Church Of St James

Church of St James, St James's Road, St James's End, Northampton

This is a large red-brick church built between 1868 and 1871 by R. Wheeler of Tonbridge to serve the newly created parish of St James's, carved out from Dallington and Duston in 1866. The church was consecrated by Bishop Magee of Peterborough in 1871 at a cost of £3,100. The north aisle was added in 1900 by the Northampton architect Matthew Henry Holding, following the style of the existing building. The tower, conceived as a war memorial, was built in 1920 by the Northampton architect George Henry Stevenson. In 1981, three western bays were divided off to form a hall with ancillary facilities.

The church is constructed of red brick with ironstone and black brick polychrome decoration (the black bricks are in fact red ones that have been painted). Limestone provides the dressings to copings and sills. The clay tile roofs feature polychromatic treatment with dark and light red bands in the lower parts and a lozenge band below the apex.

The plan comprises a nave, north and south aisles, a semi-circular western baptistry, north porch, south-east tower, chancel, north organ chamber and vestry, and a south (now Lady) chapel opening off the choir.

The exterior displays a large, impressive red-brick structure typical of late nineteenth-century churches designed to provide substantial accommodation at modest expense. A tall six-bay clerestoried nave with flanking lean-to aisles is rendered in plain Early English style, relying upon polychrome effects for visual enhancement. The clerestory contains three equal-height lancets in each bay except the western bay, which has a single light. Short buttresses demarcate the aisle bays, with two equal-height lancets per bay. The south-east tower consists of three stages, the first being very tall, with set-back buttresses. The belfry lights are pairs of windows with thin Y-tracery, above which a clock stage leads to a plain parapet behind which sits a low pyramidal roof. The main roof runs continuously over the nave and chancel at the same level, with the clerestory continuing from nave into chancel. At the east end, a window features three equal lancets with a circular window above containing a central circle surrounded by a ring of eight smaller ones. There are no buttresses at the east end.

The interior is a voluminous space retaining considerable impressiveness despite the subdivision of the three western bays to create a hall. Six wide nave bays have stepped polychrome arches carried on short polished pink granite piers with heavy crocketed foliage capitals. The bases are moulded with square brick plinths. The nave and chancel are of equal width, separated by a chancel arch with polychrome head and polished detached responds. Two-bay arcades with granite piers and polychrome arches separate the chancel from the organ chamber to the north and the south chapel. The nave is covered with a five-sided boarded roof with tie-beams and crown posts. The chancel roof has seven sides and is also boarded. The aisles have plain lean-to roofs. A fine east window depicts the Nativity, Crucifixion and Resurrection with Old Testament scenes below.

The nave and aisles are furnished with open-back benches with shouldered ends. The stalls have poppy-headed ends. A First World War memorial rood screen has been repositioned to form the separation between the church and hall. The richest interior item is a polygonal pulpit constructed of beige and green marbles on a limestone and brick plinth, which was incomplete when the north aisle was added in 1900 and was finished in 1914. The organ, by Brindley and Forster of Sheffield, was dedicated in 1913. The font bowl is square, standing on a quatrefoil base with corner shafts.

To the north, on a separate plot in separate ownership, stands the associated school of 1866, also built in red brick with polychrome decoration.

The church was erected mainly through the efforts and generosity of the Reverend William Thornton of Kingsthorpe Hall, who purchased the land for both school and church. Services were held in the school before the church opened, following the school's opening on 28 May 1866. Building of the church began in 1868. Very little is known of the architect R. Wheeler of Tonbridge, though it is possible the name may have been confused with Robert Wheeler of Tunbridge Wells, who is documented as undertaking church commissions in Kent, Essex and Sussex between 1864 and 1878.

Matthew Henry Holding (1847–1910), who designed the north aisle addition of 1900, was a capable Northampton-based church architect articled to the Oxford architect Charles Buckeridge and subsequently employed for three years in the office of John Loughborough Pearson, one of the greatest church architects of the second half of the nineteenth century. Much of Holding's work reflects Pearson's influence.

George Henry Stevenson (born 1861), who designed the tower in 1920, was another Northampton architect articled to Holding from around 1879 and remaining as his assistant until 1889, when he established his own practice.