Summary
A late C19 churchyard wall and a lychgate of 1949 incorporating a war memorial.
Reasons for Designation
The churchyard wall and lychgate of St Mary’s Church is designated at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* Historic interest: as a war memorial, the structure of the lychgate provides a poignant reminder of the losses suffered by the local community in the course of two World Wars. Furthermore, the lychgate contains within its fabric materials collected from various important buildings that were damaged by bombing in the Second World War, and timbers from decommissioned battleships that had taken part in actions in the war, giving it an unusual and symbolic manifestation of the cost to the nation;
* Group Value: the churchyard wall and lychgate have group value with the Grade I listed Church of St Mary, and the wall defines the limits of and approaches to the churchyard.
History
The wall around the north and east sides of the Church of St Mary dates to the later half of the C19, before which the shape of the churchyard was different.
A fund to erect a lychgate was begun in 1946 with a donation from a parishioner to the Church of St Mary. The Reverend W J Crick thought that the money should be used towards the construction of a lychgate, and a parishioner, John T L Coope, drew the designs. The lychgate was intended to be a memorial to those who had lost their lives in both World Wars, and the design incorporated materials from damaged buildings, decommissioned battleships and metal from armament manufacture, with a roof of Canadian red cedar shingles. Winston Churchill gave permission to use materials from the bomb-damaged Houses of Parliament, the Admiralty gave authority to collect various items from various ships, and stones from St. Paul’s Cathedral, Coventry Cathedral, St Martin-le-Grand Church in York, Leeds Town Hall and Leeds Museum were used in the construction. The bulk of the masonry came from the walls of Gotts Park in Leeds. The builder was Edgar Taffinder, Joiners Charters made the timberwork and students from Leeds College of Art completed the woodcarving.
The lychgate was officially opened on 26th June 1949, as a memorial to the dead of the two World Wars. After damage to two memorial plaques, they were replaced and wrought iron gates added as a security measure.
The lychgate was listed at Grade II in 1976.
An offer from the local British Legion in 1994 led to the renovation of the war memorial within the lychgate, and some repairs and refurbishment were carried out in 1995. Grants from the War Memorials Trust and a local charity have enabled a further refurbishment, completed in 2012.
Details
Churchyard wall, late C19, and lychgate, 1949, designed by John T L Coope.
MATERIALS: the churchyard wall is in buff sandstone and the Lychgate has buff sandstone from Gott Park, red sandstone from Coventry Cathedral, Jurassic limestone from St Martin-le-Grand Church, York, buff sandstone from Leeds Museum, Portland stone from St. Paul’s Cathedral, Millstone Grit from Leeds Town Hall and Magnesian Limestone from the Houses of Parliament, together with a teak frame and a slate roof.
PLAN: the churchyard wall runs around the northern and eastern sides of the churchyard. The lychgate, at the western end of the wall, is composed of two parallel walls linked by a pitched roof, closed at either end by gates.
EXTERIOR: the churchyard wall is a low wall in coursed sandstone with rounded coping, stepped on the northern side. There is a pair of gate piers with gabled heads to the east of the church, and another similar pair at the southern extent of the wall. The lychgate has a low sandstone wall to either side with rounded coping stones. Above and framing the central opening is timber framing in teak wood, rising to a gable over the opening. There are wrought iron panels between the timber framing and a carved wooden cross is incorporated into the open framing above the entrance. The steeply pitched roof is slated. There are wrought iron gates at each end, and an inscription in the timber beam over the outer gates reads ‘their name liveth for evermore’, with the dates 1914-1918 and 1939-1945 below. On each side above the stone wall is a panel containing individual stones from the various bomb-damaged buildings.
INTERIOR: the interior of the lychgate wall is painted white, and above on each side is a perspex-covered framed metal plaque bearing the names of the fallen from the First World War (81 names) and the Second World War (47 names).
This List entry has been amended to add sources for War Memorials Online and the War Memorials Register. These sources were not used in the compilation of this List entry but are added here as a guide for further reading, 1 February 2017.
