In October 1834 the foundation stone was laid for a large new church in what is now Park Place, Clifton. This was built for Fr Leo Edgeworth, a Franciscan. It was designed in neoclassical style by Henry Goodridge, who at this time was also working for Bishop Baines at Prior Park, Bath, and who almost certainly actively encouraged the scheme. As planned, the church would be capable of seating 2,500. The church would be encircled with a giant order of Corinthian columns, and topped with a lantern loosely modelled on the choragic monument of Lysicrates on the Acropolis. ‘Had this great classical building been quickly finished it would have stood out as the largest, most splendid Catholic church in England’ and ‘a clear challenge to the Gothicists’ (Little, pp. 75 and 103). The ambitious plan proved excessively so, and the choice of site catastrophic; its edge was to slip down towards a nearby disused quarry under the weight of Goodridge’s building. The nave and transepts were substantially complete but remained roofless, and the unfinished building was abandoned by 1838. Instead a smaller chapel dedicated to St Augustine was built alongside in 1842, from which the Clifton mission originated (the building survives today within St Catherine’s Court). Work resumed on Goodridge’s building in 1843, but again soon had to be abandoned.

After he became Vicar Apostolic in 1846, Bishop William Ullathorne OSB engaged Charles Hansom (who had built for him a Gothic church at Coventry) to complete the church to a smaller design, under a lighter timber roof. Dedicated to the Holy Apostles, this was opened by Bishop Ullathorne in September 1848. In 1850, with the restoration of the Catholic hierarchy, this became the provisional cathedral (pro-cathedral) of the Diocese of Clifton. In the 1870s the west end was remodelled by Hansom in Italian Romanesque style, but a tall intended campanile was not built. The building was furnished and enriched over time, with important glass by the Hardman firm. It was slightly damaged by wartime bomb damage, and the roof repaired in 1950s. It was about this time that fears about the stability of the building again resurfaced, and in 1964 an architect’s report concluded that extensive works (estimated cost £86,000) were needed, particularly to stabilise the foundations.

In 1965 a major donation by an anonymous group of Catholic laymen allowed for the possibility of building a purpose-built cathedral on a more convenient site in Clifton, and Bishop Rudderham appointed the Percy Thomas Partnership to prepare designs. An 1840s villa, the former home of Dame Monica Wills, was demolished to make way for it. Unlike at Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral (where the same architects had also submitted a design) there was no competition. The architects in charge were Ronald Weeks, Frederick Jennett and Antoni Poremba and the contractors were John Laing & Son Ltd. (who had also built Coventry Cathedral). Work began in March 1970, Bishop Rudderham laying the foundation stone on 26 September. A presbytery was built at the same time. The building was due for completion in 1972 but a strike by construction workers delayed things, and the new cathedral was consecrated by Bishop Rudderham on 29 June 1973, when Cardinal Heenan preached. The cost was just £600,000.

The cathedral was the first to be conceived and built in England after the Second Vatican Council, and the brief (prepared by a committee of liturgists) called for a single worship space in which 1000 people could gather in active participation around the high altar. Unlike at Liverpool, the altar was not placed centrally, but slightly off-centre, with (moveable) seating arranged around it in horseshoe fashion. Furnishings of note include the large inscribed stone font by Simon Verity, and striking concrete Stations of the Cross by William Mitchell. Notable for the quality of its board-marked concrete, the cathedral won the Concrete Society Award for 1974, and in 2000 it was awarded Grade II* listed status.

The two bells in the new cathedral belfry are the only furnishings brought from the pro-cathedral. That building went through various vicissitudes after 1973, and was finally converted in recent years to student flats.

The cathedral has undergone little alteration since it was opened. In 1995 the original fibreglass and metallic filler doors by William Mitchell were replaced in glass. The building was closed for major repairs at the time of the writer’s visit, and most of the photographs in this report were taken at the time of a previous visit in 2014.

Description

The building and its principal fittings and furnishings are described in some detail in the list entry (below), and repetition is unnecessary. Briefly, in addition to its qualities as an outstanding ‘sermon in concrete’, this is perhaps the most consistent and successful example in England of the rigorous application of modern liturgical principles to church design. Internally its success is most apparent when the building is in use and full. Furnishings not mentioned in the list entry are a small bronze statue of Our Lady in the Lady Chapel, by Terry Jones, and the organ, made by Rieger of Austria for the opening in 1973, with an ash case whose design reflects the geometrical characteristics of the cathedral building. The Henry Haig glass in the narthex (which might perhaps be more accurately described as dalle de verre, or slab in resin glass rather than stained glass) depicts Pentecost (the larger panel) and Jubilation.

