Lesser jewels that light up cathedral’s shadow

DURHAM Cathedral has dominated the city’s unforgettable skyline for more than nine centuries, dwarfing and putting into the shade, sometimes literally, the other churches that are such an important part of Durham’s fabric.

While many are wellsupported by stalwart congregations, most are overlooked by tourists, whose must-see priority is, understandably, the magnificent cathedral.

But the minor jewels have played their own parts in the story of the city and of its great mother church.

Just a few yards to the east of the cathedral, at the junction of Bow Lane and North Bailey, stands the church of St Mary-le-Bow, said to have been built on the site of the shelter, of branches or boughs, hurriedly built to house St Cuthbert’s remains when they first arrived in Durham in 995AD.

The south wall of the church once formed part of the castle’s inner bailey and, in 1637, part of the building and the old Bailey gateway collapsed. Rebuilding did not even begin for more than 30 years and was not completed until 1685. The tower dates from 1702 – the first year of the reign of Queen Anne. St Mary’s has not been used for worship since 1967 and became a heritage centre in 1976.

The point where the North Bailey becomes the South Bailey is Prior Castell’s 16th Century gateway, the upstairs room of which used to be St Helen’s Chapel. It leads into a large enclosed area on the cathedral’s south side, known as The College.

Tucked away on the west side of the South Bailey is the church of St Mary-the- Less which, since 1919, has been the chapel of St John’s College.

Built originally in the 12th Century by the powerful Neville family, it was rebuilt in 1846-47 by the Scottishborn architect George Pickering, who probably followed the original floor plan and certainly reused some of the stone. Pickering practised in Sunderland and Durham, supervised the renovation of Lambton Castle and succeeded the great Ignatius Bonomi as clerk to Durham Cathedral.

Although Durham’s famous Polish dwarf, Joseph Boruwlaski, was buried in the cathedral, his memorial, felt not to be appropriate for the great church, was set up in St Mary-the-Less.

Why poor St Mary is called “the less” is something of a mystery. It could be that the name refers to Mary Magdalene, who was less important in the eyes of the Church than Mary, the mother of Jesus.

Or it could be that as Durham Cathedral is dedicated to St Cuthbert and the Blessed Virgin Mary, this is the lesser church, in terms of importance, to be dedicated to St Mary.

Or it could be that the name is St Mary in the Leys – leys being a meadow or damp patch of ground.

In Church Street, across the River Wear to the southeast of the cathedral, is St Oswald’s Church, dedicated to the Christian Northumbrian king who died in the year AD642, near the modern Oswestry and whose skull is in St Cuthbert’s tomb in the cathedral. The church stands high above the river gorge, and its earliest parts date from the late 12th Century.

Land subsidence and general neglect of the site caused the first of several restorations to be carried out by Ignatius Bonomi in 1834.

Despite his best efforts, still more work had to be carried out 30 years later, at which point several medieval grave covers were used to repair the tower stairs.

Several pieces of Anglo Saxon stonework have been found on this site, fuelling the theory that there was a very early church here.

Archaeologists had the opportunity to investigate further after a fire caused extensive damage in 1984.

They discovered that there had been an earlier church on the site with a typically Saxon apsidal or semicircular, east end, so it seems certain that St Oswald’s was a place of Christian worship even before the Saxon cathedral was founded.

And it seems likely that this is where a priest called Peohtwine was consecrated Bishop of Galloway on July 17, AD762.

In the market place, where it occupies the entire north side, is the church of St Nicholas, designed by John Piggott Pritchett, of Darlington, and erected in 1857-58. When completed, it was christened “the most beautiful specimen of church architecture in the north of England” and was the first in the city to boast a spire, although its inclusion was nearly an afterthought.

The designing of the church was not Pritchett’s original commission. His first instruction had been to repair the already muchrepaired old medieval church, but when the piazza, used latterly as a corn market, which leaned against its south wall, was demolished in 1854, it was realised that further repairs would be completely ineffective.

The decision whether to build anew was made easier by generous donations from the new incumbent, George Townshend Fox, and the Marchioness of Londonderry, who gave £1,000. Fox dug deep into his pocket later to finance the inclusion of the steeple.

St Margaret’s, across the river from the cathedral, is one of the oldest churches in the City of Durham and dates in part from the middle of the 12th Century.

The Frosterley marble font dates from the 12th Century.

Elements of the south aisle of the first church on the site in about 1150 still stand. The north aisle was added in 1195 and the south aisle was rebuilt in 1343. During the 15th Century, a new tower was built.

The first of 20 visits made to Durham by John Wesley was in 1742, but although the city had a Methodist Society before his death in 1799, it had no proper meeting house until, in 1770, one was opened in what was then Rattan Row – now Court Lane.

It stood until its demolition 170 years later.

When Wesley visited the city in 1788, he complained that a bigger chapel was needed. One was built and opened in 1808 on land behind the present Royal County Hotel, in Old Elvet.

After some divisions in the Methodist movement, the New Connexion Bethel Chapel was built in North Road, in 1854, and the present Old Elvet Methodist Church in 1902.

The old Wesleyan chapel behind the Royal County was sold first to the Salvation Army as its Durham Citadel before becoming a bakery in its last years. The modern Roman Catholic tradition in Durham has its roots in Saxon times but suffered hard times during the 16th Century, when following the so-called old religion could be punished by the death penalty.

Roman Catholic priests ministered secretly in the area, as they did throughout the country, but they knew what their fate would be if they were discovered. In 1570, Father Thomas Plumtree was hanged, drawn and quartered in the Market Place for having said a Mass in the cathedral during the Rising of the North.

Twenty years later, four more priests were executed at Dryburn and, in 1594, John Boste met his end.

Despite the omnipresent danger, Catholicism survived in Durham and organised religious observance was gradually restored, although as late as 1688, the Jesuit chapel in Old Elvet was destroyed by a mob opposed to the rule of the Catholic King James II. The heavy legal penalties against Catholic priests were in place until 1778 and not until 1791 were Roman Catholic meeting houses allowed.

In 1827, during the reign of George IV, the new Roman Catholic St Cuthbert’s church, designed by the famous Ignatius Bonomi, was opened to replace the two former Elvet chapels.

The Roman Catholic parish church of St Godric, dedicated to one of the hermits of nearby Finchale, was opened in November 1864 and, within 100 years, was linked with St Bede’s, both in one parish. The original plans for St Godric’s were drawn up by Edward Pugin and included a tower with a spire, but the tower could not be afforded until 1909. In 1985, a year after the great conflagration at St Oswald’s, St Godric’s was also badly damaged by fire, the roof collapsing into the nave, leaving the parish with the task of raising £100,000 for the repairs.

There are churches and meeting places of several other denominations in and around Durham City. They are all rich in architecture and history, which they work so hard to conserve, but it is the work they do now which is their prime concern and which contributes so much to the life of this timeless city.