Church Of St Helen

Church of St Helen

This church at Burghwallis, constructed over several centuries from the 10th to 16th centuries with major restorations in 1864 and 1883, represents a significant example of medieval parish church architecture. The building is constructed of rubble, partly laid in herringbone fashion, with red tile roofs.

The church comprises a west tower, a three-bay nave with south porch, and a narrower three-bay chancel with a north vestry.

The tower dates to the 13th century and rises in three stages with a chamfered plinth and large quoins set against irregular rubble. Offsets mark the string courses between stages. The tower features round-headed loops on the west and south sides, and a small circular window reset in the second stage on the north side. The belfry stage has paired lancet openings divided by shafts. The top dates to the 15th century and comprises a string course and gargoyles beneath an embattled ashlar parapet with eight crocketed pinnacles.

The nave's south side displays a partly exposed plinth and large quoins set to herringbone walling. The south porch, constructed of plain ashlar in the 14th or 15th century, has a pointed-arched door with hoodmould and a coped gable to a ribbed ashlar roof. Beneath this, an altered Saxon south door retains renewed jambs and a segmental head beneath a round arch. To the right of the porch is a square-headed, three-light Perpendicular window and a renewed lancet window. The north wall shows herringbone-work in its lower section; a 19th-century buttress was built across a small square-headed north doorway flanked by two-light cusped windows with quatrefoils beneath pointed arches. The east gable has coped edges with an apex cross.

The chancel is lower than the nave and displays herringbone-work on its south side, extended eastward in large squared stone with large quoins. A slightly-pointed priests' door is flanked by windows similar to those on the north of the nave. A buttress to the right has a shorter 19th-century window beyond, and the gable has coped edges with a cross. The north vestry, a 19th-century gabled addition, has a door to the east and reuses a 15th or 16th-century north window of two quinquefoiled lights. The ashlar east end of the chancel features a pointed, three-light Perpendicular window with chamfered surround and hoodmould.

Interior

The tower arch features a 12th-century semicircular respond supporting a 13th-century pointed arch, the inner order chamfered. The nave roof, dating to the 19th century, has moulded tie beams, crown posts and collar purlin. The chancel has semi-octagonal responds to a broad, double-chamfered pointed arch, with a blind arch leading into the north vestry. A stone sedilia bench with shaped arms remains in the chancel, along with a pre-Reformation altar slab, reinstated in 1930. The chancel roof is a 19th-century barrel vault.

The furnishings include a Gothic Revival balcony built across the tower arch, and a round font bowl, possibly 12th-century, set on a later octagonal shaft. A late medieval rood screen, restored in 1881, comprises two-two-two divisions with ogee arches subdivided by pendants, topped by a vaulted canopy and cornice with carved vine trail and cresting. Oak panelling surrounds the east end, and a reredos dates to 1885.

Monuments

Numerous medieval cross slabs survive. In the nave is a slab with the brass of a knight in armour, thought to be Thomas Gascoigne (died 1554), with to its north a slab to William Adam (died 1554) bearing a rhymed inscription in old English. South of the altar is a slab with a jewelled cross, book and chalice, and an inscription around the rim to Richard Lyndall, rector (died 1460). North of the altar is a similar slab but without jewelling, inscribed to Henry Gascoigne, rector (died 1540). Other slabs and fragments are documented in Ryder, Saxon churches in South Yorkshire, County Archaeology Monograph No.2, 1982, pages 35–43.