Red Sandstone in St. Helen's Church I

 

Reddened sandstone in the west end of the tower

Walking around St. Helen's church in Burghwallis to take general record photographs of its fabric, before Colin the churchywarden finished his work in the churchyard and showed me its interior, I was struck by the amount of red sandstone that has been used in its fabric. 

 

Views of the church fabric where reddened sandstone has been used

 

As a geologist with a specialist interest in building stones acquired when establishing Triton Building Restoration Ltd. in London back in 1989, I have since surveyed hundreds of geological sites as part of the RIGS (Regionally Important Geological Sites) initiative, visited more than 125 mediaeval churches and have photographed more than 2500 stone built historic buildings, in South Yorkshire and the surrounding counties, and I was therefore intrigued to know where this red sandstone might have come from. 

 

The extent of day trips to photograph historic buildings

 

In Saxon Churches in South Yorkshire, Peter Ryder refers to the use of red sandstone , but Pevsner, the Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture in Britain and Ireland and Historic England (HE) make no mention of it. Furthermore, the Building Stones of England edition for West and South Yorkshire and the associated map explorer, based on the Strategic Stone Study co-produced by HE and the British Geological Survey (BGS), is far too generalised and full of errors and omissions – certainly for South Yorkshire – to be of any practical use. 

 

Building Stones of England West and South Yorkshire

When undertaking some online research, I came across an account of St. Helen's church by the local historian Margaret Burns, which states that "The larger blocks of red sandstone used in the plinth and in various areas of the walls would have come either from a deposit of glacial sand and gravel also only a few hundred yards away, or else from an outcrop of ‘Bunter’ sandstone at just under a mile distant". 

 

The geology around Burghwallis

 

When surveying the RIGS in Doncaster in 1997 and resurveying these and additional sites for the Doncaster Geodiversity Assessment with the BGS and subsequent work as an independent geologist for Doncaster MBC, I visited many Quaternary sand and gravel pits. Although the oldest parts of the mediaeval churches at Thorne, Hatfield, Fishlake and Kirk Sandal, have used cobbles from these unconsolidated glaciofluvial deposits for walling, they do not produce red sandstone.

 

The stone library at the Redmires Building at Sheffield Hallam University

Similarly, although Triassic red sandstone from the Sherwood Sandstone Group in Staffordshire, Shropshire and Cumbria produces very good quality building stone, which have been included in the Triton Stone Library that is now housed in the Redmires Building at Sheffield Hallam University, the equivalent sandstones to the east of the Pennines from Doncaster to Nottingham are very poorly cemented and not suitable for use as a building stone. 

 

Reddened sandstone at St. James' church in High Melton

 

Not long after I had visited St. Helen's church as part of Church Explorers Week, when I had also seen reddened and mottled red/yellow sandstone used in the nave and chancel of St. James' church in High Melton, I finally got to speak to Peter Robinson from Doncaster Museum about the C12 window head from St. Wilfrid's church in Hickleton, which is on permanent display. 

 

A column from the granary at Templeborough Roman fort

During our conversation on the stone used for various mediaeval churches in Doncaster he mentioned that Paul Buckland had suggested that the red sandstone at St. Helen’s church had been brought from the Roman fort at Templeborough in Rotherham, which was largely destroyed when a steelworks was built on it but parts of the granary were salvaged and are now displayed at the rear of Clifton Park Museum. 

 

Remains from the granary at Templeborough Roman fort in Clifton Park

 

I have never spent any time closely looking at these remains or seen a fresh surface to assess the colour of the sandstone, but I presume that the stone was obtained from a quarry on the escapment of Mexborough Rock that runs south from Rotherham to the east of Moorgate, which I know very well and from which I have obtained several specimens. 

 

The Mexborough Rock around Moorgate

 

The Rotherham Red variety of the Mexborough Rock is quite unusual for its colouration – an explanation of which has been suggested by John Hunter – and the outcrop from Harthill to Rotherham has a dull red/purplish colour when fresh, before oxidising to a brighter  red. 

 

The building sandstones of the British Isles

 

The very bright red colour, however, which is seen in many of the stones at St. Helen's church, is not a characteristic that I associate with Rotherham Red sandstone - which accords with the entry in the BRE publication: The building sandstones of the British Isles by Elaine Leary, where it is named Rotherham Red/Lilac Blue. 

 

Rotherham Red/Lilac Blue in the BRE publication

 

Although I have not seen this in any quarry, many buildings and boundary walls towards the southern end of the outcrop of Rotherham Red sandstone have red/yellow mottling. According to my well thumbed geological memoir (1947), similar colour variations were seen in exposures near Thrybergh that no longer exist and, between Hooton Roberts and Mexborough, it changes to the light brown that is typical of the Pennine Middle Coal Measures Formation.

 

A geological map of the area between Templeborough and Burghwallis

 

As a geologist, I rely on my observations of the colours, textures and other physical characteristics of stones in buildings, quarries and natural outcrops where possible, using the naked eye and a hand lens. I had hoped to arrange a meeting with both Peter Robinson and Paul Buckland to further discuss this, because I have assumed that they believe that the Anglo-Saxon builders may have made use of the network of Roman roads between Templeborough and Burghwallis

 

The network of Roman roads between Templeborough and Burghwallis

Ryder writes that the builders "happily utilised material from earlier buildings where this was available" and, in Chapter 1 of Stone Quarrying and Building in England AD 43-1525, David Parsons emphasises that the Anglo-Saxons depended heavily on the re-use of stone from demolished pre-existing structures, although being far from universal, but also goes on to say that quarrying had been quite well established by the time of the Norman Conquest.

 

Stone Quarrying and Building in England AD 43-1525

When attending a heritage fair in Rotherham Minster later in the year, a former archivist at Clifton Park Museum suggested that the red sandstone used at All Saints church at Laughton-en-le-Morthen also came from this fort.

 

Views of the north porticus and chancel of All Saints church

 

I first saw All Saints church many years ago and, except for the pilaster on the right hand side of the porticus, I immediately thought that the red/purplish sandstone used is Rotherham Red sandstone, which outcrops just over 3 km away near Todwick, although its vicar Revd. T. Rigby (1903) suggested that the sandstone came from Wickersley.

 

The geology around All Saints church