St. Bartholomew's Church - The Exterior

 

A general view from the south-east

When preparing my day out to Old Whittington, I was interested to discover that the Grade II listed St. Bartholomew’s church was opened for the general public and that a local historian would be in attendance, with access to various books and other information about its history. 

 

A view of the tower

 

Pevsner describes it as “1896 by E.R. Rollinson. Stone with a spire”, with Historic England stating the materials used as “Coursed rock-faced gritstone with freestone dressings, slate roof”, with it being in the Decorated style and that it was built on the site of an earlier church. The rest of its description is in the usual very dry style, with a lack of paragraphs, which is not very easy for a layman to understand. 

 

A drawing of the church in 1785 by Samuel Hieronymus Grimm

 

The church website, however, is very comprehensive and from this I learned that the tower dates to 1863 and it was all that remained after a fire had burned the church down in 1895. The earlier church had itself replaced the Norman church (c.1140), which was sited several metres to the south of the current building and its position is marked by two yew trees. 

 

Quarries at Wingerworth

Also, the 1863 church is described as being built with stone from Wingerworth, where the Building Stones Database for England map explorer shows Birdholme Quarry and Sutcliffe Quarry on the Deep Hard Rock and the Bolehill Quarry on the Wingfield Flags. 

 

Wingfield Flags used for walling in the tower

The sandstone used for most of the listed buildings and other historic architecture in Old Whittington is a massive medium grained sandstone, which is generally cross-bedded and has a very high iron content, which produces Liesegang rings and strong orange colouration. Although I did not see any exposures, the quarries in the area worked the Deep Hard Rock and I have assumed that this stone was used in the village. 

 

The upper part of the tower

I didn’t examine the stone closely, but I could immediately see that the walling stone of the tower has a very different character to the presumed Deep Hard Rock. It is plane bedded and is laid in thin courses and, to my eye, has a greenish colour, which I have seen in the Greenmoor Rock in Sheffield  and at the type locality of Green Moor. 

 

Rock-faced Wingfield Flags sandstone used for the walling

In The Building sandstones of the British Isles, published by the Building Research Establishment, the Delph sandstone from the now disused Bolehill Quarry is described as dark buff or dark green/grey in colour. Petrographic analyses of this stone, as published in the geological memoir, refer to a matrix that largely consists of chlorite and this also appears in the Greenmoor Rock which, together with the Grenoside Sandstone, are the northern equivalent of the Wingfield Flags. 

 

Pink sandstone used for the window dressings

I walked anticlockwise around the exterior and noted that the windows have dressings made of a pink medium grained sandstone, which was probably quarried from the Corbar Grit (Ashover Grit) alongside the Derwent Valley in Derbyshire. Where used in the Sheffield Board Schools at Ranmoor, Western Road and Pomona Street by the architects Holmes and Watson, this pink gritstone is described as Matlock stone.

 

Plane bedded Wingfield Flags used for walling

 

The rock-faced thinly coursed walling stone used for the rebuilt church is fine grained and has the same plane bedding and greenish colour, which suggests that this has again been obtained from the same quarry at Wingerworth. 

 

Massive sandstone used in the east elevation of the chancel

 

Moving around to the east end of the chancel, I was therefore very surprised to see that the lower courses are much larger and very irregular in size and shape and the sandstone used is medium/coarse grained, cross-bedded and rich in iron. 

 

A detail of the sandstone used for the lower courses of the chancel

 

I was more interested in the stone used for the very weathered head-stops and the hood mouldings, which I first thought was dolomitic limestone from the Cadeby Formation, as Old Whittington is less than 10 km away from the Magnesian Limestone escarpment. 

 

Head-stops on the north elevation

 

Using my hand lens and applying a drop of hydrochoric acid to the head-stops that I could reach on the west end, I realised that it is a Jurassic oolitic limestone and, when enlarging photographs of a couple of these, I could see that the limestone is predominantly composed of ooliths. 

 

A head-stop with the enlargement showing ooliths

 

I have seen many of these limestones over the years, including Bath stone, Portland stone, Ancaster stone and Clipsham stone and all of these contain fragments of fossil shells to a varying extent and the only limestone that is essentially composed of ooliths is Ketton stone from Rutland. 

 

A head-stop carved from predominantly oolitic limestone

Although I included this limestone in the Triton Stone Library, which is now housed in the Redmires Building at Sheffield Hallam University I have only seen it used in a building at St. Anne’s Roman Catholic Cathedral in Leeds and for the dressings at the Ketton Cement Store of Thos. W. Ward on Attercliffe Road in Sheffield. 

 

A winged lion

I only spent 20 minutes taking general record photographs of the exterior and I will take another look at the various stones used in its construction, and I finished my quick look at the exterior by taking a few photos of the stone carvings on the tower, which include a winged lion and an angel.

