King's Stag Memorial Chapel is a

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain ...

chapel in King's Stag,

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset (unitary authority), Dors ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

History

The memorial chapel at King's Stag was built in 1914 at the expense of the Right Rev. Huyshe Yeatman-Biggs, the

Bishop of Worcester A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...

, in memory of his wife, Lady Barbara Yeatman-Biggs, who died in 1909. Prior to its construction, a small mission room had served the hamlet. At the time, the churchyards at both Stock Gaylard and Lydlinch were full, and the Bishop also believed a chapel would benefit parishioners when journeying to a parish church was difficult, such as in bad weather. The site of the chapel, approximately a quarter of an acre, was gifted by the Bishop's son, Mr. Lewis Yeatman. Its position spanned two ecclesiastical parishes, with the chapel and part of the burial ground belonging to that of Stock Gaylard, while the rest of the ground was based in

Lydlinch __NOTOC__ Lydlinch is a village and civil parish in the Blackmore Vale in north Dorset, England, about west of Sturminster Newton. The village is sited on Oxford clay close to the small River Lydden. The parish – which includes the village of ...

. The foundation stone was laid by Lady Octavia Legge, the sister of Lady Yeatman-Biggs, on 1 August 1914. The chapel was built by Mr. R. G. Spiller of

Sherborne Sherborne is a market town and civil parish in north west Dorset, in South West England. It is sited on the River Yeo, on the edge of the Blackmore Vale, east of Yeovil. The parish includes the hamlets of Nether Coombe and Lower Clatcombe. T ...

. The chapel's bell was gifted by Miss E. F. E. Yeatman.

Architecture

The chapel is approximately 40 feet in length and 18 feet wide. It is built of brick, with cement rendering and half-timbered framing using oak, and a tiled roof. The porch is built of

Bath stone Bath Stone is an oolitic limestone comprising granular fragments of calcium carbonate. Originally obtained from the Combe Down and Bathampton Down Mines under Combe Down, Somerset, England. Its honey colouring gives the World Heritage City of ...

. The west side of the chapel has a small

vestry A vestry was a committee for the local secular and ecclesiastical government for a parish in England, Wales and some English colonies which originally met in the vestry or sacristy of the parish church, and consequently became known colloquiall ...

and adjoining store room which was designed for the

bier A bier is a stand on which a corpse, coffin, or casket containing a corpse is placed to lie in state or to be carried to the grave.''The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language'' (American Heritage Publishing Co., Inc., New York, ...

, coal and other stores.

References

{{reflist Churches in Dorset Church of England church buildings in Dorset