St James' Church is in St James' Road, Church, Hyndburn, Lancashire, England. It was an active

Anglican Anglicanism is a Western Christian tradition that has developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the context of the Protestant Reformation in Europe. It is one of th ...

parish church in the deanery of Accrington, the archdeaconry of Blackburn, and the diocese of Blackburn until November 2015 when it was closed. The church is recorded in the National Heritage List for England as a designated Grade II* listed building.

History

A church has been on the site since 642 AD, and the site is historically associated with St Oswald who camped here on his route from Northumbria to Maserfield in Cheshire to fight the Mercian king Penda. The tower dates from the late medieval period, and the nave was built in 1804–05. The parapet was added to the tower in 1844. In 1895–96 the chancel was built, and tracery was installed in the nave windows. The stained glass in the south nave windows was replaced in 1918 following damage caused by an explosion in a nearby ammunition factory. The tower was damaged by fire in 1983.

Architecture

Exterior

The church is constructed in sandstone with

slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...

roofs. In the body of the church the stone is coursed, but in the tower it is uncoursed and roughly hewn. The plan consists of a five-

bay A bay is a recessed, coastal body of water that directly connects to a larger main body of water, such as an ocean, a lake, or another bay. A large bay is usually called a Gulf (geography), gulf, sea, sound (geography), sound, or bight (geogra ...

nave, a three-bay chancel, and a west tower. The tower is supported by buttresses, and has a low rectangular west door, above which is a three-light Perpendicular window. There are Perpendicular bell openings on three sides of the tower, and a clock on the fourth side. The parapet is

embattled A battlement in defensive architecture, such as that of city walls or castles, comprises a parapet (i.e., a defensive low wall between chest-height and head-height), in which gaps or indentations, which are often rectangular, occur at interva ...

. The nave is in two storeys, with two tiers of windows along the sides. These are round-arched, in

Georgian Georgian may refer to: Common meanings * Anything related to, or originating from Georgia (country) ** Georgians, an indigenous Caucasian ethnic group ** Georgian language, a Kartvelian language spoken by Georgians **Georgian scripts, three scrip ...

style, and contain tracery from the

Victorian period In the history of the United Kingdom and the British Empire, the Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria's reign, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. The era followed the Georgian period and preceded the Edwardian ...

. The chancel windows are arched with tracery.

Interior

Inside the church are galleries on three sides, carried on octagonal cast iron columns with fluting and roundels in the

capitals Capital may refer to: Common uses * Capital city, a municipality of primary status ** List of national capital cities * Capital letter, an upper-case letter Economics and social sciences * Capital (economics), the durable produced goods used f ...

. At the west end is a pair of staircases. The ceiling is flat. The

reredos A reredos ( , , ) is a large altarpiece, a screen, or decoration placed behind the altar in a church. It often includes religious images. The term ''reredos'' may also be used for similar structures, if elaborate, in secular architecture, for ex ...

was made by Powell's in 1909, and is made using the '' opus sectile'' technique. The

font In metal typesetting, a font is a particular size, weight and style of a typeface. Each font is a matched set of type, with a piece (a "sort") for each glyph. A typeface consists of a range of such fonts that shared an overall design. In mod ...

is Perpendicular in style. In the south wall of the nave are two sets of windows with stained glass depicting the Four Evangelists. These were remade by Morris & Co. in 1918 to the original designs of Edward Burne Jones after they were damaged in the 1917 explosion for the cost of £230. On the south side of the chancel are windows of 1927 by B. D. Walmsley. There is a

ring Ring may refer to: * Ring (jewellery), a round band, usually made of metal, worn as ornamental jewelry * To make a sound with a bell, and the sound made by a bell :(hence) to initiate a telephone connection Arts, entertainment and media Film and ...

of eight bells, all cast in 1865–67 by John Warner & Sons.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Church Kirk, St James' Church Church of England church buildings in Lancashire Diocese of Blackburn Grade II* listed churches in Lancashire English Gothic architecture in Lancashire Georgian architecture in England Gothic Revival church buildings in England Gothic Revival architecture in Lancashire Buildings and structures in Hyndburn

History

Architecture

Exterior

Interior

See also

References