A small timber building built to serve local mining communities in the 1930s, of no special architectural interest but with an intimate and welcoming interior.  The Stations of the Cross are carved in coal.

In the early twentieth-century development in Harworth and Bircotes was associated with Harworth Colliery, with extensive new housing built particularly in the interwar years to accommodate miners and their families. In 1928 a Mass centre was founded from Oldcotes, and in 1939 the present timber church opened as a chapel-of-ease. It is said that this had previously been a temporary church at Maltby. The parish was erected in 1947.

St Patrick’s School was built alongside the church in the 1960s, but has since been demolished. A parish hall was built in the late twentieth-century.

Description

A simple timber framed building, clad in tongue and groove boarding on a red brick base, the roof covered in a modern grey tiles. The plan consists of a nave and sanctuary under one roof with sacristy and confessionals. The west end has a small gabled porch with circular window over, the sides are each lit by four large windows, with two projections housing the sacristy and a confessional. On the north side is a link block leading to the parish hall, no longer used. The east end has a single rounded arch window.

Inside, the nave is of four bays and the sanctuary one. The walls are plainly painted white with timber boarding to dado height, while the east end wall has vertical tongue and groove boarding. The roof is of collar purlin and timber boarded construction, and the floor is of timber, carpeted in the circulation areas. The sanctuary is raised by one step and has a pine forward altar, tabernacle on a plinth and the font to the northeast corner. The Stations of the Cross are carved in coal.

Heritage Details