Hulme: St George
Overview
Grid reference: SJ 828 972
The church was designed by Francis Goodwin and the foundation stone was laid on 7 September 1826 by Bishop C.J. Blomfield of Chester (in which Diocese it then stood). The church was virtually completed by June two years later but had to wait until 9 December 1828 to be consecrated by Dr. John Bird Sumner, the recently appointed Bishop of Chester.
Visiting and facilities
Building is closed for worship
Building
Ground Plan Description and Dimensions
Ground plan:
Nave of six bays with north and south aisles containing galleries reached by staircases at the west end. Tall west tower. Shallow apsidal sanctuary and a north-east polygonal vestry.
Description of Archaeology and History
The church was designed by Francis Goodwin and the foundation stone was laid on 7 September 1826 by Bishop C.J. Blomfield of Chester (in which Diocese it then stood). The church was virtually completed by June two years later but had to wait until 9 December 1828 to be consecrated by Dr. John Bird Sumner, the recently appointed Bishop of Chester. It was restored in 1884 by Joseph Stretch Crowther. It was the first church to be built to serve the expanding population of Hulme, there having been no mediaeval church here. The site was given by Wilbraham Egerton of Tatton Park and the church, which was entirely paid for out of the First Parliamentary Grant, cost £15,025. It evidently took some time for the scheme for building a church in Hulme to become effective. The Commissioners for Building New Churches recorded in their first report of February 1821 that "Hulme in the parish of Manchester" was amongst the "Places in which the Board have deemed it expedient that additional churches or chapels should be built", but the Commissioners did not receive plans until 1823 and they were not approved until 1825. When the church began in 1826 it was assumed that it would be finished by January 1828, but in the event it took six months longer.
Exterior Description
The tower is about a hundred and thirty-five feet tall and has a strong presence. This is the result of the strong vertical emphasis and above all the tall corner pinnacles. The tower is of four stages, the lowest and highest of roughly similar heights and the intermediate stages rather less tall. Access is by a spiral staircase in the south-east angle reached by a door in the nave. The lowest stage has a doorway in the west wall under a moulded arch with panelling filling the spandrels between it and a horizontal pierced parapet above. Above this is a tall two-light window with stone bar tracery and there are identical windows in the north and south walls also. Above the windows are circular clock faces within moulded surrounds set against a panelled background under a pedimented head finished with a foliate finial. The middle stage, which is slightly set back from that below, has two glazed two-light windows in each face for the ringing chamber, all of the same design, though much smaller, as the windows below. Slender buttresses run up the middle of each wall between the windows and terminate in finials above the castellated cresting with which this stage is finished. The uppermost stage which houses the bells has a tall traceried louvred light in each face on each side of which rise buttresses which run up through the parapet to terminate in small pinnalces. Since there are also pinncales centrally placed over the window heads, there are thus three lesser pinnacles to each side of the parapet in addition to the great corner pinnacles, which give quite a mediaeval feeling of exuberance to the profile of the tower. The corners are supported by paired set-back buttresses with encircling stringcourses rising into gablets to mark each stage. At the mid-point of the belfry stage similar stringcourses with gablets mark the transition from buttresses round a polygonal core to proper octagonal turrets which are decorated with panelling and rise far above the pierced parapet into big crocketted pinnacles which make the whole composition similar in spirit to, though more attenuated than, the great tower at Wrexham.
The rest of the exterior, though somewhat repetitive in detail, is grand and imposing. The six bays of the aisle wall are divided by slender buttresses with several off-sets which rise above the castellated parapets in square pinnacles with gablets and foliate finials. Between them are three-light transomed windows with Perpendicular panel tracery. The transom marks the position of the galleries inside. At the west end are shallow bays with canted corners each side of the west tower housing staircases to the galleries as well as porches to the aisles. These are lit by windows in the west wall and the canted walls of design identical to those of the lowest stage of the tower. The porches across the angled walls are also like that in the base of the tower. The nave proper also has embattled parapets but no pinnacles save at the eastern corners where there are two large pinnacles comparable with those on the west tower. The east walls of the aisles have a blind window at the upper level with tracery like those in the west wall and between these the sanctuary breaks forward with a three-sided apse, each wall of which has a tall two-light window with tracery like those in the east and west walls of the nave but much taller, and transomed. The buttresses at the angles are also like those of the nave. The parapet is decorated with small blind quatrefoils in squared recesses and is castellated like the nave parapets. In the north-east angle is a small vestry which may have been added by Crowther; it has an octagonal plan and a pretty octagonal pyramidal roof covered with hexagonal slates which give a fish scale effect.
