St. James’ Church High Melton – Part 2

 

A gargoyle on the tower

Continuing my walk around the exterior of St. James’ church in High Melton, having taken note of the use of a mixture of limestone and reddened sandstone for the chancel and nave, I was very interested to see that the jambs of the Perpendicular Gothic style square headed window inserted into the nave incorporate stones with scalloped decoration

 

Reset capitals in the nave window

 

The Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture for Britain and Ireland (CRSBI) considers them to be “probably contemporary with the capitals of the south arcade because their scale seems consistent, although they do not show any later features such as nailhead cutting”. 

 

A view of the tower from the north-east 

Moving on to the tower, Historic England refer to this as Perpendicular and is presumably part of the C15 phase of building that is included in their description, which makes reference to Pevsner’s entry in the West Yorkshire volume of Buildings of England; however, the Parish History of High Melton leaflet refers to the lower part as C14, the upper part C15 and with it being further raised in the C18 and a clock installed in 1768. 

 

A view of the tower from the north-west

At the time of my visit, which was in quite overcast conditions, when walking around the tower I didn’t notice any obvious changes in the masonry of the tower, which is essentially built with very large squared and evenly coursed ashlar blocks – a pattern that I have learned to associate with the later Perpendicular Gothic style of the C15, rather than the C14, by visiting over 125 mediaeval churches in the region. 

 

A view of the tower from the west

 

The sharp contrast between the ashlar of the tower and fabric of the nave, chancel and south aisle, which is at best well squared and coursed rubble, to my eye suggests that the tower up to at least the base of the belfry stage dates to the C15. 

 

A view of the tower from the south-west

 

Furthermore, the dolomitic limestone from the Cadeby Formation has a marked yellow tinge that is very uniform in colour, which is shared in common with St. Wilfrid’s church in Hickleton and St. Peter’s church in Barnburgh and is a characteristic that sets them apart from most of the mediaeval churches that I have seen in Doncaster. 

 

A view of the tower from the south

 

This colour is due to the incorporation of loose sand from the Yellow Sands Formation that underlies it, which is a feature of the small exposure of the junction between these two formations that could still be seen in Melton Park when I last saw it back in 2007. 

 

The upper stages of the tower

Looking at my photos, I can see differences in the colours of the limestone used to build the belfry stage and those below, which are uniformly yellow, and the weathering appears to be less pronounced, but an investigation close up from a scaffold would be needed to confirm this. 

 

A sculptural detail on the north-west buttress

 

On the north-west corner of the tower is a very large diagonal buttress, which incorporates a spiral staircase and is decorated with what appears to be a two headed figure, but this is very weathered. At ground level, the limestone is also very weathered and has been inappropriately repaired with sand and cement. 

 

A replaced block in the north-west buttress

 

A single block has been replaced in recent times with a pale cream coloured dolomitic limestone, which is quite typical of the stone now available from the very limited number of quarries that are still extracting stone from the Cadeby Formation. This highlights the problems faced by a specialist building restoration contractor when trying to satisfy an architect's specification "to match the existing as closely as possible". 

 

An extensive repair with stone slips

The south-west buttress has had an extensive section of weathered stone repaired using stone slips, which is based on the principle of undertaking ‘honest repairs’ that was first advocated by SPAB (The Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings) using clay tiles. 

 

A detail of a repair with stone slips

 

Moving round to the north elevation, I was interested to see that the south aisle overlaps the tower. It is built with roughly squared and irregularly coursed rubble sandstone and limestone, which is very similar to that seen in the north elevation of the nave – considered to be of a pre-Conquest date by Peter Ryder in Saxon Churches in South Yorkshire. 

 

A view of the south aisle and porch

As with the masonry on the east side of the porch, it contains courses of very thin-bedded limestone at quite regular intervals, which sets it apart from the better squared and more regularly coursed masonry that I had seen in the chancel. 

 

A view of the south aisle and nave.

 

The Lady Chapel, which the CRSBI considers to have been built in the second half of the C14, is separated from the south aisle by a very large squat buttress, which doesn't appear to have any structural purpose and may hide the junction between these two elements of the church. 

 

A view of the south aisle and chancel

 

A clear view of the masonry to the Lady Chapel is obscured by a tree and I therefore couldn’t take a photo that would usually enable me to see differences in the pattern of masonry, which indicate separate phases of construction. 

 

Views of the south elevation

I then took a few general record photos of the south elevation, including the windows that have been inserted into the nave wall to form a clerestory. These have double ogee arches cut into a head that is made of a single piece of limestone and have very crude dressings to the jambs. 

 

A window in the north wall of the nave

Entering the porch, I was quite surprised to discover that the south door has an ogee arch with a large roll moulding, which is an architectural feature that I had not seen before and, together with north door in the nave, is dated by Pevsner to the C14. 

 

The south door

 

Set into the walls of the porch are several small fragments of masonry that are decorated with crosses and other geometrical designs that may possibly be fragments of grave slabs, which I have often seen before in the churches that I have visited, but there was no information to explain them and I proceeded to enter the church and have a quick look at its interior before I had to catch the hourly No. 219 bus back to Doncaster.

 

Reset fragments of sculpted masonry in the porch