Church of St Margaret and St James is a Grade I listed building in the Westmorland and Furness local planning authority area, England. First listed on 6 February 1968. A Medieval Church.
Church of St Margaret and St James
- WRENN ID
- grim-nave-sage
- Grade
- I
- Local Planning Authority
- Westmorland and Furness
- Constituency
- Westmorland and Lonsdale MP: Tim Farron (LD)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 6 February 1968
- Type
- Church
- Period
- Medieval
- Address
- Church of St Margaret and St James, Long Marton
- OS grid reference
- NY 666 239
- Coordinates
- 54.60999, -2.51774
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
The Church of St Margaret and St James is a parish church with parts of its north and west walls, and possibly part of the south wall, dating back to before the Norman Conquest. The tower was likely added in the early 12th century, with the chancel extended during the same century. A south chapel was added in the mid-15th century, and a vestry in the 16th century. The church underwent restoration in the late 19th century.
The early masonry features coursed blocks with wide jointing, and the long-and-short quoining at the northeast corner of the nave is prominent. There is a render on the west wall, which may be original, surviving inside the 19th-century gallery's stair turret. The later masonry consists of finer cut blocks, often snecked, with chamfered plinth and string courses at the east end. The roofs are covered with graduated slate and have stone copings.
The structure includes a west tower, nave, and chancel, with various types of windows, mostly mullioned. Notably, there is a pre-conquest window with a monolithic semicircular head on the north side of the nave, which is now blocked internally. The north side of the three-stage tower features an original paired belfry opening, while the other openings are 19th-century reconstructions. The gabled south porch was repaired in 1880.
The only west doorway, which now opens into the tower, is pre-conquest and has rebates and a draw-bar slot on its inner jambs. The south doorway was cut through at a later date. The tympana above these doorways, possibly pre-conquest, were reset during the 19th-century restoration, with the tympanum of the west door discovered when access for the current west gallery was created. The north doorway, which is partially blocked, dates to the 12th century, while the south chancel door is from the mid-14th century, along with the two-seater sedilia and piscina located on the south side of the chancel.
Local climate
Church of St Margaret and St James sits in one of the wettest parts of the UK, with an average of 1,200 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 91% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 82% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 57 freeze-thaw cycles a year, more than 96% of listed buildings. Of these, 36 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
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