Betjeman’s Best British Churches. Richard Surman
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TREBETHERICK † St Enedoc
By the mouth of the R. Camel, near Trebetherick, 6m/10km N.W. of Wadebridge
OS SW931772 GPS 50.5582N, 4.9216W
A small, crooked 13th-century spire peers myopically through the grassy hillocks on the golf course, and over Daymer Bay. St Enedoc is the place where John Betjeman himself is buried, his grave marked by a delightful slate headstone beside the gate. The church is 12th-century, but most is now from the 15th century. The restored interior, dark and ancient, was rescued from drifting sands in the 19th century.
TUCKINGMILL † All Saints
1m/2km N.E. of Camborne
OS SW657407 GPS 50.2201N, 5.2855W
A strong church suitable for this former tin-mining area, it was built for the Bassett family, in Romanesque style, by J. Hayward of Exeter, 1843–5. A whitewashed stone interior, with large granite chancel arch and arcade form a rather plain interior. The glass is by Robert Beer of Exeter.
APPLEBY-IN-WESTMORLAND: ST LAWRENCE – the light-hued sandstone and modest tower give a real charm to the church, which stands on the banks of the River Eden
The present county of Cumbria comprises the two traditional counties of Cumberland and Westmorland, as well as incorporating the Furness part of Lancashire, sometimes known as ‘Lancashire North of the Sands’, which has happily restored Cartmel Priory to its ex oficio position of being the ‘true’ cathedral of Cumbria. Not for nothing is the county’s motto Ad Montes Oculos Levavi – ‘I shall lift up mine eyes to the hills’.
A largely glacial landscape of mountains, valleys, lakes, tarns and fells, fringed in the west by a coastal plain, this part of England has been a source of awe for some. In the 18th century Daniel Defoe found the Westmorland landscape to be ‘the wildest, most barren and frightful of any that I have passed over in England’, bounded by unpassable mountains, with straggling paths on which the unwary traveller was likely to be waylaid.
By the mid-18th century the beauties of the area were being acknowledged by John Brown and Thomas Gray, although some, notably Thomas de Quincy, were still dismayed by the remoteness and savagery of the Lakeland landscapes. It was principally Wordsworth who gave romantic voice to the Lakeland landscape, and Turner and Constable who captured its mysterious beauty on canvas.
Slate sandstone and limestone are the rocks that define many of the area’s churches. The soft sandstone of the west doorway of St Bees Priory has weathered into its own abstract grotesques. In lonely Martindale, St Martin’s is rough-hewn slate, a tiny church that offers a peaceful pause to the fell walker. Sandstone features in the east of the county, notably in the beautifully situated church of St Lawrence in Appleby. In the north-east, hard by Hadrian’s Wall, is the glowing stone of Lanercost Priory, whilst at Cartmel the limestone tower of the Priory can be seen from Morecambe Bay, outlined against the distant hills.
North of St Bees, the Georgian town of Whitehaven testifies to Cumbria’s industrial past. Enriched by coal mining and ore extraction, the town was developed to a grid plan by Sir John Lowther in the 17th century. It was a successor’s principal colliery steward, Carlisle Spedding, who designed the fine Georgian church of St James – which Pevsner considers to be one of the finest Georgian interiors of the county.
But it is the little upland and valley churches of the Lakeland fells that draw many: the idyllic setting of St Michael at Isel and the quiet charm of St John’s at Ulpha, more or less as Wordsworth knew it. Old Westmorland’s open and remoter places contain churches of infinite charm too. St Ninian Ninekirks, redundant but still open, requires a good walk along an indistinct track to a meadow overlooking the River Eamont, about one and half miles round trip but hugely rewarding. For the less energetic, the ‘Cathedral of the Dales’ – Kirkby Stephen’s parish church of St Stephen, with its glorious Early English arcades – is easy to access.
BASSENTHWAITE: ST BEGA – an ancient church with pre-Conquest origins
APPLEBY-IN-WESTMORLAND
† St Lawrence
12m/19km S.E. of Penrith
OS NY683204 GPS 54.5782N, 2.4915W
This large Decorated and Perpendicular church is set in a beautiful and unspoiled town between the River Eden and the Norman castle on the bluff dominating the ford. The chancel and other works are by Lady Anne Clifford, 1654–5, who lies here with her mother Lady Margaret. There are 15th-century Parclose screens, 17th-century monuments and a celebrated 16th-century organ case, removed from Carlisle Cathedral.
ARMATHWAITE
† Chapel of Christ & St Mary
9m/15km S.E. of Carlisle
OS NY505462 GPS 54.8082N, 2.7701W
The chapel stands on a hillock in fine scenery by the River Eden. The original chapel fell into a ruinous state and was used as a cattleshed until rebuilt c. 1688 by Richard Skelton of nearby Armathwaite Castle. Today it is a plain stone building, consisting of undivided nave and chancel, and small W. turret containing one bell. There is still something about it of the manger and the cattle in the straw that makes one think of it as a true church of the Nativity. The glass in the E. window is by William Morris and Co, to designs by Dearle and Burne-Jones.
BAMPTON † St Patrick
7m/11km S. of Penrith
OS NY521180 GPS 54.5553N, 2.7412W
Built in 1726–8, with the church interior much altered in 1885. The W. tower has a doorway with an interrupted segmental pediment. Inside are elegant oak Georgian arcade columns and a cut-down Jacobean pulpit.
BASSENTHWAITE † St Bega
6m/10km N.W. of Keswick
OS NY226287 GPS 54.6479N, 3.2000W
A short walk down a sloping track leads to a church with one of the loveliest of Lakeland settings, beside a vigorous stream, visited by the Wordsworths and Tennyson. Pre-Conquest in origin, c. 950, it has a slight lopsided feel, with two S. arches opening into the mid-14th-century chantry chapel endowed by Sir Adam de Bastenthwayt. Squeezed into the S. aisle is a 14th-century monument to Sir Robert Highmore. A beautiful replica of the original 14th-century lead crucifix hangs over the octagonal pulpit on the N. side of the chancel arch. On the other side is an iron hourglass bracket: a charming simple church in an inspiring setting.
BECKERMET † St John the Baptist
3m/4km S. of Egremont
OS NY018067 GPS 54.4463N, 3.5145W
By J. Birtley, 1878–9, St John the Baptist occupies a striking situation high above the confluence of two becks. It is a most successful example of a small Victorian church, with a pleasing and well-designed interior. There is a collection of Anglo-Danish sculpture and later coffin lids. The nearby 13th-century St Bridget’s, now a mortuary chapel, has two shafts of Norman crosses in