List description

II*

Roman Catholic Cathedral. 1969-73 to the designs of Ronald Weeks, E S Jennett and Antoni Poremba of the Percy Thomas Partnership. Pre-cast concrete panels and in-situ concrete. Lead-clad pitched roofs stepped between tiled flat roofs. Irregular, elongated hexagon in plan, with west door set in one of the longer flanks, and the altar and sanctuary set on axis with this – almost, but not quite in the centre of the building. The building set over a car parking area in the sub-basement. Polygonal, board-marked concrete piers flank the St Peter and Paul’s doors’ to Clifton Park and Pembroke Road, and mark the corner between these doors. Raised walkway with board-marked concrete balustrade to each entrance. Irregular composition of offset, superimposed, part-hexagons rise in three layers to culminate in the smallest hexagon, above the sanctuary; this has pairs of windows to three sides at the base, of irregular hexagonal form, with lead surrounds. From this smallest hexagon a tall, lead roof rises, of irregular pyramidal form. This has inset panels of glazing to the liturgical west, and from its apex rises a spire comprising three linked ribbed concrete uprights, one taller than the others and of triangular section with a bevelled top. The west door has a heavy projecting board-marked concrete canopy.

Dramatic interior with board-marked concrete to walls, deep upstand beams of roof and to galleries. Pyramidal timber acoustic cones’ set in lower ceilings. Complex natural top-lighting, above and behind sanctuary and to the Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, the latter separated by screen, designed by Brother Patrick of Prinknash Abbey. Walls of narthex inset with stained glass by Henry Haig. Narthex gives on to baptistry area; font of Portland stone by Simon Verity. The Stations of the Cross are low relief panels of light-weight cast concrete, each one worked in 1« hours by William Mitchell. His original doors replaced with clear glass in c.1995, but the lectern made by him to Weeks’s design remain.

A new cathedral in Clifton was commissioned in 1965 to supersede the Pro-Cathedral (already listed) of the 1830s. The Percy Thomas Partnership produced a powerful and dramatic building, which is perhaps the most important work of one of Britain’s largest post-war architectural practices. Clifton is often described as being the first cathedral in the world to accord completely with the liturgical guidelines issued by the Vatican in November 1963 (Building, 15 June 1973, p.73). Its planning is more succinct and successful than that at Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral because it places the altar to one side, with a horseshoe of seating for the congregation. This quickly became a preferred alternative to the notion of seating entirely in the round’ because of the clearer view it gave everybody of the celebration. Built in a remarkably short space of time to a low budget (£600,000), Clifton Cathedral achieves a rare integration of materials and spatial quality which is remarkable for a cathedral of any period. George Perkin in Concrete Quarterly (January 1974, p. 23), described it as having a remarkable serenity and delight’ coupled with an apparent simplicity’. Mary Haddock, in Building (20/27 December 1974, p.43) admired the hint of theatre in the design; the absence of clutter and garish church ornament; the fine materials and the use of colour; the cold design in stained glass – … a heart-lifting Christian temple, inspiring reverence but not awe. A sermon in concrete.’ The Cathedral won the Concrete Society Award for 1974.

Sources Building, 25 February 1967, p.88 Architect and Building News, 1/15 January 1969, pp.22-29 Building, 15 June 1973, p.73 Concrete Quarterly, January-March 1974, pp.22-32 Building, 20/27 December 1974, pp.39-43 Information from William Mitchell.

Listing NGR: ST5728373587

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The parish was established in 1933, when a site off the London Road containing a shop and bungalow was purchased and the buildings adapted by Roberts & Willman of Taunton to serve as a church and presbytery. A parish hall was added in 1934 and additional land acquired in 1944 and 1945 for a church. At about the same time the parish hall was destroyed by fire but was soon rebuilt. In the mid-1980s, ideas of building a new church were abandoned and the existing premises were enlarged and converted to provide a worship space and parish centre. 

Description

The church forms part of a complex of simple modern single-storey buildings, all faced with red brick laid in stretcher bond and with a mixture of flat roofs and slate-covered pitched roofs. The church forms the eastern side of the complex and is rectangular on plan with a continuous pitched roof and with a shallow flat-roofed bow on the west side. There are large modern windows in the north wall and slit windows in the bow.

Internally, the church is a single space with a small sanctuary in the western bow.  The walls are plain plastered and all the fittings are modern. The glass in the sanctuary (‘Jesus Christ the Apple Tree’ and ‘The Firmament’ of 1985, three lights each) is by Henry Haig, who also designed the large dalle de verre windows at Clifton Cathedral. There is also a stained glass roundel of Our Lady Annunciate set into one of the clear glass windows on the north side of the church.  

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The list entry (see below) contains a full account of the history of the church, and repetition is unnecessary. What follows is a brief summary.

Giles Gilbert Scott (1880-1960) was commissioned to design the church by Dom Anselm Rutherford, OSB, the Prior at St John’s church, Bath. The style and the model of Santa Maria in Cosmedin, Rome, were suggested by Dom Anselm. Scott later described the church as one of his favourite works and ‘this little gem of a church’. The foundation stone was laid by the Bishop of Clifton on 6 October 1927 and the church was opened on 13 July 1929 by the Bishop of Lancaster, Dr Thomas W. Pearson OSB. In 1932, care of the mission was handed over to the Diocese of Clifton as the Benedictines withdrew from Bath. In 1937 the parish was erected. The church was consecrated on 7 October 1954.

In the 1950s, the church was completed by Scott, who added a Lady Chapel and sacristy (1953-54), and inserted an organ gallery (designed 1954, built 1960). The presbytery and the corridor linking it to the church were completed in 1958.

