St Mary the Virgin, Arkengarthdale
St Mary the Virgin, Arkengarthdale
St Mary’s is a Grade II parish church at Langthwaite in Arkengarthdale, North Yorkshire, in the Diocese of Leeds, built to replace a flood-damaged medieval church at Arkle Town.
- Location
- Arkengarthdale, Yorkshire
- Country
- England
- County
- Yorkshire
- City / town
- Arkengarthdale
- Address
- Arkengarthdale, Yorkshire, DL11 6SP
- Postcode
- DL11 6SP
- Built
- 1818
- Denomination
- Church of England
- Dedication
- Mary
- Diocese
- Leeds
- Parish
- Arkengarthdale
- Grade
- II
- Style
- Early English (Commissioners' type)
- Materials
- Coursed rubble with graduated Westmorland slate roof
- Grid reference
- NZ 003 027
- Opening hours
- St Mary's is always open.
- Access
- Accessible toilets in church. Level access throughout
Overview
Historic England records a church of 1818 for George Brown, lord of the manor of Arkengarthdale. The fabric is coursed rubble with a graduated Westmorland slate roof. It is a Commissioners’-type church in Early English style: nave and chancel under one roof, a north vestry and a three-stage west tower. Five bays of two-light Y-tracery windows are divided by thin buttresses; the east window is of four lights. Entry is by the west door of the tower under a four-centred arch. The interior is a single hall without aisles or chancel division, with a west gallery on quadrilobate wooden columns. Fittings include the original font with a fluted column and pyramidal cover, a second font given by George Gilpin-Brown in 1891, fragments of stained pitch-pine box pews, an original pulpit and a simple turned-baluster altar rail.
The listing notes that the building replaced an older church at Arkle Town undermined by flooding. Wikipedia, citing the Victoria County History, states that the medieval church was pulled down in the 1810s and that, although the style resembles Commissioners’ churches, it was not funded by a parliamentary grant. There is a reredos and plaque by Robert Thompson.