Church of St Mary

Summary

Mission church. Constructed in 1898, windows replaced in C20, roof-covering altered in C21.

Reasons for Designation

The Church of St Mary, Cadgwith, Cornwall, constructed as a mission church and chapel of ease in 1898, is listed for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* as a good example of a ‘tin tabernacle’, an increasingly uncommon building type not intended for longevity;
* although typically modest, the church survives largely complete, with a good-quality timber interior and retaining its historic layout;
* it is particularly unusual to find a building of this type surviving in its original location.

Historic interest:

* as a reflection of the historic religious needs of this remote coastal area;
* for the connection, through its first rector Reverend Vyvyan, with the largest-ever rescue mission by the RNLI in 1907;
* as one of the few ‘tin tabernacles’ in England which remain in use.

Group value:

* with several nearby Grade II-listed cottages which have historic links to Cadgwith’s fishing industry.

History

Pre-fabricated churches, often called 'tin tabernacles' or ‘iron chapels’ were developed in the mid-C19 as a relatively low cost means to serve fast growing urban and rural areas, particularly in response to the upsurge in Non-Conformism, as well as for use in the overseas colonies. Quickly assembled places of worship, these structures were often designed to serve a temporary purpose before more permanent stone or brick structures could be built, and a limited number survive in England.

Corrugated iron was invented and patented in Britain in 1829 and was the first mass-produced cladding material of the modern building industry. It was a technological breakthrough, the corrugations giving strength and considerable structural advantages over flat sheeting. A further significant development came in 1837 when the process of galvanizing the iron with zinc to prevent rusting was patented. Manufacturers quickly recognised its potential for use in prefabricated structures, in iron or other materials, and several firms such as William Cooper Ltd of London and Francis Morton in Liverpool, produced a range of prefabricated iron buildings that were made available for sale in catalogues. By 1850 the technology was being exported all over the world by enterprising manufacturers and the first iron church is believed to have been constructed in 1855 in London and they eventually came into their own during the period from the late C19 up to the start of the First World War. They were still being built in the 1920s and 1930s.

For centuries the people of Cadgwith, a small fishing village on the Lizard peninsula and within the parish of Grade-Ruan, had to travel almost two miles to the Church of St Rumon at Ruan Major for worship. In 1895 Charles H Thursby, a gentleman visitor from London, built a chapel next to his new residence ‘Carsilgy Bungalow’ on Prazegooth Lane. The Holy Cross was licensed as a Catholic chapel to encourage the baptism of children of immigrant Irish Catholics who had married in Cornwall. A chancel was added to the building, described in the local trade directory as being of timber construction, in 1896.

The founding of this chapel is often confused with the construction of a new mission chapel built in the village; in February 1898 the local press reported that funds for the building were raised by an evening of entertainment at the Lizard reading room organised by the Reverend Arthur Harrison of Constantine. In August that year, a bazaar was held in St Ruan to help with debts from the chapel’s construction. When completed, the new mission chapel, dedicated to St Mary, also served as a Chapel of Ease to the parish church. Its first rector, the Cornwall-born Reverend Henry Vyvyan (1855-1937), welcomed people of all denominations, especially children, throughout his incumbency in the parish until 1932.

Reverend Vyvyan was recognised as one of the most-distinguished honorary secretaries of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI), serving the Cadgwith station from 1898 until his death. He received a RNLI silver medal for gallantry for his active role in the rescue of 227 survivors with the Cadgwith lifeboat ‘Minnie Moon’ from the White Star liner ‘Suevic’ when it ran aground off Lizard Point on 17 March 1907. The rescue of a total of 456 passengers and crew from the liner by sixty volunteers from four stations without any loss of life remains the largest in the institution’s history.

The Church of St Mary has changed little in plan from its first depiction on the 1907 Ordnance Survey (OS) map, and a historic postcard of around 1910 shows the chancel bay at the south end and a short spire at the north end of the roof. The windows were replaced in the later C20, and the corrugated-iron roof covering was covered-over in the early C21. The earlier Catholic chapel was later converted into a residence and has since been demolished. St Mary’s is now a Festival church and is the only place of worship in Cadgwith village.

Details

Mission church, of the type often known as a ‘tin tabernacle’. Constructed in 1898, windows replaced in C20, roof-covering altered in C21.

MATERIALS: stone plinth and supporting substructure, timber structure clad in galvanised corrugated-iron; pitched roof with box-profile sheet covering (possibly concealing the original).

PLAN: a small rectangular chapel (11.5m by 5m) orientated north to south, with small extensions to those elevations.

EXTERIOR: the church is set into the hillside to the north of Cadgwith cove, with the only access from a footpath from the public car park to the north into the village. It has four window bays north to south, with a porch at the north end and chancel bay to the south. The open porch has a pitched roof, above which on the north elevation of the church is a single bell on a timber frame, operated internally, with a rectangular louvre behind. Above this at the apex of the gable is a small timber cross, and behind this is a short spire with a square base and pyramidal top, surmounted with a further timber cross. Timber bargeboards to the gable end have simple circle decoration at their ends, obscured by the C21 roofing material. The east and west elevations are each of four equal bays, and each bay has a single timber-framed window with top-opening casement. The church has a substructure of five parallel rubble-stone walls which are exposed on the east side. The chancel bay on the south end has a pitched roof and is set in and down from the south elevation.

INTERIOR: the church is accessed via a timber door (donated in the C20 in memory of members of the local Jane family) and is one open space, exposed to the ceiling. The walls and ceiling are clad with painted timber matchboarding; the ceiling has trenched purlins and there are two wrought-iron braces. The floor is of unpainted boards. At the north end there is a vertically-boarded cupboard to the right of the entrance door, and at the south end there is a step up onto a painter timber dias, the width of the building. An arch to the chancel bay has a rectangular timber louvre above, and there is a further step up into the chancel, which has chamfered ceiling beams and plain timber altar rails. To the rear of the pews on the east side is a single chamfered timber post which may have been part of a screen; it has been adapted in the later C20.

A small Serpentine font, and the timber late-C19 lectern, prie-dieu, simple bench pews and altar are not fixed. One pew at the rear of the church is a repurposed school bench with a cast-iron frame.

Sources

Books and journals
Beacham, P, Pevsner, N, The Buildings of England: Cornwall, (2014), 131
Warner, M, A Time to Build, (2022), 106

Websites
Heritage Gateway: Cornwall & Scilly Historic Environment Record, accessed 03/11/2023 from https://www.heritagegateway.org.uk/Gateway/Results_Single.aspx?uid=MCO44007&resourceID=1020
Cornish Memory: Cadgwith Cove, Helston, c1910, accessed 03/11/2023 from https://www.cornishmemory.com/item/WAT_02_052
RNLI - 1907: the Suevic rescue, accessed 03/11/2023 from https://rnli.org/about-us/our-history/timeline/1907-the-suevic-rescue

Other
Ordnance Survey, Cornwall (1907) (1:2500)
Kelly’s Directory of Cornwall, 1897, p115
Western Morning News, ‘A New Church at Cadgwith’, 27 December 1895, p7
The Cornishman, 10 February 1898, p4

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