In 1965-66, the church was reordered (architects: Ivor Day & O’Brien). The original high altar was dismantled and replaced by smaller stone altar, and the tabernacle was placed on a shelf in the apse. The tabernacle’s cross was replaced by the pelican in her piety. The temporary pulpit was removed and replaced by a stone lectern. The font was moved from the baptistery in the campanile closer to the sanctuary.

The base of the campanile was completed in 1958 but it was never completed to its full height, due to structural concerns. Scott’s designs for a pulpit and altar rails remained unexecuted and the temporary replacements were removed in the 1960s (pulpit) and the 1980s (rails).

Description

The church and its fittings and furnishings are fully described in the list entry (below). The following additional comments and corrections follow conventional liturgical orientation (the church actually faces southeast and the list description uses the actual, not the liturgical, orientation).

• The west elevation of the tower has a two-light arched window (not a ‘single, narrow, arched light’ as in the list description).
• The baldacchino, while made by Stuflesser of Ortisei, was designed in 1928 by Scott.
• The sculptor of the Stations of the Cross somewhat in the style of Eric Gill has not been established (c.1930s).
• The crucifix in the apse was installed in 1968.
• The Victorian pews came from St Luke’s Anglican church in Bedminster; others are at St Joseph, Southdown (qv). The church was originally furnished entirely with chairs.
• The list description mentions a ‘stone tabernacle’. The tabernacle is in fact made of bronze with silver-plated doors and since 1965-6 has been placed on a stone shelf in the apse.
• The organ of 1915 by Rushworth & Dreaper of Liverpool was originally the firm’s demonstration organ. It was installed in the church in 1960. It is on the National Pipe Organ Register.
• The fine carved capitals by William Drinkwater Gough include a portrait of Scott.
• The reredos in the Lady Chapel at the northeast was carved by the sculptor and painter Theodor Kern (1900-1969).
• The west elevation of the tower has a two-light arched window (not a ‘single, narrow, arched light’ as in the list description).

List description (church and presbytery)

II*

Roman Catholic Church and presbytery by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott. The church was opened July 1929 and consecrated in 1954 (1,000 years after the birth of the patron saint, Alphege). Presbytery completed 1958. Internal carvings largely by William Drinkwater Gough.

MATERIALS: It is built of Bath stone rubble, taken from the Box quarries, and has pitched roofs of Roman tiles which were imported from Lombardy, Italy. The stone for the pillars was from Leckhampton, near Cheltenham.

PLAN: Severe Early Christian basilican plan with a nave and west gallery, chancel with blind apsidal sanctuary, flanked by Lady Chapel and sacristy, open narthex, and the base of a campanile; the rest of which was not built.

EXTERIOR: The entrance front (north east) has a triple, arched open loggia which is raised by one step. It has sturdy columns with capitals in a Byzantine style, carrying flush arches under a lean-to roof, over plain walling, but with a vertical band set flush at impost level. The recessed centre has three large arched recesses, each with a small arched light with sunken surround and with plain stone sills at seat height. In the gable above is a large oculus with rectangular iron armature. To the left is a large square campanile base with a single, narrow, arched light. The side elevations each have ten slender round-arched lights to the clerestory, and seven oculi to the aisles, all severely plain in detail, with iron armatures and recessed surrounds. There are deep overhanging eaves and verges. To the rear (south west) the otherwise blind apse is articulated by a round-arched arcade of detached columns set under the eaves and was clearly intended to be visible from the railway beyond.

INTERIOR: Severely plain, with unplastered walls to the nave. The six-bay arcades are carried on columns with carved capitals depicting subjects from the life of Our Lady to the right, and of St Alphege to the left; those supporting the choir and organ loft depict persons associated with the design and building of the church, including Scott, himself. The floor is made up of small pieces of linoleum, in the same manner as using marble to create a tessellated floor. The roof consists of king-post trusses with purlins and boarding. To the rear is a deep gallery, which was completed in 1960, and is carried on two columns and responds, with an open, wood balustrade front. The chancel is raised on one plus two steps, and the sanctuary beyond a further three. The baldacchino over the altar is of gilded oak, carved by Stuflesser of Ortisei and decorated by Watts of London. There is a stone tabernacle in the apse. The aisles have simple lean-to roofs, and the south aisle continues through as the Lady Chapel with a prominent carved and gilt figure of Virgin and Child in a vesica piscis behind the altar, which was designed by Scott in 1954, and carved by Hertfordshire-based, Austrian sculptor Theodore Kern. The corresponding position on the north has an enclosed sacristy with a door through to the chancel. The base of the campanile is a plain square room, formerly used as baptistery, with deep arched recesses, and a door to presbytery. The doors throughout are generally of heavy oak in small square panels. The nave has pews and the aisles have chairs. A new lighting system was installed within the church in 1986, but it retains Scott’s original wooden, hanging lamp holders which are in the form of golden ‘sunburst’ disks which are carved with a cross in relief.

