St Mark's Church, Connah's Quay is in the town of

Connah's Quay Connah's Quay (), known locally as "The Quay" and formerly known as Wepre, is a town and community in Flintshire, on the River Dee and next to the border with England. With a population of 16,771, it is the largest town in Flintshire. The ...

Flintshire Flintshire () is a county in the north-east of Wales. It borders the Irish Sea to the north, the Dee Estuary to the north-east, the English county of Cheshire to the east, Wrexham County Borough to the south, and Denbighshire to the west. ...

Wales Wales ( ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by the Irish Sea to the north and west, England to the England–Wales border, east, the Bristol Channel to the south, and the Celtic ...

. It is an active

Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...

church in the mission area of Borderlands, the archdeaconry of Wrexham and the

diocese of St Asaph The Diocese of Saint Asaph is a diocese of the Church in Wales in north-east Wales, named after Saint Asaph, its second bishop. Geography The Anglican Diocese of St Asaph in the north-east corner of Wales stretches from the borders of Cheste ...

. The church is the

parish church A parish church (or parochial church) in Christianity is the Church (building), church which acts as the religious centre of a parish. In many parts of the world, especially in rural areas, the parish church may play a significant role in com ...

for Connah's Quay and the mother church of St David's Church, Connah's Quay. It is designated as a Grade II

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

Cadw (, a Welsh verbal noun meaning "keeping/preserving") is the historic environment service of the Welsh Government and part of the Tourism and Culture group. works to protect the historic buildings and structures, the landscapes and heritage ...

. The new Vicar, Rev'd Alexier Mayes, was licensed in April 2018.

History

St Mark's was built in 1836–37 to a design by John Lloyd. The church then consisted of a nave with a small

apse In architecture, an apse (: apses; from Latin , 'arch, vault'; from Ancient Greek , , 'arch'; sometimes written apsis; : apsides) is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical Vault (architecture), vault or semi-dome, also known as an ' ...

and a tower at the west end. Between 1876 and 1878 the

Chester Chester is a cathedral city in Cheshire, England, on the River Dee, Wales, River Dee, close to the England–Wales border. With a built-up area population of 92,760 in 2021, it is the most populous settlement in the borough of Cheshire West an ...

architect John Douglas added the chancel and refitted the church. The choir vestry was built in 1933 with stone from the former Kelsterton Brewery. The

lych gate A lychgate (from Old English ''līc'', corpse) or resurrection gate is a covered gateway found at the entrance to a traditional English or English-style churchyard. Examples also exist outside the British Isles in places such as Newfoundland, the ...

s had been built in 1917 but in 1974–75 they were moved towards the church when a lay-by was constructed. At this time a memorial garden was laid out and gravestones were moved. It is believed that the clock by J. Benson of London was installed in 1837. This was repaired and refurbished in 1991 by

JB Joyce & Co J. B. Joyce & Co, clockmakers, were founded in Shropshire in England. The company claim to be the oldest clock manufacturer in the world, originally established in 1690, and have been part of the Smith of Derby Group since 1965. The claim is ch ...

of Whitchurch. The bells which had been donated in 1891 were removed in the 1990s because they had become unsafe.

Fittings and furniture

The

font In metal typesetting, a font is a particular size, weight and style of a ''typeface'', defined as the set of fonts that share an overall design. For instance, the typeface Bauer Bodoni (shown in the figure) includes fonts " Roman" (or "regul ...

at the front of the church dates from 1876. The

pulpit A pulpit is a raised stand for preachers in a Christian church. The origin of the word is the Latin ''pulpitum'' (platform or staging). The traditional pulpit is raised well above the surrounding floor for audibility and visibility, accesse ...

is made from carved

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 ...

and dates from the same period, as does the lectern. There is a portable Nave Altar used at most services, which is moved for weddings and funerals. The original reredos dating from 1878 was covered up - the current reredos was painted in 1924 and installed as a gift from the Choir in memory of the Fallen from Connah's Quay following the Great War. The organ was built by Whiteley Brothers of Chester in 1879. It was renovated in 1974 and restored in 2000. The Memorial Doors in the gallery were given in 2000 in memory of the deceased of the parish. In the church is a monument dated 1839 by William Spence.

External features

In 1917 a

was built in

Arts and Crafts The Arts and Crafts movement was an international trend in the Decorative arts, decorative and fine arts that developed earliest and most fully in the British Isles and subsequently spread across the British Empire and to the rest of Europe and ...

style in memory of a previous vicar of the church. It is in

sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...

with a timber superstructure. The lych gate is designated by Cadw as a Grade II listed building.

Services

The Parish Church holds an 8:00am Said Holy Eucharist, an 11:00am Parish Eucharist, at which the choir are present, and a 6:00pm service run by Golftyn Chapel. There is also a Holy Eucharist service every Thursday morning at 10:00am.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Connah's Quay, St Mark's Church Grade II listed churches in Flintshire 19th-century Church in Wales church buildings

Gothic Revival church buildings in Wales John Douglas buildings Churches completed in 1933

History

Fittings and furniture

External features

Services

See also

References