St. Cuthbert, Darlington, (Restored by George Gilbert Scott)

St. Cuthbert

Restored by George Gilbert Scott

Restored 1862-66

Darlington

Source: Illustrated London News

“The fine old fine old parish church of St. Cuthbert, Darlington, after being closed during nearly four years for restoration, under the supervision of h architect, Mr. Gilbert Scott, was lately reopened for public worship. This church dates from 1192; it was the last great work of Bishop Pudsey; but, after having been proceeded with to the height of about 20 ft. from the foundation, was left exposed to the weather for nearly thirty years, after which, using up the materials provided by the founder, the builders added fresh stonework of a later period of architecture. [Continued below]

[Click on image to enlarge it.]

You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the Hathi Trust Digital Library and The University of Michigan Library and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one. — George P. Landow

Accompanying article in Illustrated London News continued

Hence the difficulty which has existed until the last few years in affixing any exact date to the erection of this building. The shape of the church is cruciform: from the vest entrance to the east end of the chancel it measures 130 ft., from north to south ends of the transepts 75 ft.; the breadth of nave is 24 ft., with two aisles. each 10 ft, wide. The roof is very high pitched, and covered with lead. It had been lowered 6 ft. about a century ago, but has been restored to its original height, and is now open to the body of the church — a flat plaster ceiling, which entirely hid the gable windows of the nave and transepts, and the lantern windows of the tower, having been removed. The tower was originally built to sustain a spire of wood covered with lead; but in the fifteenth century a belfry and stone spire were added, which proved too heavy for the piers; and consequently the windows nearest them, which originally were too weak for the superstructure, were closed in to act as buttresses, and a very solid arch was put up between the eastern piers to prevent internal compressure. This was subsequently used as the rood screen, and since as the organ-gallery, giving to this church its peculiarly cathedral appearance. The tower rests upon two superb arches of rectangular mouldings. They rise from clustered piers, of which the main pillars are of a pointed section; each of them is furnished with two sub-pillars, inclosed in rectangular formations. A large square block intervenes between the inner mouldings of the arch and the apsis. Borne of the capitals are flowered, others moulded only. Above these tower arches — four arches opening into the roof. Each aisle opens into a transept by a single arch of fine detail. The three westernmost aisles in the nave are very wide and obtuse, of three orders, chamfered; while the easternmost is much narrower, of fine proportion and elegant mouldings. The pillars are cylindrical and octagonal alternately, except the most eastern, which rests upon a clustered respond and a very beautiful pier composed of four cylindrical and filleted shafts, separated by pear-shaped and pointed bowtels. The piers supporting the tower having given signs of shrinking some five years ago, and having been pronounced in a dangerous condition, the opinion of Mr. Scott was taken and the building placed under his care. He determined to employ upon this the plan he is now carrying out on a still larger scale at St. David’s — namely, to suspend the tower, belfry, and spire upon shoring and take out in detail the eastern piers of tne tower, replacing them with new material and upon a perfectly strong and safe foundation. This immense weight having hitherto been resting upon mere round stones from the bed of the Tees, which had been disturbed by the dangerous custom of making vaults inside the church, nearly 5000 square feet of shoring were used, and every precaution taken to ensure success, which in this case has been complete.

The transepts are peculiarly beautiful in this church. They are ornamented by an arcading of a peculiarly beautiful character, which had been positively hidden by brick and plaster, one window being closed up entirely. The capitals are all fine: the foliage is of peculiar beauty. The west front is very fine. Above the deeply-reoessed doorway is an arcade of five obtuse arches, with banded pillars, two of which open as windows, over these a triplet, the centre only open in the gable. These three windows are filled with three beautiful stained-glass windows, by Messrs. Clayton and Bell, of London, the two lower being medallion, and the gable window containing the effigy of the patron saint. The south transept has four lights, disposed two and two, with a circular window in the gable. The north has five lights, two and two, the fifth in the gable: four of these have been filled in with stained glass, as well as two more windows in the eastern sides of the transepts. The aisle windows are square-headed and decorated, and date from the fifteenth century, when the high-pitched aisles of the original fabric gave place to those of the present form. A proposal was made to restore these aisles to their original character; but Mr. Scott's wise conservatism prevented this removal of the landmarks of architecture. The restoration of the chancel has been a work very successfully carried out by a local architect, Mr. Patchett. The eastern front, which had been most barbarously rebuilt in 1748, has been taken down and rebuilt; and as, fortunately, the builder had used the original stone*, these were placed together, alonp with remains in the north and south walls, and the sills remaining in their original position, have enabled the architect to present one of the very finest east ends that exist in any part of England. The seven lights are arranged three and three, the seventh being in the gable, and when these shall be filled with stained glass of good quality the effect will be magnificent.

The pews of this church, which had been pronounced the woret-pewed church in England, have been all swept away; and the human remains beneath the floor have been either removed and reinterred, or else covered over with concrete. Some idea may be formed of the extent of burials from the fact that the soil had risen far above the bases of the pillars, and that above 300 skulls were removed in one day.

The pulpit, of Caen stone and marble, was designed by Mr. Scott, and as well as a very handsome front in grey marble, resting upon roee-ooloured and green marble pillars, is the work of Mr. Farmer, of London, by whom the seats and chair-stalls were made.

Bibliography

“St. Cuthbert, Darlington.” Illustrated London News. (24 February 1866): 189-90. Hathi Trust Digital Library version of a copy in the University of Michigan Library. Web. 26 December 2015. The text above was created from the page images web version with ABBYY FineReader.

Last modified 24 May 2024