The presbytery, to the south east, is linked to the campanile base by a wing that has a tripartite window above a shallow segmental open arch spanning small stream. The presbytery comprises a long range with a short central ‘T’ arm to right, set gable to street. All the windows are steel casements with both horizontal and margin-bars, set to flush plain lintels and sills, and with rounded mullions. The front (south west) gable has a tripartite light at first floor, and French doors below. The long, left return has five tripartite lights; the central one at first floor has a door to a flat balcony roof. To the right, and set back, is a lean-to wing with tripartite light, behind which is a short gabled wing. The link corridor retains a plank and stud door.

HISTORY: The Church of Our Lady and St Alphege was built in Bath in response to an increase in the Catholic population of the city during the 1920s. Bath’s Catholic population was in the care of both the secular and regular clergy during this period. The former served the Church of St Mary in Julian Road to the north of the city; and the Benedictine community at Downside served the Priory Church of St John the Evangelist in the central South Parade. A site in Oldfield Park, alongside the railway, in the south of the city was selected for the new church. The architect Sir Giles Gilbert Scott who was working on the nave of the Abbey Church of St Gregory the Great, at Downside Abbey (which was completed in 1925 and is listed at Grade I) was commissioned to design the new church.

Sir Giles Gilbert Scott (1880-1960) established himself as one of the most accomplished and sophisticated ecclesiastic architects in Britain, designing for both Anglican and Roman Catholic parishes. One of his most famous commissions, Liverpool’s Anglican Cathedral (listed at Grade I), was a massive undertaking that was to occupy Scott throughout his life; it was consecrated in 1924, but construction continued throughout Scott’s life and was finally completed in 1980, some twenty years after his death. Scott also designed many secular buildings, including Battersea and Bankside Power Stations in London (the former listed at Grade II*), and the K6 telephone box to commemorate the Silver Jubilee of King George V in 1935. The London-based sculptor, William Drinkwater Gough, was responsible for the stone carving within the church. He collaborated with Scott on several commissions including the Abbey Church in Ampleforth, North Yorkshire (listed at Grade II), the Church of St Bartholomew in Brighton (listed at Grade I), and Liverpool Cathedral.

The Church of Our Lady and St Alphege was Scott’s first essay in the Early Christian style which became fashionable in the early part of the C20 for both Roman Catholic and Anglican churches. Scott’s design was inspired by a recent visit he had made to the continent, and the Roman basilica of Santa Maria (circa 780) in Cosmedin, Rome, in particular. Significantly he was very much involved in all aspects of the design of both the church and the presbytery from 1927 through to the 1950s. In later years Scott described the Church of Our Lady and St Alphege as ‘one of my favourite works….’ and ‘…. this little gem of a church’.

The nave and chancel were completed in two years and the Church of Our Lady and St Alphege was opened in 1929, initially as a chapel of ease; it was not consecrated until 1954. Work on the remainder of the church, including the organ gallery (designed by Scott in 1954 and built in 1960); and the presbytery and its link corridor proceeded throughout the 1950s, all to Scott’s designs and he was heavily involved in this second phase of building. The former parish hall to the north west which was replaced by a new building in 2010 was designed by a local Bristol architect. The church and its attendant presbytery have remained almost entirely unaltered since their completion in November 1960.

SOURCES: Gavin Stamp, The Roman Catholic Parish Churches of Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, Ecclesiology Today (2007), vol. 38, pages 63-80 The Church of Our Lady and St Alphege, Oldfield Park, booklet Michael Forsyth, Bath – Pevsner Architectural Guides (2003) http://www.saintalphege.org.uk/14gough.html William Drinkwater Gough: The search for the sculptor. Accessed on 22 June 2010

REASON FOR DESIGNATION: The Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady and St Alphege and the attached presbytery are designated at Grade II* for the following principal reasons:

• Architecture: It is an accomplished, composition by the nationally-renowned architect Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, reminiscent of a Roman basilica;
• Design: every element has a consistency of approach and every detail is carefully considered and crafted, resulting in a design of great integrity, both structurally and decoratively
• Intactness: the historic fabric and layout of the church is little altered
• Interior: the interior scheme demonstrates a very high degree of quality in its materials and above all its craftsmanship; it is imaginative and cohesive in its simplicity
• Fittings: most contemporary fixtures and fittings remain including the fine gilded oak baldacchino, the figure of the Virgin and Child in the Lady Chapel, ‘sunburst’ lamp holders, carvings by W D Gough, and the floor made up of linoleum pieces, in the manner of a tessellated floor
• Grouping: the presbytery is designed from similar materials to the church and in a complementary style

Listing NGR: ST7390163886

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The first mission to the north of Bath was set up at 3 Brunswick Place in 1823. In 1832, a larger chapel of St Augustine was opened at 5 Portland Place. After its sale in 1841 due to insufficient numbers, the mission returned to Brunswick Place. In August 1852, St Mary’s Chapel was established in a former riding school in Montpelier (now the hall of Christchurch Anglican church). In 1870, a marble altar was built for this chapel by Signor Leonardo, a Roman craftsman.

