Haggerston: St Columba
Overview
Grid reference: TQ 334 834
Both the church and the buildings adjoining it were built to the designs of James Brooks. The church was begun in 1867 and the parsonage and ancillary buildings in 1873. The mortuary chapel was added in the 1890's. This complex of church buildings is one of the few instances where Brooks original scheme was fully carried out.
Visiting and facilities
Building is closed for worship
Building
Ground Plan Description and Dimensions
Ground plan:
Long aisled nave with a crossing, shallow chancel and transepts, and a baptistry at the north west corner. Over the entrance porch on the north side of the church is a small mortuary chapel. The church forms the southern side of a courtyard, round which are grouped the parish buildings.
Description of Archaeology and History
Both the church and the buildings adjoining it were built to the designs of James Brooks. The church was begun in 1867 and the parsonage and ancillary buildings in 1873. The mortuary chapel was added in the 1890's.
Exterior Description
This complex of church buildings is one of the few instances where Brooks original scheme was fully carried out. Round a small courtyard are grouped a clergy house, which apparently contains seven sets of rooms for the male priests, a separate house for the sisters working in the parish (in this case the sisterhood of St. Peter from Kilburn), two fairly small parish halls with a caretaker's flat, and finally, the enormous church. All the buildings which make up this group are built in a warm red brick which is most attractive, and the roofs are tiled. Although the church is cruciform in plan the main emphasis is clearly longitudinal; the nave is both lengthy and high, the aisles and transepts extremely shallow. The external elevation of the east wall, which rises sheer from the road, can be divided into three sections. From the battered base of the wall rise three substantial buttresses; the two outer buttresses only rise to a third of the height of the wall, but the centre buttress is continued upwards to support a large empty canopied niche. Flanking the niche are two wide lancet windows with pointed drip-mouldings. The gable of the roof is pierced by a small sexfoil window and a triangle of three smaller roundels. On either side of the gable are brick pepperpot turrets with conical roofs. The side walls of the sanctuary, which is only one bay deep, are blind apart from a single window high up in the wall below the arcade. It seems possible that the arrangement of the centre section of the building with its stubby transepts may have been forced upon the architect by the limitations of the site, for marks upon the lower half of the blank gable wall of the south transept show that at one time buildings abutted onto it. At the south east corner of this transept is a small stair turret with a conical brick roof, and the gable is again flanked by two turrets of similar pattern. By contrast to the severe expanses of unrelieved brickwork in this transept, that on the north side, which faces into the courtyard boasts three large windows. All are of the same pattern, with two squat lancets and a rose in plate tracery, but the roses of the two lower windows are sexfoiled, that of the upper cinquefoiled. The transept roofs are slightly lower than 2 those of nave and chancel, but the junction is covered by the massive crossing tower, a brick essay in the Norman manner, with small lancet windows and a large pyramidal roof, topped by a small louvred timber gablet. The nave is five bays long, with a tall clerestorey and small windowless aisles below the enormous steep-pitched roof. The clerestorey windows are made up of the same combination of two lancets and a rose in plate tracery as those in the north transept. The fenestration of the west wall has been justly compared to that found in some Yorkshire abbeys, with four broad lancets at the lowest level, a triplet above them, and a sexfoil in the gable to finish the progression. On the north side of the nave at the west end of the building is the baptistry, in effect a subsidiary transept. The of the o baptistry is blind, but on the north wall are two pairs of lancets, the lower pair larger than the upper, and the gable of the wall is ornamented with a grid of raised brickwork. Tucked in the angle between this baptistry and the north wall of the nave is a small mortuary chapel, which lies parallel to the nave. The chapel is three bays long with a narthex at the western end and an apsidal termination at the eastern. The main body of the chapel is raised up over a loggia which shelters the entrance to the church. Housed within the narthex of the chapel is a hoist for raising the coffins; otherwise access to the chapel is from within the church. The mortuary chapel is not the work of Brooks, and was added by the Rev. Ernest Geldart later in the 19th century.
Interior
Interior Description
The west wall is perfectly flat, and the two tiers of windows are set into the walls under stilted arcades on ringed shafts. The nave arcades are of triple-moulded equilateral arches on short columns with four attached shafts and plain cushion capitals. The columns. were originally of brick, with stone shafts, but they showed signs of collapsing, and Brooks replaced them with stone. A single slender wall-shaft runs up from the spandrels of each arch to the roof brace to mark the bay divisions. Within each bay the clerestorey windows are set into the wall under plain moulded arches. The aisles behind the nave arcades are narrow and windowless, and their timber lean-to roofs are supported on elegant principal rafters of brick. The main roof is of an unusual kind with very long curved braces running up to support an arch-braced roof of conventionaltype, except that each pair of braces has a semi-circular profile. At the eastern end of the nave the lower roof braces frame the tall chancel arch, whose attached shafts have rough -hewn capitals. Beyond the arch is the crossing space, which is, in effect, the chancel, since the transepts are so shallow. Over the crossing is a simple quadripartite vault with ribs of stone and a blocked lantern opening. The south transept houses the organ and the north transept a shallow gallery. The sanctuary walls are bare, the windows set in deep reveals with heavy mouldings, and the junction between the walls and the groined roof so handled as to make it seem that the flat east wall is in fact, apsidal. The whole interior of the church has been whitened, although it was Brooks' intention that the red brick should be loft exposed. The windows are all clear-glazed.
Fixtures and fittings
Font (object)
The black marble octagonal bowl of the font is supported on a short fat column with eight marble colonettes. On each face of the font is inscribed a design which mirrors the arrangement of the clerestorey windows; on the eighth face is inscribed a cross.
Font (component)
The font has a fine steeple cover with a gabled base, and the counterweight of the cover is a corona of iron.
Reredos
1860s
The reredos is composed of five panels with gables above.
Pulpit
The large pulpit with its tester and highly coloured Italian marble baluster rails was another addition made by Fr. Le Couteur. Despite the vine-leaf motifs on the tester paying token homage to the late 19th century English Gothic school, the composition as a whole clearly owes a large debt to the Roman church.
Organ (object)
1874
By Allen of Bristol
Churchyard
Grid reference: TQ 334 834
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.
National Heritage record for England designations
There are no records of National Heritage assets within the curtilage of this site.
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 | N/A |
| Solar Thermal Panels | N/A |
| Biomass | N/A |
| Wind Turbine | N/A |
| Air Source Heat Pump | N/A |
| Ground Source Heat Pump | N/A |
| Ev Charging | N/A |
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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