Building Fabric and Features
Stained Glass
c.1958
In the east window, two lights with Christ with St. Blaise and St. Nicholas of Myra against clear glass background; below are a man with a shuttle and a woman with a bobbin; c.1968, by Francis Skeat.
Interior
Interior Description
The interior of the church is tall, spacious and dignified. It was built to hold 2,000 people, about a third of the pews originally being reserved. The floor is paved with stone flags in the alloys and laid with wooden boards under the pews. At the west end a tall arch within two separate orders of shafts and mouldings opens into the tower-space which originally formed the main entrance to the church. There was at first a west gallery across this arch at the same level as the side galleries. The arcades consist of tall slender clusters of shafts on high plinths to raise them above the box pews which survived until 1884. The main shafts in the principal directions have moulded bases and foliate capitals and lesser shafts between continue unbroken into the mouldings of the arches. The simple panelled fronts of the galleries abut each pillar about half-way up. Above each pillar a fóliate cortel carries a small colonette and from the head of each of these spread the ribs of a low-pitched but very attractive tierceron vault carried out in wood. This is decorated with chevrons along the ribs and foliate bosses of cast iron at the intersections. The roofs of the aisles above the galleries are divided into rectangular panels by cast iron ribs, also painted with chevrons, and the shallow polygonal apse has a vault similar to that of the nave adapted to the apsidal shape. It is separated from the nave by a four-centred chancel arch rising the whole height and spanning the width of the building so that it makes a minimal division of the space. The apse was originally filled with glass by Thomas Willement, dating from 1845.
Originally the communion table stood in the apse with brass rails round it and identical pulpit and reading desk on each side in front of it. It was presumablyin 1884 that the present sanctuary arrangements were made, with the choirstalls placed in the eastern bay of the nave within a low wooden screen two steps above the nave floor. Vestries are placed behind an oak screen on the north side of this bay and the organ, originally built in 1830 in the west gallery, was moved to the corresponding position on the south side (necessitating the removal of one bay of the gallery) in 1893.
Fixtures and fittings
Altar
The altar is of oak with panelled front and sides.
Pulpit
1893
The pulpit stands near the front of the north gallery; it is an octagonal design of oak with traceried panels on a tall moulded stone base.
Lectern
The lectern is a small oak eagle.
Font (object)
The font may be original ; it is octagonal, of stone on a slender panelled stem and with a shallow bowl with quatrefoils on each face.
Organ (object)
1829
The organ was built for the 1829 Chester Music Festival by Renn and Boston; it was placed on a temporary platform at the west end of Chester cathedral and afterwards was taken down and moved to Hulme, where it was re-erected on the west gallery.
Churchyard
Grid reference: SJ 828 972
Burial and War Grave Information
It is unknown whether the building is consecrated.
It is unknown whether the churchyard has been used for burial.
It is unknown whether the churchyard is used for burial.
It is unknown whether the churchyard has war graves.
Environment
Ancient, Veteran & Notable Trees
Caring for God's Acre is a conservation charity working to support groups and individuals to investigate, care for, and enjoy the wildlife and heritage treasures found within churchyards and other burial grounds. Look on their website for information and advice and please contact their staff directly. They can help you manage this churchyard for people and wildlife.
To learn more about all the species recorded against this church, go to the Burial Ground Portal within the NBN Atlas. You can check the spread of records through the years, discovering what has been recorded and when, plus what discoveries might remain to be uncovered.
There are no records of Ancient, Veteran or Notable Trees within the curtilage of this site.
Renewables
| Renewable | Installed |
|---|---|
| Solar PV Panels | No |
| Solar Thermal Panels | No |
| Biomass | No |
| Wind Turbine | No |
| Air Source Heat Pump | No |
| Ground Source Heat Pump | No |
| Ev Charging | No |
Species summary
There are no records of species within the curtilage of this site.
Caring for God's Acre is a conservation charity working to support groups and individuals to investigate, care for, and enjoy the wildlife and heritage treasures found within churchyards and other burial grounds. Look on their website for information and advice and please contact their staff directly. They can help you manage this churchyard for people and wildlife.
To learn more about all the species recorded against this church, go to the Burial Ground Portal within the NBN Atlas. You can check the spread of records through the years, discovering what has been recorded and when, plus what discoveries might remain to be uncovered.
'Seek advice' Species
More information on species and action to be taken upon discovery.
Caring for God's Acre is a conservation charity working to support groups and individuals to investigate, care for, and enjoy the wildlife and heritage treasures found within churchyards and other burial grounds. Look on their website for information and advice and please contact their staff directly. They can help you manage this churchyard for people and wildlife.
To learn more about all the species recorded against this church, go to the Burial Ground Portal within the NBN Atlas. You can check the spread of records through the years, discovering what has been recorded and when, plus what discoveries might remain to be uncovered.
Further information
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