Church Of St James

The Church of St James is a parish church built in 1858 by Matthew Thompson, with eastern parts added in 1879, except for the north vestries which were constructed in 1962. The church is made of snecked stone, with the eastern parts featuring tooled squared stone and ashlar dressings, topped with slate roofs. It has an aisleless four-bay nave and a narrower west tower that includes a porch on the south side. The church features a taller crossing and a south transept with a porch on the east, as well as a polygonal sanctuary with small flanking chambers. The design reflects a free 13th-century style, becoming more elaborate in the later sections.

The nave is divided by stepped buttresses and has trefoiled lancet windows. The tower transitions to an octagonal shape above low angle buttresses, featuring a west window and belfry openings that are trefoiled lancets with cusped spherical triangles in their heads, topped by an octagonal stone spire. The gabled porch has diagonal buttresses and includes boarded doors with ornamental ironwork beneath a double-chamfered arch, which has head stops to the hoodmould and two spherical triangle lights in the west wall. The eastern parts of the church also have stepped buttresses and taller trefoiled lancets in the transept, along with foliate hood stops and a gable cross on the transept.

The sanctuary features a ridge of pierced cinquefoils and a wrought-iron finial cross. The south-east porch has similar doors to the main porch under a trefoiled arch and a two-light window in the 14th-century style on the east side. Inside, there is a plain chamfered tower arch and a tall hollow-chamfered arch leading to the crossing. The moulded sanctuary arch has foliate caps and head stops, flanked by smaller segmental-pointed arches leading to the side chambers. The sanctuary includes segmental-pointed arches to the side chambers and trefoil-headed niches further east. The crossing and transept boast a lofty roof with arch-braced trusses supported by moulded wall shafts. There is an ornate stone and marble pulpit, and early 20th-century glass depicting Northumbrian saints in the nave windows.