The site for the present church was bought by the diocese in 1877 for £1870, with a house in Harley Street to serve as the presbytery. On 24 June 1879, the foundation stone was laid by Archbishop Errington, who lived in retirement at Prior Park, and on 3 May 1881, the church was opened by Cardinal Manning. The architects were Dunn & Hansom, and the contractor was Joseph Bladwell. The overall cost was £7,000 (including £1,600 for the carvings, by Roddis of Birmingham). The planned final west bay was never built; neither were the school room attached to the Lady Chapel and the clergy house attached to the sacristy. The marble altar from the previous chapel was installed in the Lady Chapel. In 1885, the parish school was built in Harley Street, to the north of the presbytery.

During the so-called Baedeker air raids in April 1942 the church suffered minor damage to the windows and roof. Repairs were carried out in the 1950s under Alec French. The church was redecorated and reordered for the centenary and dedication in 1981 (architect: D.J. McDonagh). This involved moving the altar forward, as well as the removal of choir stalls, pews and the pulpit. In 1985, the niches of the reredos were filled with paintings of saints and martyrs by John Armstrong. In 1997, the artist Fleur Kelly painted five frescoes on framed blank stone panels (intended in 1879 for paintings) on the north side of the nave.

On 26 July 2015, the church was seriously damaged by fire. At the time of writing (October 2015) it is intended that it should re-open ‘as beautiful or more so than it previously was’ (parish website).

Description

The church is fully described in the list entry (below). It requires a few corrections and additions.

• The list entry follows the erroneous entries in the two Buildings of England volumes which identify the high altar’s reredos with the marble altar made by Signor Leonardo for the predecessor chapel. In fact, the reredos in the sanctuary is of timber, and the Italian marble altar (not reredos) is now in the Lady Chapel.
• Several (Victorian and later) stained glass windows survived the war (some by Hardman & Co of Birmingham), including the east windows in the sanctuary and Lady Chapel. The south window in the Lady Chapel, depicting Marian symbols, is the parish’s war memorial for the soldiers and sailors who died in the First World War.
• The floor above the sacristy is the organ loft, with four arches and a pierced balustrade to the sanctuary.

List description

II

A Roman Catholic church in a High Victorian Gothic style, built in 1879-81 to a design by AM Dunn and EJ Hansom, with carving by Roddis of Birmingham.

MATERIALS: The building is constructed from limestone ashlar with small areas of rubble and a red plain tiled roof.

PLAN: Rectangular plan and oriented east-west, with a chancel, south Lady Chapel and north vestry (Lady Chapel and vestry both have external rubble walling), unfinished nave and a south aisle.

EXTERIOR: The building comprises a high single-storey with coped verges and single stack at the north side of the vestry. The building is of seven bays, with a break between the nave and chancel. The south elevation fronts the street and shows five bays to the nave and aisle with buttresses in two stages marking the window bays, a porch to the west and the Lady Chapel adjacent to the chapel to the east. There are two-light windows with Decorated tracery of cusped head lights and rose above to the south aisle; above in the clerestory are paired windows, each with two lights, again separated by strip buttresses. The south porch is situated within the western bay of the south elevation and the entry has stiff-leaf capitals, a statue of the Virgin within the gable, and is surmounted by a gable cross. The south Lady Chapel, also with gable crosses, has a small three-light Decorated window in the south wall, and a large decorated window in the east wall of 3 cusped lights with trefoils above. Lighting the chancel are small single-light windows in the south wall, largely hidden behind the chapel roof, and a large east window of three-lights with cusped roundels above. The north side has a vestry with two light lancets and a modern sky-light inserted into the roof. The north nave has plain paired lights within the clerestory and the west wall is rendered and featureless.

INTERIOR: The interior has a plain wagon roof to the nave, which was replaced c.1950s following bomb damage in the Second World War, while the chancel roof consists of a decorative bracketed bressumer supporting a panelled ceiling. The five bay nave is separated from the south aisle by clustered columns with stiff-leaf capitals and carved spandrel figures of angels. In comparison the unaisled north wall is plain, with the only decoration consisting of five stone panels which were filled by frescoes in 1997. The chancel contains a reredos, by Signor Leonardo, which was brought from Italy, and comes from a previous chapel.

HISTORY: The Catholic parish of St Mary’s was established in 1847 with the construction of a chapel, now the hall for the neighbouring Christchurch Anglican Church. The current Church of St Mary was opened on 3 May 1881 by Cardinal Manning, Archbishop of Westminster, and was dedicated to Our Lady, Help of Christians. The church also purchased 5 Harley Street for use as the parish rectory. The Church was designed by Dunn and Hansom of Newcastle-upon-Tyne and was built by a local builder, Mr Joseph Bladwell, with carving by Roddis of Birmingham. The original plans indicate that the design was never fully executed: the west end was due to be extended to incorporate extra bays, a school was due to be attached to the south side of the Lady Chapel, and a house due to be added to the north of the sacristy. Although none of these were constructed, rough stonework and the rendered west elevation indicate their intended position. Until World War II, St Mary’s was situated adjacent to residential properties with a house directly abutting the west elevation of the church. In the Baedeker raids of April 1942, however, some of the surrounding buildings were destroyed and this resulted in the larger grounds that currently surround the church. Although the church itself survived, the bombs damaged the roof and shattered all of the original stained glass. To celebrate the church’s centenary in 1981, a scheme of renovation was undertaken which consisted of the relocation of the high altar and the font and the removal of the pulpit and the pews. As part of this scheme of renovation the Italian marble reredos, by Signor Leonardo, was cleaned and restored. In 1985 the eight panels within the reredos, which formerly contained fabric, were filled with paintings of saints and martyrs by the artist John Armstrong. In 1997 the five stone panels on the north wall were filled by frescoes. These frescoes were painted by a local artist, Fleur Kelly and they depict The Annunciation, The Visitation, The Nativity, The Marriage Feast at Cana and The Deposition from the Cross, all painted incorporating details relevant to the local community.

