, there is a rose window that has a hood mould with head stops in the form of ram’s heads, which have been restored with a uniformly coloured medium grained gritstone. 

 

The rose window at the west end of the south aisle of the chancel

 

Along the parapet to the chancel, the blocks beneath the crocketted pinnacles, hood moulds to windows, mullions and isolated blocks have also been recently restored with a similar medium grained sandstone, which is quite consistent with the Crosland Hill stone supplied from the Rough Rock at Huddersfield, but this is only an educated guess. 

 

A head stop on the south aisle of the chancel

Immediately below the cinquefoiled blocks that form part of the ornate parapet, the moulding is carved with various details that include an angel, faces, grotesques, rosettes, floral details and shields but, in their usual way, Historic England (HE) make no mention of these interesting examples of architectural sculpture. 

 

An angel on the south aisle of the chancel

 

From my photos, I can see that the gritstone used for the fabric is much coarser than the sandstone used for restoration and small quartz pebbles are frequent, which limits the carving to crudely carved features. This texture is quite typical of the Rough Rock in West Yorkshire, although the variety produced at Crosland Hill is fine to medium grained and an exception to the rule. 

 

A detail on the south aisle of the chancel

 

Moving on to the Holdsworth Chapel, which the Medieval Churches of West Yorkshire by Peter Ryder dates to c.1554, I was very interested to see that the 'flying buttresses' are very similar to those seen at All Saints church in Silkstone and St. Mary’s church in Ecclesfield. 

 

The buttresses on the Rokeby Chapel

 

When visiting various mediaeval churches that have elaborately carved C12 corbel tables, I have often wondered if they were produced by itinerant masons similar to the Herefordshire School, because the figures looked so similar, and I thought perhaps that there was a connection between the churches at Halifax, Silkstone and Ecclesfield. 

 

A buttress on the Rokeby Chapel

 

All Saints church in Silkstone is one of five sister churches that share very similar designs, which includes those at Darton, Royston, Cawthorne and the now rebuilt High Hoyland but all of these, except Darton, were completed by 1500 - as was St. Mary’s in Ecclesfield. 

 

 

Continuing past the south porch and taking a photo along the south elevation to the east, the west end of the south aisle has a castellated parapet in the same style as the Holdsworth Chapel, with both the ground floor windows and those above having a very late Perpendicular Gothic style that have very simple tracery or it is absent. 

 

A view of the south elevation

Moving round to the west elevation of the four stage tower, which I couldn’t get far enough away from to photograph in its entirety, it is dominated by the very large Perpendicular Gothic style window but my Panasonic Lumix TZ100 camera was able to zoom into the high level gargoyles. 

 

The west elevation of the tower

 

Above the west door, there are two highly weathered coats of arms, which are quite crudely carved into the very coarse grained Rough Rock and the finer grained beds are differentially weathered, which highlights the large scale cross-bedding. 

 

Coats of arms above the west door of the door

 

Moving back to the west end of the south aisle, the blackened stone work has been sufficiently weathered to expose a fresh surface of the Rough Rock, which here is coarse grained and contains the occasional small quartz pebble. 

 

A detail of the Rough Rock

 

Attached to the wall above this is a sundial with a date 1808, which is not mentioned in the HE listing description. The inscription, cut into a slab of Elland Flags sandstone, records the names of the churchwardens - William Lawrence, Jonathan Illingworth, Robert Abbott and John Sutcliffe. 

 

The sundial

 

Halifax Minster - The Exterior Part 1

 

The east end of Halifax Minster

Setting off from Treeton at 8:10 am on my day out to Halifax and Huddersfield, I finally arrived at Halifax bus station at 11:50 am and immediately set off to find the Grade I listed Halifax Minster, formerly known as the Church of St. John the Baptist. This was originally built in the C12, but now mainly comprises a fabric that was built in several phases during the C15 – with some C16 and C17 additions and a restoration of 1879 by Sir George Gilbert Scott and his son John Oldrid Scott. 

 

The approach to Halifax Minster from King Street

 

Approaching from King Street and passing Halifax war memorial, my first view was of the tall tower, which was was completed c.1482 and dominates the rest of the church – described by Peter Ryder in The Medieval Churches of West Yorkshire as being “without doubt the largest and most impressive church in the county”. 

 

The British Geological Survey map of the area around Halifax

 

The bedrock underlying Halifax is the Rough Rock, which in this area is a coarse and pebbly gritstone and The Building Stones of England – West and South Yorkshire mentions that building stone for Halifax and its suburbs was provided by quarries at Norland Moor, Greetland and Ovenden, among others. 

 

Quarries shown on the Building Stones of England database map explorer

To the east of Halifax, stone for walling, roofing slates and paving for the cities of Halifax, Huddersfield, Leeds and Bradford was obtained from many quarries on the Elland Flags around Northowram, Southowram, Hipperholme and Brighouse. 

 

The north aisle

 

The stonework of the tower is severely blackened, a legacy of the pollution produced by the steam powered textile mills, but the block size of its ashlar masonry immediately suggested that the Rough Rock as been used in its construction and probably for the masonry for the adjoining north aisle – with the the style of the Y-tracery of its windows being dated c.1290 by Pevsner, although these have been since restored. 

 

A view along the north aisle

The western end of the north aisle has been rebuilt with ashlar where the arrises are quite weathered and adjacent to this is the north porch, which is built with large gritstone ashlar blocks that still retain their sharp profiles and are therefore probably of a later date. 

 

The north porch

 

Unusually for a C15 church, the nave does not have a clerestory and the usual castellated parapet and crocketted pinnacles but the Rokeby Chapel, dated by Ryder to 1533, has a  decoration to the parapet that I had not seen before and would describe as an acanthus leaf pattern but, very surprisingly, Historic England (HE) make no mention of this. 

 

Grave slabs adjacent to the north aisle

 

Alongside the north elevation, grave slabs and riven paving are laid between the fabric and the boundary railing, which are undoubtedly made from the Elland Flags sandstone. Although I had seen a lot of yellowish massive sandstone when exploring Headingley in Leeds, I had always associated this formation with flaggy beds – as seen at Leeds Minster and the Church of St. John the Evangelist and its former graveyard, which now forms the Penny Pocket Park. 

 

The Rokeby Chapel

 

All three elevations of the Rokeby Chapel have large Perpendicular Gothic style windows, with the north elevation having a square window and a door below that were inserted at a later date. Continuing to the 3-bay chancel, which does have a clerestory, the windows and decoration to the parapet are in the same style and indicates that it is contemporary.

 

A view of the Rokeby Chapel and the chancel

 

Continuing to the east end, a tree obscures the east window of the north aisle and I only took a couple of general photographs from a distance, but the parapet details and the windows look very similar, with some of the tracery in the chancel window having been restored. 

 

The east elevation of Halifax Minster