A small stone-built Gothic chapel, built to serve a mainly immigrant Irish population in the early twentieth century.

During the eighteenth century clergy from Bishop Thornton would administer to the scattered Catholic community in Pateley Bridge and surrounding countryside. Between 1903 and 1937 there was an influx of Irish workers to the area, who found employment in the construction of the Nidderdale reservoirs, built to supply water to Bradford. Several temporary workers’ villages were established and in 1906 a small iron chapel was opened at Angram. A priest from Leeds Cathedral travelled every week to say Mass. During the 1920s, the Drill Hall in Pateley Bridge was also used, as was the home of a Mr and Mrs Faulkner. In 1928, Fr Hammond moved to the town and purchased Grassfield House. Here a room was converted and this was used until the building of the present church.

Funds were raised to build the new church with contributions coming from the Irish workers at Scar Village. The site was sold by Mr Fredrick Sinclair Campbell for £418. Mr M. Hawe opened up the Queens Grit Quarry at Blazefield to provide stone for the building, which was designed by Robert Ronchetti and opened in September 1935.

The church was renovated and reordered in 1984. The modern conservatory-style addition sited between the church and presbytery functions as a parish room.

Description

A small rectangular, coursed squared gritstone building with slate roof. The main elevation is centred on the gable end wall with a small entrance porch with a lancet window to either side and one in the middle of the wall. The gable apex is surmounted by a carved stone cross. To the right, a small integral bellcote. There is a modern disabled ramp up to the doorway.  On the south elevation, the first four bays project slightly forward, are lit by single lancet windows and have stone buttresses. The easternmost bay is set back and is taller, marking out the sanctuary.

The main doors enter straight into the nave, which has a central alley flanked on either side by wooden pews. The nave is open to the roof and has simple painted walls which highlight the stone window surrounds. The interior space is broken by a wide two-centred moulded stone arch without capitals, marking the entrance to the sanctuary. The fittings are generally plain and of timber, the sanctuary floor has wood parquet blocks. There are four modern rectangular glass light pendants with frosted and etched designs of the Evangelists set within coloured glass margins. These were commissioned for the Golden Jubilee of the church.

Heritage Details