SOURCES Michael Forsyth, Pevsner Architectural Guides – Bath (2003) 242 Neil Jackson, Nineteenth Century Bath: Architects and Architecture, Bath (1991) 149 http://www.stmarysrcbath.com/content/view/25/41/

REASONS FOR DESIGNATION The Roman Catholic Church of St Mary Our Lady, Help of Christians is recommended for designation in Grade II, for the following principal reasons:

• A good quality church built within a dense urban environment by Dunn and Hansom, a notable pair of ecclesiastical architects of the C19.
• An accomplished design executed using good quality materials and demonstrating a high standard of craftsmanship.
•  The interior carving by Roddis of Birmingham is of particular note.

Listing NGR: ST7470265533

Rectory

II

MATERIALS: Limestone ashlar to front and rear, double pile parapeted roofs to left (No.6) and part of No.5, Welsh Slate to front and rear, double pile parapeted roof to right of No.5 has Welsh Slate and double Romans to front roof, rear roof now flat, covering not visible behind parapet, ashlar stacks with some early clay pots to right to front roof of No.5, on front and rear roofs on coped party wall to right of No.6, small ashlar stack with early clay pot on front roof on coped party wall to left of No.6. Staircases to rear.

EXTERIOR: Each house has three storeys and basement, two-window range. House to right (No.5) (formerly two) has two six/six-sashes in plain reveals with wrought iron balconettes to first floor, second floor has two eight/eight-sashes in plain reveals with stone sills, ground floor has two six/six-horned sashes in plain reveals with stone sills flanking six-panel door with reeded and fielded panels and single glazed panel in plain reveal with Pennant step, blocked former doorway to right. Slit openings in pavement and plinth below ground floor windows show position of basement openings. Chamfered plinth starting from ground level to left to accommodate steep fall in ground to right, weathered sill course to first floor, moulded eaves cornice not extending to full width of building to left and coped parapet. House to left (No.6) has two six/six-sashes in plain reveals with wrought iron balconettes to first floor, second floor has two six/six-sashes in plain reveals with stone sills, ground floor has to right eight/eight-sash with panes to left and right narrower in plain reveal with stone sill, shallow round headed recessed panel to centre left probably originally intended to contain doorway opening (cf. No.4 Harley Street qv), to far left six-panel door with beaded panels, fielded panels with voided corners and glazed panels in deep plain reveal. Basement has eight/eight-sash in plain reveal with timber lintel, partially above ground. Deep plinth to left of door, plinth to right of door starting just above pavement level to accommodate steep fall of ground to right, weathered sill band to first floor, moulded eaves cornice and coped parapet. To left side unfinished termination of front, rear and side walls and two ashlar chimney breasts with openings for fireplaces to first floor and second floor. Rear elevations retain glazing bar sashes to No.6 and first floor of No.5, other windows C19 and small C20 windows, part of Nos 5 and 6 deeper plan than No.5 to right, small render extension in angle of offset, small ashlar porch with double Romans on lean-to roof against garden wall sheltering six-panel rear door to No.6.

INTERIORS: Not inspected.

HISTORY: Part of the ground conveyed to Fielder, King, Hewlett and Broom(e) by Sir Peter Rivers Gay on 25 March 1790 on which St James’s Square and adjoining streets were built, this plot remained undeveloped until 1817 when Manners’ New and Correct Plan of Bath shows houses on sites of Nos 3-6 and Portland Chapel opposite.

Listing NGR: ST7466865548

4 Harley Street (in parish ownership)

II

MATERIALS: Limestone ashlar to front, rubble and render to rear, double pile parapeted roof, Welsh Slate to front and rear, two ashlar stacks on coped party wall to right, to rear with some early clay pots, coped party wall to left. Staircase to rear.

EXTERIOR: Four storeys and basement, single-window range. First floor has one two/two-horned sash in plain reveal with stone sill, second floor has one similar sash, third floor has one three/three sash in similar reveal with stone sill and timber lintel to right, six-panel door with reeded and fielded panels with fanlight in round headed plain reveal in shallow round headed recess to left. Basement has two/two-horned sash in plain reveal partially above ground to right. Plinth, band course over ground floor, lintel and moulded cornice over second floor, lintel and coped parapet at eaves. Rear elevation has two/two and four/four-horned sashes, two three/three-sashes to second floor, and small ashlar extension.

