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Why it's time to cherish Spalding's historic Parish Church




There are many ways to describe Spalding Parish Church - but ‘hidden gem’ really shouldn’t be one of them.

This magnificent medieval marvel reaches high into the South Holland sky and has been a fixture of the town for more than 700 years.

It’s full of impressive architectural wonders - a beautiful beamed roof, colourful stained glass windows, curious carved characters, the delicately decorated chancel roof - and its features encompass the town’s long story, a tale that it has been at the heart of.

The nave looking eastwards. (48673653)
The nave looking eastwards. (48673653)

This Grade I listed building really has not been hiding.

And yet, for some reason, there’s a feeling that the town doesn’t make enough of this building - the Parish Church of St Mary and St Nicolas to give it its full name - and perhaps that’s why Rev John Bennett gets told it is something of a ‘hidden gem’.

Perhaps what they really mean is ‘underrated’, which would be fair.

I’d hazard a guess that there are plenty of people in the area who have never set foot through its doors.

Maybe this year, as our usual summer plans are thrown into doubt by the continuing fallout of the coronavirus pandemic, it’s time to appreciate what we’ve actually got on our doorstep?

If you do go for the first time, I’d wager that you’d be pleasantly surprised.

The nave looking westwards (48673691)
The nave looking westwards (48673691)

Rev Bennett certainly was taken aback on his first visit.

He told me: “The first time I walked through the north door I just couldn’t get my bearings at all - it just seemed to go on forever.”

One thing that is striking is how much the building does reflect the town’s past. Yes, it’s a church - and there’s everything you’d expect from a grand, historic parish church here - but there’s more to it than religion.

As a venue it has hosted concerts from the likes of Lesley Garrett as well as Radio 4’s Any Questions and The Kitchen Cabinet and even a performance from Maasai Warriors.

There are memorials to all those who died in the world wars, windows which depict the area’s farming prowess and features which commemorate the influential Johnson family, who lived at Ayscoughfee Hall, as well as other notable families who have shaped the town’s past.

For almost 300 years, the town’s grammar school was housed in the St Thomas’ Chapel too.

The proud vicar, who has been in place since 2010, explained: “I think it’s a fine building - you can dig deeper and there are layers and layers of information about the history of the town.

“For the town this has always been the main public building. When boats came up the river, merchants would come in here and do their deals.

“There’s plenty of history here. You can stand in a place that has stood here, with the same purpose, for so long and imagine the people who came through here with their different lives in different times.

“We have a tagline on our website that we have stood here through flood, plague, famine and war - and it’s true.”

Rev John Bennett outside The Parish Church of St Mary and St Nicolas, Spalding (48673671)
Rev John Bennett outside The Parish Church of St Mary and St Nicolas, Spalding (48673671)

For a building this old, indeed, Covid is just another line in its long history.

It has stayed open throughout the pandemic - although weddings and christenings have been in shorter supply. The choir, so central to the church, is now finally able to return after a Covid-enforced break.

Maybe it takes a shock like Covid to get us to appreciate what we have? There’s certainly a sense that we haven’t been doing that before.

Rev Bennett explained: “If you go to Lincoln, Sleaford, Boston - they all promote their historic, ancient parish church in a way that they don’t here.

“We have been told that we have got lots of churches but I think this is in a category of its own. It was here probably 500 years at least before any other one.

“There’s nowhere quite like this in terms of architecture.”

He added: “Why not see it in the same light as Ayscoughfee Hall? Something that belongs to the town. It doesn’t belong to the church exclusively, or people of faith.

“It’s the parish church of the town of Spalding.”

Are we not just bad at promoting ourselves in this neck of the woods?

“I think you’re absolutely right. Lincolnshire itself has got more medieval churches than any other county so we just take them for granted,” Rev Bennett added. “I’ve often said that at the 2012 Olympics Tim Berners Lee flashed around the Olympic Stadium ‘this is for everyone’.

“That’s what I feel about this building. The doors are open, people can come in in their own time and do whatever they want, get from it whatever they want to find.”

What, I wonder, is it like to have this as a workplace? As nice as the Free Press office is, this is, well, somewhat grander.

With a glint in his eye, the vicar was at his most, well, reverential, when answering: “I must admit when I am locking up I just stare, usually sing, and just wonder at it.

“I wonder at it as a holy place and have a sense that this is the House of God, this is the Gate of Heaven

“It is wonderful. I never tire of it. There are nearly always things you have not noticed or things you can look at more closely.”

The Great West Window (48673682)
The Great West Window (48673682)

Five highlights at Spalding Parish Church:

  1. The heraldic hatchments of the Johnson family. These diamond shaped panels hang in the nave, with a guide available to help you decode their story in full.
  2. The impressive Great West Window, of 1866. It’s behind you as you enter the west door. It depicts Christ and the apostles and is one of a series of colourful windows to explore.
  3. The memorial to Captain John Perry next to the west door. He was a fascinating character who lost his arm in a battle with the French in 1691, worked for Tsar Peter the Great and later helped drain the Fens around Spalding.
  4. The corbels. These stone heads are at the foot of the trusses that support the roof. Watch as they progress from vegetable to animal to man as you go from west to east.
  5. The beautiful ceiling in the chancel, which depicts the life of Jesus and Mary in medieval patterns and symbols.

The story of the church

  • The foundations of the building were laid in 1284 by Prior William de Littleport to replace the old parish church, which was on the site of the town’s market place today.
  • In 1360, the west and south aisles were widened and the tower was built. The spire was added about 100 years later.
  • The pillars were raised by two metres and an oak roof added in 1450.
  • Spalding Grammar School was in an upper room at the St Thomas’ Chapel from 1588 to 1881, when it moved to Priory Road.
  • Extensive restoration was carried out under the direction of Sir George Gilbert Scott in 1865-7. Scott was a prolific Gothic revival architect who worked on Midland Grand Hotel at St Pancras Station in London as well as a string of historic churches.
  • The main entrance was moved to the west door in 2003.

The 400-year-old secret to the church’s financial success

While the Diocese of Lincoln wrestles with financial challenges and dwindling congregations, Spalding’s Parish Church has a more stable future than many others.

That’s largely thanks to Spalding Rectory Feoffees, a charity set up in 1620 by thirteen notable townspeople.

These feoffees - old English for trustees - still pay for the vicar to this day.

Rev Bennett said: “We are well served because we are not dependent on the Diocese of Lincoln to pay stipends - that’s a very strange historical oddity. I don’t know of anything similar anywhere else in the country.

“We never want to take it for granted but we look forward without great fear and trepidation for the next 10, 20, 30 or 50 years and we don’t really need to worry about finances.”



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