Sacred Heart Catholic Church

Sacred Heart Catholic Church

Catholic church built in 1869 with near-contemporary extension and twentieth-century alterations. Designed by architect Edmund Kirby of Birkenhead. The building is constructed of squared rubble sandstone laid in shallow courses with ashlar red sandstone dressings and decorative banding. The roof is slated in wide bands of blue and grey fish-scale slates. The style is Early English.

The church follows a linear plan aligned east-west. It comprises a tower and spire to the north-east corner, an advanced entrance porch, narthex, baptistry, aisleless nave, sanctuary, Lady chapel, and an added confessional to the south side wall. An attached presbytery stands on the south side of the west end.

The east elevation is dominated by a tall wide gable to the nave rising from a shallow chamfered plinth. Within the gable apex is a massive circular window with circular lights encircling a central quatrefoil. To the right stands an advanced multi-stage square tower with stepped chamfered corners forming the base to an octagonal spire incorporating lucarnes to alternating facets. An advanced gabled porch is positioned at the centre of the gable, featuring a wide stepped pointed arch containing twin pointed arch-headed doorways. Above the doorways is a cinquefoil window. To the left is the baptistry with an angled end and single and two-light lancets with trefoil heads.

The south elevation has a five-bay nave side wall with stepped and gabled buttresses defining each bay. Each bay contains paired lancet windows on a cill band with banded heads set amidst an impost band. A plain eaves band runs below the steeply-pitched nave roof. A single-storeyed confessional was added to the centre of this elevation, with a hipped end to the roof and a pair of shallow-arch-headed windows to the south end. The original confessional at the west end of the nave survives within a semi-circular projection and features a banded conical stone roof. The sanctuary has a canted end with tall three-light windows with cinquefoil heads separated by tall stepped buttresses.

The north elevation is detailed generally as the south side but with a lower monopitch roof to the Lady chapel extending from the side of the sanctuary.

Interior features include three large stained glass windows by Meyer in the sanctuary, dating to 1881, and a further small window high on the south side. The sanctuary roof is arched with exposed rafters and a scalloped central truss. A small Lady chapel to the right has a single narrow stained glass window above the altar. To the left is a doorway to the vestry and a blocked entrance to the former confessional, now a store. The main altar survives but altar rails are missing. A carved wooden pulpit, formerly to the left of the chancel arch, is now positioned to the right. The nave contains contemporary pews, formerly arranged with an aisle on either side of a central bank, now reconfigured with a central aisle and extensions to the pew ends. Three doorways provide access to the added confessionals on the south side. Tall arch-braced king post roof trusses with collar beams rise from mid-wall corbels and support a multi-purlin roof structure with exposed rafters. The narthex at the east end houses the main entrance with stairs to the gallery. The gallery extends over the west end of the nave and contains the organ and reused pews from the nave for the choir.

The attached presbytery is built in matching stone with fish-scale slates in a vernacular style. Its windows, of varying sizes, are mullioned with ashlar dressings. The door has red sandstone ashlar dressings matching the church. The house contains five bedrooms but is altered and its interior is not of special interest.

The church and presbytery stand in an urban setting in a former coal mining area, surrounded by brick terraced housing. The site of the former school, a vacant plot to the south, and landscaped grounds to the east and south of the buildings complete the setting.

The parish was established in the nineteenth century to serve a growing local community of Irish immigrant families. The church was built on land donated by Lord Lilford with materials donated by John Holland, a local colliery manager. It was consecrated in 1869 and a foundation stone laid in 1875. The presbytery was built either at the same time or soon after, originally separate from the church building, with a linking section in matching materials added by 1894. The school opened in 1888 and was demolished around 2000. The church closed for worship in 2004.