INTERIOR: Not inspected.

HISTORY: Part of the ground conveyed to Fielder, King, Hewlett and Broom(e) by Sir Peter Rivers Gay on 25 March 1790 on which St James’s Square and adjoining streets were built, this plot remained undeveloped until 1817 when Manners’ New and Correct Plan of Bath shows houses on sites of Nos 3-6 and Portland Chapel opposite.

Listing NGR: ST7466665537

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During the Second World War, Mass was said in the hall of St Barnabas, the local Anglican parish church. In 1947, a prefabricated church was built. This was replaced by the present church designed by William D. Proctor of Oatley & Brentnall, the successor practice to that founded by Sir George Oatley, architect of the Wills Memorial Building, Bristol. Work on site started in November 1968 and the church was opened by Bishop Rudderham on 20 November 1969. The builders were Messrs George Williams & Sons of Bath. The overall cost was £22,000. The short and broad plan was designed so that no member of the congregation would be further than fifty feet from the altar. The sloping site allowed for the construction of a hall below the church. A few furnishings were brought from the closed Anglican church of St Luke, Bedminster, including some pews, a chair and a prie-dieu. 

Description

The church faces southeast. This description follows conventional liturgical orientation.

The church is a steel-framed structure with walls of concrete blocks faced in Bath stone. The side walls have prefabricated stone chip panels below the clerestory windows. The plan is roughly square with a west narthex, a sacristy at the southeast, and a projecting sanctuary with canted sides. The west elevation has an eight-light window under the gable, with the mullion and transom at the centre forming a cross. The pitched roof has a dormer window on each side. The side windows are narrow clerestory bands, while the sanctuary is lit by six-light windows on each side.

The walls are plastered, apart from the sanctuary which is lined in reconstituted Bath stone. Above the stone altar hangs a timber canopy whose shape recalls, in the words of Bryan Little, the ‘winged’ headdress of a Vincentian sister. On the left of the sanctuary is the Blessed Sacrament chapel with the tabernacle on a stone support. On the right is the sunken baptistery with a Bath stone font on a convex triangular plan. Above hangs a carved and painted panel of Our Lady and the child (in memory of Percy Livingstone Parker, made by Stuflesser of Ortisei), originally from the temporary Lady Chapel in Our Lady and St Alphege’s church, Bath (qv). Once the Lady Chapel was built in 1954, the panel was moved to St Joseph’s.

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Between 1820 and 1837, Mass was said at Midford House, the home of the Parfitt family. From 1837 to 1901, the chapel at Midford Castle was used. Chaplains came from Downside Abbey (up to 1841) and then from Prior Park. The mission at Midford closed in 1901 when the house was sold. The parish was re-founded in 1919, using the chapel at Prior Park. In the post-war period, the development of housing estates in the area made the construction of a new church feasible. In 1954, the presbytery was acquired by the Diocese for £2,640 and the same year, the architects Whitmarsh-Everiss & Smithies prepared initial designs (unexecuted). The present church was opened by Canon Hughes on 17 September 1965, reputedly the first church in the diocese to be opened after the conclusion of the Second Vatican Council. It was built in six months and cost £20,000. The architect was Martin Fisher and the contractors were F. J. Amery & Son. A planned spire or fleche was not built. The church was consecrated by Bishop Alexander on 1 June 1976. Recently, the sanctuary was reordered and an extension containing a confessional and sacristy added.

Description

The church is square on plan, with the sanctuary in the northeast corner. The following description follows conventional liturgical orientation, i.e. as if the altar was at the east.

The walls are of concrete blocks faced in Bath stone bricks, with concrete buttresses between windows to the southwest and northwest. The tiled roof with skylight over the sanctuary is supported on stressed plywood girders. The plan is square with a monopitch roof with skylight over the sanctuary. Attached to the northeast is a small meeting room under a pitched roof. There are two entrance doors on either side of the west corner. Beside the northwest door is a sculpture of Saints Peter and Paul by Julian Everard.

The interior has not been inspected. Accounts at the time of the opening refer to the stressed plywood V-frame roof structure coming down to the low eaves on two sides. The original altar and font were of Box-Ground stone. The original sanctuary arrangement had the tabernacle set against the north wall of the sanctuary. Furnishings include a crucifix comprising a nineteenth-century Bavarian corpus on a modern ash cross and two limewood bas-reliefs by Peter Watts depicting Passover and the Last Supper. The original baptistery was located near the west entrance.

The presbytery is listed Grade II (list entry no.1395736)

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The parish has its origins in the move to Batheaston of the Good Shepherd convent and its reformatory school after bomb damage to their premises in Arnos Vale in 1941. In 1947, the sisters moved to Chippenham and the same year a temporary church dedicated to St Euphrasia Pelletier, the foundress of the Good Shepherd order, was opened in Batheaston. It was replaced by the current church, on which work started in April 1966 and which was opened by Bishop Rudderham on Ascension Day 1967. The church seated 280 and the contract cost (with a new parish hall and ancillary spaces) was £33,000. This was one of the first churches in the diocese whose design fully expressed the liturgical intentions of the Second Vatican Council. The architect was Martin Fisher of Bath.

