OUR ANGEL

In 2007 the church was being redecorated. While the painters were busy the burglar alarm suddenly went off which was very strange because it wasnt set whilst they were in. The vicar was called to switch it off and while he was there one of the painters said, "Shall we tell the vicar what we've found?" and pointed to the east wall of the church and an exposed wall painting. They had uncovered this while scraping the wall and were about to repaint it. The vicar told them to stop work and immediately called in our church architect who was an expert in medieval churches. He arrived, scrambled up the scaffolding, examined the painting and declared that in his opinion they could be medieval. He took photos and promised to contact people who he was sure could help in putting a date to the paintings.

He unfortunately died before much could be done but he had contacted English Heritage who, by looking at photos, declared that they were Victorian.

The church underwent major renovation work in 1844 and a new East Window was put in along with a wooden ceiling. The window seems to have cut through the painting while the head of Christ is now above the wooden ceiling. It seems strange that the paintings were done in the Victorian era, as English Heritage would have us believe, and were immediately vandalised by the insertion of a new window. It just doesn't make sense.

The church has had visits from some conservators who will be reporting back to the architect with regards to further work that can be done to conserve the paintings but in the meantime we have had a flurry of media interest with BBC Look North featuring us in one of their programmes and the Yorkshire Post doing a write up.

Photographs of the Angel can be found in the Photo Gallery