 

An angel

A Day Out to Old Whittington - Part 3

  

An old well on the green at Church Street North

Continuing my day out to Old Whittington, I made my further along Church Street North past Mary Swanwick Primary School, which dates back to 1848 with further additions as the numbers of pupils increased, but it still retains much of its Victorian School character.

 

Mary Swanwick Primary School

 

Just beyond the school, Nos. 48-50 comprise a pair of semi-detached houses that date to the C18 and are built with sandstone ashlar, with a Welsh slate roof. I just took a couple of general record photographs of these and carried on along to the next building on my British Listed Buildings Photo Challenge. 

 

Nos. 48-50 Church Street North

 

Holly House is a large C19 house built with coursed sandstone with a hipped Welsh slate roof, which is now used as the Holly Hill Special School. I just took a single photo from the roadside of the rear elevation before retracing my steps along Church Street North. 

 

Holly House

 

Next on my listed was the raised pavement, described by Historic England (HE) as either C18 or C19, which is an interesting feature that adds great character to the Conservation Area. It is set next to small green at the centre of a triangular junction with Church Lane North, where there is one of several old wells in the village - as seen on the 1:25,000 scale Ordnance Survey map. 

 

Views of the raised pavement

 

The next building on my Photo Challenge was Nos. 54-56 Church Street North, a pair of C18 cottages that are built with an iron rich Pennine Lower Coal Measures Formation sandstone, possibly the Deep Hard Rock, with a stone slate roof. 

 

Nos. 54-56 Church Street North

 

From here, the road changes to Church Lane North and my next stop, a high boundary wall, is described by HE as “Boundary wall extending along eastern boundary of footpath between No. 65 and the churchyard of St Bartholomew’s Church”, but no information is provided about its date or the reason why it is Grade II listed. 

 

The Grade II listed boundary wall

Returning to Church Lane North, I could only get a glimpse of The Close, a house which the HE description dates as “C16/C17 origin with C18 and later additions and alterations”. It is another example of the use of PLCMF sandstone and, when enlarging my photo, the slates used for the roof look both grey/purple and green in colour. 

 

The Close

 

I then had a good look at St. Bartholomew’s church and the Commonwealth War Graves Commission headstones, which I will describe in future posts, before following a public footpath to High Street through woodland, where I picked some wild garlic that was growing near the stream.

 

steps on the path to High Street from St. Bartholomew's church

Shortly before arriving on High Street, I stopped to take a photograph of the west elevation of the entrance lodge to Whittington Grange, described by HE as “C18/early C19 facade. Stone rubble. Slate roof with large off centre chimney. 2 storeys. Modern leaded casements. Stone porch”. 

 

The west elevation of the lodge to Whittington Grange

 

When passing the entrance to the lodge on High Street, I noted that building work was being undertaken and, although trying to be discreet when taking a photograph from the public highway – which in law I am perfectly entitled to do – one of the workmen had seen me doing this and came to challenge me. 

 

A general view of the lodge to Whittington Grange

Having explained that I was just participating in a British Listed Buildings Photo Challenge, we got talking about the damp proofing work that they were undertaking and my specialist interest in building stones, before I continued to Elmwood. 

 

A view of Elmwood from the entrance

The HE description of this Grade II listed house is again extremely sparse - “Early C19. Coursed stone. Modern hipped tiled roof. 2 storeys. 3 windows cambered headed sashes to upper floor, square headed casements to ground floor, all with Gothick glazing bars. Later solid porch”, but I had to be content with taking a few record photos that just get a glimpse of it. 

 

A partial view of Elmwood

Further along High Street, the lodge to Whittington Hall Hospital is also partially obscured by a tall hedge and the HE description for this property, which is only listed for group value, is also minimal so I just took a couple of general photos before continuing up Woodmere Drive. 

 

The lodge to Whittington Hall Hospital

The last building on my Photo Challenge was the former Whittington Hall Hospital, which incorporates Whittington Hall (c.1829). It was built by Henry Dixon, who inherited the estate of John Dixon – an industrialist who was the last member of the family who had originally founded a glassworks back in 1710. 

 

Views of the former Whittington hall Hospital

 

Yet again the HE description doesn’t provide very much information, especially relating to the buildings that were added to the original house in the later C19 and I just took a few photos of the south-west and south-east elevations before returning to High Street – passing a modern sculpture with crucibles that is dedicated to the metallurgist Harry Brearley, who lived in Old Whittington for a few years.

 

The modern sculpture with crucibles on Woodmere Drive

A Day Out to Old Whittington - Part 2

 

The Revolution House

Entering the Conservation Area, having walked up from the bus stop on Sheffield Road, I continued my day out to Old Whittington by finding the first building on my British Listed Buildings Photo Challenge – the late C18/early C19 red brick built No. 87 High Street. 