In c.1991, the roof was renewed and about twenty years ago new stone sanctuary furnishings designed by the original architect were installed. There is a presbytery (a former coach house of early eighteenth-century origin), but today the church is served from Bradford-on-Avon (qv). 

Description

The church is square on plan, with the altar in the southeast corner. This description follows conventional liturgical orientation, i.e. as if the altar was in the east.

The external walls are of concrete, in the form of narrow blocks and poured. The eastern diagonal half of the roof rises over the sanctuary, while the western half is flat. Most of the walls (apart from the wall facing the street) have small-paned windows, externally covered in polycarbonate sheets. The main entrance is via a small flat-roofed narthex along the northwest wall. An external staircase leads to a door in the southeast wall, while a projection at the south corner contains a confessional.

The internal walls of the narthex and of the basement hall are of exposed narrow concrete blocks, while the walls of the church are painted. The holy water stoups in the narthex are also of concrete. The interior of the church is filled with light; windows behind and above the sanctuary have coloured glass forming a bright globe at the centre. The stone altar and ambo date from the most recent reordering by the original architect, about twenty years ago. The tabernacle is placed on a wall-mounted pedestal and surmounted by a tall canopy. Above the altar is a canopy whose shape echoes that of the roof, with the raised monopitch pointing west. To the left of the sanctuary is a small projecting oriel window with blue glass, containing a modern concrete sculpture of the Virgin and Child. In the north and south corners are tall statues of St Thomas More and St John Fisher under timber canopies, from an army chapel. The sunken baptistery in the west corner has a cylindrical stone font which matches the new altar and lectern. The benches are arranged in four blocks.

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In 1916 permission was granted to Edward Raymond Barker for Mass to be said in his private oratory. More permanent arrangements came in 1930 when Charles Meek, another Bisley resident and relative of Archbishop Ullathorne, gave funds for building a church at Bisley in thanksgiving for his conversion. It was built on land belonging to the Raymond Barker Estate, from designs by the well-known and prolific Catholic architect Wilfrid Mangan. The foundation stone was laid by Fr Dunstan Sargent OP, parish priest at Stroud, on Rosary Sunday, October 1930. Mangan’s design was illustrated in The Tablet, which wrote:

‘In designing this little chapel, the architect has been at pains to avoid anything out of harmony with the surroundings. The walls are faced in rough white cement, heavily quoined and buttressed with local stone in random sizes and courses. The mullioned windows, of local stone, are filled with leaded glass in diamond panes, and the roof is covered with hand-made grey Cotswold tiles. Sixty worshippers will find accommodation in the little building, but provision has been made for later extension’. 

On 21 March 1931, The Tabletreported that the completed church would be opened on St George’s day by Mgr Lee, Vicar Capitular of the Diocese, when Fr Bede Jarrett OP would preach. Although allowance was made for later extension, the church remains very much in its original form, and continues to be served from Stroud.

Description

The church is small, with an unaisled nave and sanctuary under a prominent tiled roof (originally covered with grey Cotswold tiles), gabled south porch and lean-to north sacristy. The walls are rendered but with exposed dressings of local stone. The windows are mullioned, with stone hoodmoulds and leaded panes; the three-light east window is set high up. A stream gurgles in a channel under the west end. The interior, under a high-pitched collar purlin roof, is simple but pleasing. The walls are plastered, the floor timber boarded. There are no fittings and furnishings requiring particular mention.

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In 1662 Charles Trinder, a lawyer and Recorder of Gloucestershire (and later lord of the manor), established a resident priest at the Manor House in Bourton. The mission established by Trinder lasted for seventy five years, and was mainly served by Benedictine monks.

The present church traces its origins back to 1927 when Henry James (‘Jim’) Barnes and his wife Mary settled in Bourton. Mary taught small groups at her house to which the parish priest from Chipping Camden came occasionally. During the Second World War, as in the First, Bourton received refugees from Belgium, so regular Masses began to be said at the Barnes’ home and later in the front room of that of Dr Liston. In 1940 Mass was said in private houses and in 1942 the newly-appointed priest at Stow determined that a Mass centre should be provided at Bourton and the Church of England hall was duly rented. After the war fundraising was begun and in 1957 a large site in Station Road was acquired, and building work on the present church-cum-hall started in May 1960. The first Mass in the new church was on 9 October the same year. There were ambitions to build a more substantial church and a presbytery but these have not materialised. The roof covering was replaced in the early 1990s (it is thought) but the new thick concrete tiles were too heavy for the roof structure and internal strengthening had to be carried out, hence the two steel rectangular hollow section supports on either side. The church is served from Stow.

Description

The church has a nave and sanctuary in one plus a sacristy on the right. The walls are of artificial stone and the building is roofed with concrete tiles and has metal-framed windows. The entrance frontage has a raised gabled parapet incorporating a crucifix.  The interior is simply appointed and is seated with chairs. There are no fixtures or fittings requiring particular mention.

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