Church Of St John The Evangelist

The Church of St John the Evangelist is a church built between 1880 and 1882 by Myres Veevers and Myres of Preston, on the site of an earlier chapel dating back to 1830. The church is constructed of tooled stone, rock-faced, with slate roofs featuring gable copings bearing crosses. It is designed in the Early English style, with steeply pitched roofs, moulded string courses, and gableted buttresses. Most windows are coupled lancets with hoodmoulds and figured stops.

The tower, located in the north-east corner of the transept and chancel, is three-stage with angle buttresses. It incorporates a two-story stair turret projecting on the east side, topped with a foliated cap. The north doorway is arched, with three orders incorporating shafts with foliated capitals. Belfry windows are 3-light and louvred, with gargoyles, an embattled parapet featuring blind quatrefoils, and crocketed pinnacles with finials.

The adjoining transept has angle buttresses and a gableted doorway with a moulded arch and foliated shafts. The nave’s north wall features three bays with buttresses, bracketed eaves, and coupled lancet windows; a basement entrance is also present. The south aisle has five bays with similar buttresses and windows. A large, gabled porch, timber-framed in a Jacobean style and set on a stone plinth, stands to the second bay, accessed through a wide opening with a moulded arched doorway and double doors.

The west end consists of two unequal gables; the west window of the nave has five stepped lights with cusped heads, each with a hoodmould and foliated stops. Plate tracery roses top both gables. At the east end of the aisle is a matching style organ-house. The chancel has prominent buttresses and three two-light windows with quatrefoils within the heads.

Inside, the nave’s combination with a large aisle creates a broad internal space. A five-bay south arcade features plain columns with heavily foliated capitals (each different) and matching responds supporting moulded two-centred arches. A similar two-bay arcade is present to the north transept. The rounded chancel arch is screened by a Perpendicular-style screen, installed in 1905, featuring a coved canopy and elaborate carving. A memorial window from 1899, dedicated to Thomas Richard Crosse, is positioned at the west end. This memorial includes a portrait of Crosse in military uniform within the top of the northernmost light, acknowledging the Crosse family of Shaw Hill as principal benefactors of the church.