Church of the Holy Trinity

Church of the Holy Trinity, Church Street, Elsecar, Barnsley, S74 8HS

Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places

Explore this list entry

Overview

Heritage Category:
Listed Building
Grade:
II
List Entry Number:
1151087
Date first listed:
23-Apr-1974
List Entry Name:
Church of the Holy Trinity
Statutory Address:
Church of the Holy Trinity, Church Street, Elsecar, Barnsley, S74 8HS
User submitted image
Contributed by Historic England Archive This photo may not represent the current condition of the site. Over 400,000 images and stories have been added to the Missing Pieces Project so far. Share your story.
View all

Location

Location of this list entry and nearby places that are also listed. Use our map search to find more listed places. 

There is a problem

Use of this mapping is subject to terms and conditions .

This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale.

What is the National Heritage List for England?

The National Heritage List for England is a unique register of our country's most significant historic buildings and sites. The places on the list are protected by law and most are not open to the public.

The list includes:

Icon Buildings
Icon Scheduled monuments
Icon Parks and gardens
Icon Battlefields
Icon Shipwrecks

Find out more about listing

Images of England Project

To view this image please use Firefox, Chrome, Safari, or Edge.
Archive image, may not represent current condition of site.
Date:
2001-07-26
Reference:
IOE01/04204/02
Rights:
© Mr John Kril. Source: Historic England Archive

Local Heritage Hub

Unlock and explore hidden histories, aerial photography, and listed buildings and places for every county, district, city and major town across England.

Discover more

Official list entry

Heritage Category:
Listed Building
Grade:
II
List Entry Number:
1151087
Date first listed:
23-Apr-1974
Date of most recent amendment:
04-Dec-1986
List Entry Name:
Church of the Holy Trinity
Statutory Address 1:
Church of the Holy Trinity, Church Street, Elsecar, Barnsley, S74 8HS

The scope of legal protection for listed buildings

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

The scope of legal protection for listed buildings

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

Location

Statutory Address:
Church of the Holy Trinity, Church Street, Elsecar, Barnsley, S74 8HS

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

District:
Barnsley (Metropolitan Authority)
Parish:
Non Civil Parish
National Grid Reference:
SE 38682 00220

Details

This list entry was subject to a Minor Enhancement on 26/10/2020

SE30SE
2/3

HOYLAND NETHER
Elsecar
CHURCH STREET (north side)
Church of the Holy Trinity

(formerly listed as Holy Trinity Church and as on Wath Road)

23.4.74

II
Church. Built 1841-1843 with the patronage of the fifth Earl Fitzwilliam (1786-1857). Vestry and organ chamber added 1871. Early English Gothic Revival style.

MATERIALS: coursed, dressed and ashlar sandstone, Welsh slate roof.

PLAN: (the church is orientated north-south rather than east-west). The church has a nave with an apsidal chancel to the north and a tower to the south (the ritual west end). The main entrance is on the east side of the tower. The vestry and organ chamber lie to the west of the chancel.

EXTERIOR: Tower: this is of two stages topped with a spire. The tower has clasping buttresses that have corner shafts and gablets to the first stage, then rising as octagonal turrets topped by pinnacles. The entrance has a deeply-moulded arch supported on shafts, all set beneath a hoodmould. Above there is a lancet window with a hoodmould, this being below a clock set within a chamfered, square recess. The second stage, the belfry stage, has triple lancets with a continuous hoodmould, the central lancet being louvered, the flanking ones being blind. The spire is octagonal and recessed, featuring lucarnes and a weathervane.

Nave: the five-bay nave has a chamfered plinth and clasping corner buttresses with octagonal shafts topped by pinnacles. The bays are marked by offset, gabled buttresses. Between are lancet windows with hoodmoulds with head-carved stops. Above there is an oversailing course beneath a coped parapet. The gables are coped, the north gable (ritual east) having a quatrefoil-panelled plinth at its apex.

Chancel: this is lower than the nave and is a semi-octagonal apse. It is, set with smaller buttresses between bays detailed like the nave.

INTERIOR: this has a porch within the base of the tower containing a stone stair with an iron handrail up to the ringing chamber above. The porch also has two trefoil-headed doorways into the nave. At the ritual west end of the nave is a gallery with an ashlar parapet pierced by quatrefoils supported by an arcade of trefoil-headed ashlar arches set on cast-iron stanchions. The roof trusses are decorative, being divided into cusped panels, the tie beams being supported by arched braces set on carved-head corbels, the braces terminating with pendant bosses.

FITTINGS: octagonal Gothic Revival font, C20 chancel fittings.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT: from the late C18, Elsecar was the industrial village of the Earls Fitzwilliam, whose seat of Wentworth Woodhouse lies nearby. At Elsecar they invested in coal mining and iron working, erecting industrial buildings along with good quality workers’ housing and a range of other urban facilities including a church and school, all within what had been an agricultural landscape. The survival of many of these buildings makes Elsecar an important and significant place, telling the story of three centuries of coal mining, Christian paternalism, and industrial boom and decline. The church’s foundation stone was laid by the fifth Earl Fitzwilliam on Whit Monday in 1841. It opened on Whit Monday in 1843, costing £2,500 to build. The vestry and organ chamber were added in 1870-1871, along with gas lighting.

Listing NGR: SE3868200220

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:
333875
Legacy System:
LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Rimmer, J, Went, D, Jessop, L, The Village of Elsecar, South Yorkshire: Historic Area Assessment. Historic England Research Report 06-2019, (2019)

Legal

This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.

Ordnance survey map of Church of the Holy Trinity

Map

This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale. This copy shows the entry on 06-Jun-2026 at 18:06:21.

Download a full scale map (PDF)
© Crown copyright [and database rights] 2026. OS AC0000815036. Use of this mapping is subject to Terms and Conditions.

End of official list entry

All text content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0 , except where otherwise stated. Any supplied maps are © Crown Copyright [and database rights] 2026 OS AC0000815036 and may not be reproduced without permission.

Previous Overview
Next Comments and Photos