St. Mary's Church

Appleton Wiske Northallerton England

 
HISTORY

 
No church is mentioned in Domesday 1086 but Saxon burial urns, found near the present Church, indicate some antiquity to the ground anyway as a Holy place. The oldest part of the Church, the fine Chancel Arch, dates from the twelfth century so it is possible that once the Conqueror had granted the Manor to Robert de Bruis it was not many years before a stone Church was built on the site in accordance with pious hopes of the Norman baronage. The buttresses are an addition of some two centuries later.

There seems some division of opinion about the "St. Mary" mentioned in the dedication. Three Catholic sisters, who gave twenty acres of land to the parish in 1586 to provide revenue for the illegal mass to be said once a year in the Church called it "The Chapel of St. Mary Magdalen in Appleton". By the eighteenth century the dedication was assumed to be to "St. Mary the Virgin". Perhaps the fact that the manorial dues from Appleton went to St. Mary's Abbey at York until 1536 had confused the genealogy.

The earliest literary reference to the Church at Appleton is mentioned of the visit of Edward I to hear mass in 1299.

During the reign of Elizabeth I and James there were several prominent families who continued to support "Papist View": One of the local family of Bowes was executed for harbouring a priest. In 1586 there were 28 Recusants in Appleton refusing to attend the Elizabethan Church. Between 1569 and 1630 the most frequent mentioned names are Bowes, Best, Lodge and Rayner. By the middle of the 18th century these names had given way to the family of Joseph and Elizabeth Tate, prosperous free holders and graziers.

The Parish records of Appleton begin in 1596, by which time the manor had passed to Theodore Goodwin of Norfolk and thence to Thomas Grange of Cambridge. Whether you attend Church was largely a matter of family and service loyalties and since the main landowners from 1613 to 1732 were Thomas Bowes and his descendants it is not surprising that at least 32 inhabitants of the village followed his noted recusancy in the 17th century. Heavy fines do not seem to have diminished their steadfastness.

From 1660 to 1770 there seems to have been a variable attendance at the Church and mush neglect of its fabric for in 1771 a humble petition from Appleton Wiske Church leaders and laity reported that the Church was too dangerous to worship in and "the same has now become so ruinous that it cannot any longer be supported but must be wholly taken down and rebuilt". £510 was needed for the entire work (which is believed to be a similar sum to that needed for the building of the new vestry in the 1960's).

Repairs were eventually made in 1802, a new roof, gallery and pews, the vestry and south porch being built and plain square east window inserted. In 1875 the Church was again re-roofed, the Chancel arch restored and new windows inserted.
 

 

An incised sundial on the outside wall at the south east angle still measures accurately.		 The white paint and blue and red texts of the interior give it a light and airy effect.
Today the Church has a bell tower at the west end, a grey-blue slate roof and stucco plaster porch with walls of grooved stone. The remains of the carved serpents, "paterae" and scallops can be seen on the 12th century chancel arch.
Inside can be seen the Royal Arms of George III and a 17th century painted board denoting a lady churchwarden, Mrs. George Rokeby. 

 

There is some fine Church plate, notably the 1673 cup made by Marmaduke Best of York.

 
In the 16th and 17th centuries there was a great tradition of bowmanship and the long bow was practised every Sunday in the churchyard. The incisions in the stone fabric of the Church are moree likely to have been made by bowmen sharpeneing arrows than by weavers sharpening shuttles in the 18th and 19th centuries, though this may have occurred too.
Entrance to the nave is now by the west door, the former north door and south doors having been walled up in 1760 and 1802.
One of the problems with St. Mary's is access. Houses have been built so close to the Church on the north and east sides that the Church is best seen from the neighbouring Church Farm. In 1938, Mr. Wilkinson bought a building which obscured the entrance to the Church and gave it to the Parish to be demolished. Miss Routledge paid the legal fees. A Lych Gate to serve both as entrance and a War Memorial as built at a cost of £50-0s-0d and was declared open in November 1938. Recently work to strengthen the buttresses and walls and to repair the roof has been completed and some of the old sandstone tombstones (inscriptions now obliterated) have been removed away to facilitate grass cutting
From the commemorative booklet produced for the opening of the Recreation Field June 1988 & written by
Margaret Walls
SERVICES
CHURCH BUILDING

 

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