 

No. 87 High Street

 

Next to No. 87 is a high garden wall built with sandstone that is both plane and cross-bedded, with a colour varying from grey/light brown with Liesegang rings to orange, which reflects a very high iron content that is a characteristic of the unnamed sandstones of the Pennine Lower Coal Measures Formation (PLCMF). 

 

A garden wall on High Street

These occur to the north of Old Whittington, but the only quarries marked on the old Ordnance Survey maps appear on the Deep Hard Rock, which outcrops to the west and south-west of the village. Boundary walls are typically built with the nearest available stone and small quarries are very often not marked, but the provenance of such sandstones are not easily determined without documentary evidence. 

 

A closer look at the garden wall on High Street

The lower few course of the boundary wall are built with blocks that are larger than those seen in the courses above and are in much better condition, with the thinner blocks often being scoured and deeply weathered, which suggests a higher content of silt. 

 

Long Cottage

A little further along High Street is Long Cottage, which Historic England (HE) describe as C18 or earlier, where the well squared and broached walling stone is very similar to the stone used in the lower courses of the boundary wall. 

 

Old Whittington war memorial

Old Whittington war memorial (1921), by the local sculptor Joseph Syddall, was the next ‘listed building’ on my Photo Challenge, which is described by HE as “Post 1918. Memorial to the dead of both World Wars. Square stone shaft with wreath rises from vermiculated plinth on stepped base. Surmounted by cap and finial with plain stone cross on each face”.

 

A detail of the gritstone used for Old Whittington war memorial

 

I didn’t examine the stone with my hand lens but my photos of the stone, with my thumbnail used as a scale, enable me to make a comparison with my Wentworth Scale, which shows that it is medium to coarse grained. As with the Whittington Moor war memorial, it is very probable that Stancliffe Darley Dale stone from the Corbar Grit (Ashover Grit) is used. 

 

My Wentworth Scale

The next building on my list was the Grade II* listed Revolution House, which HE date as probably C17, with Pevsner stating that it is “allegedly C16 but much restored”. It is built with locally quarried iron stained sandstone, with a thatched roof – a very unusual roofing material in Derbyshire, with the only other example that I recall being in Baslow.

 

The Revolution House

Formerly the Cock and Pynot inn, which was originally a much larger building, it is the place were the plot was hatched in 1688 to depose James II, with William of Orange and his wife Mary being invited to take the English throne - known as the Glorious Revolution. 

 

A plaque on the Revolution House

 

It was opened as a museum in 1938, but it has been closed since 1st April due to budget cuts by Chesterfield Borough Council, who have stated that they have been seeking a suitable community partner to keep it open. According to a local resident that I spoke to, there has been no shortage of volunteers who have come forward and local residents are exasperated by the attitude of the council in respect of this important asset.

 

Various buildings on Church Street North

 

On Church Street North, which was part of the mediaeval route through the village, several stone buildings which were built before the 1883 Ordnance Survey map was published, are not listed but contribute significantly to the character of the Conservation Area. These include Nos. 1-7, the Cock and Magpie Inn (1790) and Clematis Cottage. 

 

Views of the Old Mansion House

 

The Old Mansion House is dated to the C17 or earlier by HE, with C18 and C19 additions, but the garden wall and large shrubs and a tree obscure the view from the road and I could only get partial views of the C19 east elevation from different angles. 

 

Crozzle on the garden wall of No. 6 Church Street North

 

The south section of the garden wall of No. 6 Church Street North is topped with crozzle, a type of slag, which is a familiar sight in Sheffield and other steel producing areas, where steel was once produced by the carburisation of wrought iron using the cementation process. 

 

The Sheepbridge Iron and Coal Works

The nearby Sheepbridge Coal and Iron Works, as shown on the C19 Ordnance Survey maps, may have been the source of the crozzle, but this is just speculation and I moved on to an L-shaped terrace of houses that comprises Nos. 8-14 and 16-18 Church Street North.

 

Nos. 8-14 Church Street North

 

These are described in the Old Whittington Conservation Area Appraisal as "Although much altered, this terrace is of significant importance, being an example of an extended terrace of the 19th century workers cottage". The boundary wall and vegetation obscures the view of these and I just took a few general record photos, noteding the further use of locally quarried iron stained PLCMF sandstone and stone slate for the roof.

 

Nos. 16-18 Church Street North

On the opposite side of the road is the imposing Seventh Day Adventist Church (1894), which is not a listed building. Built in the Gothic style, it replaced an earlier Wesleyan Methodist Chapel on High Street (1828), which has been converted into Chapel Cottage.

 

The Seventh Day Adventist Church