A Walk From Wheatley to Doncaster

 

A detail of the Corn Exchange in Doncaster

My day out on the buses and trains from Treeton to Doncaster, with the principal objective to visit the Church of St. Leonard and St. Mary in Armthorpe and its churchyard, turned out to be very informative to me as a geologist with specialist interests in building stone - with St. Mary’s church in Wheatley adding further to this. 

 

A view of the mural on No. 29 Baxter Avenue

When taking a photo of the west end of St. Mary’s church, the bright colours of the mural on the south wall of No. 29 Baxter Avenue first caught my eye and, getting nearer to it in St. Mary's Crescent play area, I was interested to see that the brick boundary wall immediately to the south of it is built on what looks like a much older wall. 

The western section of the old wall

 

Taking a closer look at this wall, which is approximately 20 m long, it is made of an unsorted mixture of dolomitic limestone fragments and glaciofluvial pebbles of pre-Ipswichian age, as seen in Armthorpe, set in lime mortar, which suggested to me that it was a form of very crude concrete. 

 

Layering consistent with formwork construction

 

Having worked as a semi-skilled building labourer, before and after studying geology at Nottingham University, I know that shuttering or formwork is a way of constructing a concrete wall and this wall shows layers that are consistent with this. 

 

A detail of the wall

I had never seen any wall like this before and I contacted the archaeologist Peter Robinson at Doncaster Museum to ask if he knew what this was, but he was unable to help me; however, looking at the 1854 Ordnance Survey (OS) map, it appears as a wall that isn't very obviously connected to any building or estate. 

 

Wheatley on the 1854 OS map

A Google search for “Is shuttering used for lime based rubble walling” came back with an AI generated response as bungaroosh, which I had never heard of before, and is described as a composite building material made from lime, gravel, coarse sand, flints and sometimes brick fragments or other brick rubble. Although the Romans used this method of construction, it is almost exclusively found in the English seaside towns of Brighton and Hove, where it was a popular product during the 18th and 19th centuries. 

Bungaroosh at Prince's Crescent in Brighton

I don’t suppose that I will ever know the origin or purpose of this wall and I set off down Queen's Road on the short walk to Doncaster Market, passing the brick built former Nether Hall Road Methodist Church, which is not a listed building. 

 

The tower of the former Nether Hall Methodist Church

Another Google Search, with AI generated results, indicates that it was designed by the London based architects Gordon and Gunton and completed in 1902, with Accrington brick and Ancaster limestone used in its construction, but I did not get close enough to confirm this. Much of the church was demolished in the 1980’s, leaving only the tower and the Nether Hall Road façade, with the demolished sections being replaced with apartments. 

 

The tower and the adjoining façade of the former Methodist church

Arriving at Market Pace, I took a few photos of the Corn Exchange (1870-1873) by William Watkins of Lincoln, which was inserted into the U-shaped original market building (1849) by J. Butterfield, who was the architect of Doncaster Corporation. 

 

The north elevation of the Corn Exchange

 

I have never examined the stonework of these buildings but, from my photographs, the sandstone used for the band course between the ground and first floors, the associated balustrades and the entablatures to the projecting bays appears yellowish in colour, compared to the massive sandstone used for the ashlar and other dressings. 

 

Various sandstones used at the Corn exchange

A dull red sandstone has been used for the large engaged columns, which is very probably Red Mansfield stone – a sandy variety of the Upper Permian Cadeby Formation that was used extensively throughout Britain in later Victorian buildings. 

 

The foundation stone

 

On the north-west corner, a very large foundation stone made with a reddish coloured sandstone, is set into the rusticated plinth and the worn inscriptions record Arthur Smith and William Cotterill Clark, who were mayors of Doncaster in 1870 and 1873 respectively. 

 

A detail of the foundation stone named William Cotterill Clark

 

Moving round to the right return of the Corn Exchange, I noted that the fine/medium grained sandstone ashlar above the plinth has disintegrated quite badly and that sections of this have been previously repaired with sand and cement. 

 

Decayed sections of ashlar restored with sand and cement

 

The colour and texture suggest that this is a Coal Measures sandstone, which is likely to be from West Yorkshire. Looking at the Building Stones Database for England (BSDE) map explorer, only 30 of Doncaster’s 807 listed buildings (which includes 32 mediaeval churches) are marked on this.

 

Listed buildings in Doncaster on the BSDE map explorer

When I first saw the map explorer, I was really quite shocked by the fact that so few buildings are shown in South Yorkshire and that the Strategic Stone Study and the updated publication for West and South Yorkshire, on which it is based, contain basic errors that anyone with a knowledge of the local geology and geography would not have made. 

 

Publications resulting from the Strategic Stone Study

 

The Historic England officer responsible explained that this was a desk top study undertaken by consultants in south-west England, which is quite galling for a local building stone specialist – especially when the map explorer entry for the Market Building/Corn Exchange describes it as being built with Portland stone.

 

The BSDE map explorer entry for the Corn Exchange