Christ Church was a

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...

church in

Crewkerne Crewkerne ( ) is a town and electoral ward in south Somerset, England, southwest of Yeovil and east of Chard. The civil parish of West Crewkerne includes the hamlets of Coombe, Woolminstone and Henley, and borders the county of Dorset to the s ...

Somerset Somerset ( , ), Archaism, archaically Somersetshire ( , , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel, Gloucestershire, and Bristol to the north, Wiltshire to the east ...

, England. It was constructed in 1852–1854 to the designs of

James Mountford Allen James Mountford Allen (14 August 1809, Crewkerne, Somerset – 1883, St Pancras, London) was an English architect. Allen was the son of Rev. John Allen, vicar of Bleddington, Gloucestershire, and formerly the master of Crewkerne Grammar Schoo ...

. Christ Church was demolished in 1975 and the site is now occupied by a residential development, Christchurch Court.

History

Christ Church was built as a

chapel of ease A chapel of ease (or chapel-of-ease) is a church architecture, church building other than the parish church, built within the bounds of a parish for the attendance of those who cannot reach the parish church conveniently, generally due to trav ...

to the parish church of

St Bartholomew Bartholomew was one of the twelve apostles of Jesus according to the New Testament. Most scholars today identify Bartholomew as Nathanael, who appears in the Gospel of John (1:45–51; cf. 21:2). New Testament references The name ''Bartholomew ...

. Owing to Crewkerne's increasing population at the time, the existing accommodation provided by the parish church had become insufficient. By 1842, the town had a population of over 4,000, with the parish church containing 800 sittings, of which only 108 were available to the poor. A new district church was proposed in 1842, but the scheme failed to come to fruition. A vestry meeting held in 1846 resolved to erect galleries in the parish church, but the proposal was abandoned in favour of the construction of a chapel of ease. Some of the town's residents objected to the installation of galleries in the parish church on the grounds that they would "interfere with hebeauty" of the interior. A vestry meeting of 1851 saw the formation of a building committee for the chapel of ease scheme. By this time, a site at South Street had been acquired and a substantial donation of £1,000 received from Mr. William Hoskins of North Perrott. Mr. Hoskins expressed his desire to provide the poor of the parish with much-needed church accommodation and requested that two-thirds of the new church's seating be free and unappropriated. He was also against the proposal to erect galleries in the parish church in the fear it would "destroy tsarchitectural beauty". The remaining sum required for the new church was raised by public subscription. The plans for the new church were drawn up by the Crewkerne architect

and Messrs John Chick of Beaminster hired as the builders. The foundation stone of the church was laid by Mr. Thomas Hoskins of Haselbury Plucknett on 31 August 1852, and the church was consecrated by the

Bishop of Bath and Wells The Bishop of Bath and Wells heads the Church of England Diocese of Bath and Wells in the Province of Canterbury in England. The present diocese covers the overwhelmingly greater part of the (ceremonial) county of Somerset and a small area of D ...

, the Right Rev. Robert Eden, on 20 September 1854. The total cost of the church, including endowments, amounted to £3,932. The church underwent restoration and improvement work in 1878 and reopened in November that year. The vestry was enlarged in 1900 to the designs of Howard Gaye of

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

. A new organ, built by James Ivimey of

Southampton Southampton is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and unitary authority in Hampshire, England. It is located approximately southwest of London, west of Portsmouth, and southeast of Salisbury. Southampton had a population of 253, ...

, was dedicated at the church on 13 July 1910 by the Rural Dean, Rev. W. Farrer. By the 1960s, Christ Church was facing dwindling congregation numbers as many parishioners favoured worshipping in St Bartholomew, except namely the elderly parishioners who had used Christ Church for years. In 1965, plans were revealed for the potential selling or leasing of the church to the

Roman Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

. At the time, the Catholic parish covering Chard, Crewkerne and Illminster faced a shortage of accommodation in Crewkerne as their small wooden chapel, also on South Street, was too small to serve its congregation, particularly after recent expansion of the town. The plans did not come to fruition. Christ Church was declared redundant by the Church of England on 7 August 1969. Although it was a listed building, the

Church Commissioners The Church Commissioners is a body which administers the property assets of the Church of England. It was established in 1948 and combined the assets of Queen Anne's Bounty, a fund dating from 1704 for the relief of poor clergy, and of the Eccle ...

sought the demolition of the church to make way for housing. In January 1975, Yeovil District Council approved the Church Commissioners' plans for its demolition and replacement with four houses. Demolition was carried out in 1975 and ultimately it was replaced with Christchurch Court, a residential development of eight flats and garages. The Bishop of Bath and Wells, the Right Rev. John Bickersteth, authorised the breaking up of the churchyard's remaining tombstones, approximately 14 of them and many illegible, for reuse as building foundation material, unless any relatives wished to remove them themselves. A request was also made to the Home Office for an order to abolish the requirement of moving human remains from the site, where they would be left undisturbed. A

Blue plaque A blue plaque is a permanent sign installed in a public place in the United Kingdom, and certain other countries and territories, to commemorate a link between that location and a famous person, event, or former building on the site, serving a ...

is now fixed on the front boundary wall to commemorate the former church.

Architecture

Christ Church was built of local stone quarried on the site, with dressings of

Hamstone Hamstone is a honey-coloured building stone from Ham Hill, Somerset, England. It is a well-cemented medium to coarse grained limestone characterised by marked bedding planes of clay inclusions and less well-cemented material which weather dif ...

. It was made up of a four-

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'', ''sea'', ''sound'', or ''bight''. A ''cove'' is a small, ci ...

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

with

clerestory A clerestory ( ; , also clearstory, clearstorey, or overstorey; from Old French ''cler estor'') is a high section of wall that contains windows above eye-level. Its purpose is to admit light, fresh air, or both. Historically, a ''clerestory' ...

, north aisle,

chancel In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the Choir (architecture), choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may termi ...

, with a

vestry A vestry was a committee for the local secular and ecclesiastical government of a parish in England, Wales and some English colony, English colonies. At their height, the vestries were the only form of local government in many places and spen ...

on the north side and an organ chapel on the south side, and north porch. A

bellcote A bellcote, bell-cote or bell-cot is a small framework and shelter for one or more bells. Bellcotes are most common in church architecture but are also seen on institutions such as schools. The bellcote may be carried on brackets projecting from ...

was located at the west end of the roof. The arches, windows and other dressings were worked by Charles Trask of Norton-sub-Hamdon. The church's font of

Caen stone Caen stone () is a light creamy-yellow Jurassic limestone quarried in north-western France near the city of Caen. The limestone is a fine grained oolitic limestone formed in shallow water lagoons in the Bathonian Age about 167 million years ...

also featured carved work by Mr. Trask. The church was designed with 410 sittings, 321 of which were free.

References

External links

Exterior and interior photographs of Christ Church from 1967 in Historic England's England's Places Collection
{{DEFAULTSORT:Crewkerne, Christ Church Crewkerne Church of England church buildings in South Somerset Former churches in Somerset Demolished churches in England Churches completed in 1854 Buildings and structures demolished in 1975 1854 establishments in England