United Reformed Church of St Columba, Tynemouth, North Tyneside

Summary

Former New United Presbyterian Church, now (2022) the United Reformed Church of St Columba, 1856 to 1857 by James Dobson. Late-C19 wings and an early-C20 hall. Italianate style.

Description

Former United Presbyterian Church, now the United Reformed Church of St Columba, 1856 to 1857 by John Dobson. Late-C19 wings and an early-C20 hall. Italianate style.

MATERIALS: Prudham sandstone ashlar, red brick, and a half-hipped and pitched Welsh slate roof.

PLAN: the building has a main block aligned north-south, with wings aligned east-west. Attached to the rear of the east wing is a north to south aligned block.

EXTERIOR: the main mid-C19 block, designed by John Dobson, is of two storeys and five bays and built of Prudham sandstone ashlar which is rusticated and quoined on the ground floor, with ashlar above. It has a roof hipped to the north and gabled to the south with two ashlar end stacks rising above a parapet. The late-C19 east and west red brick wings are of two storeys, a basement, and of three bays with a hipped roof. The west wing has a red brick banded gable end stack. Extending from the rear of the east wing is an early-C20 machine made red brick hall. This is of two storeys and five bays with stone dressed windows and doors and foundations. It has a pitched roof split on two levels and an off-set red brick chimney stack.

The front elevation of the main block has a projecting central entrance with a moulded and shouldered doorway set forward from a rusticated surround with a moulded cornice. It supports a plain entablature and a pair of fluted brackets with a heavy moulded canopy. Recessed within the doorway is a two-leaf half-glazed door with an over-light. To either side are two deeply recessed ground-floor windows with moulded windows surrounds containing six-over-six panes, and moulded panels below. On the first floor, six Doric columns and two square end pilasters rise from a plain string band to support a moulded entablature with a dentillated and moulded cornice with a balustraded parapet above. Between the Doric columns are five keystone arched windows with moulded capitals and pilaster jambs, which contain wooden framed round-headed windows. Information on the rear and side elevations was provided from photographs and other sources. The east and west return are of rubble construction, with three first-floor arched windows. The rear (south) elevation has four arched first-floor quoined and arched windows, the outer windows glazed and the inner two blocked in and joined with late-C19 red brick infill. Below the outer glazed windows is a ground-floor window with a flat lintel and sill.

The front elevations of the flanking side wings have rusticated ashlar quoins to the northern corners, moulded ashlar window and door surrounds, a plain ashlar eaves band and a gutter cornice. The west wing has a central door surround with a reinstated early-C21 doorway, accessed by steep steps, and a window either side with a bracketed and simply moulded window surround. On the first floor, there are three similar windows, all with two-over-two sashes. The basement is ashlar rendered with two reinstated early-C21 three-light windows. The right (west) return facing Howard Street has a two-storey bay window and the rear (south) elevation abuts 54 Howard Street. The east wing has an early-C21 banded and rusticated porch with a lead capped block pediment which partially blocks one of three tall ground-floor windows with bracketed window surrounds and lead pane windows. The first-floor windows match those of the west wing. The left (east) return has a single window on each floor with plain ashlar sills and lintels, with matching fenestration to the front elevation. Attached to the rear of the east wing, and facing towards Norfolk Street, is the early-C20 five-bay range. The east elevation has a gable ended southern bay with a stepped entrance sharing an ashlar lintel with a pair of top-light casement windows to the right (north). Above is a semi-circular first-floor window of three-lights, a second-floor pair of single-light windows and a blind slit window set in the apex of an ashlar coped and banded gable end supported on ashlar brackets. To the right (north) are four bays with four pairs of stone mullioned windows on the first floor and stone mullion and transom ground-floor windows. The west elevation has four pairs of squat first-floor windows. The south elevation abuts 72 Norfolk Street. All the windows have lead pane windows, apart from a single pair of basement windows now with ventilation grills.

INTERIOR: information on the interior was provided from photographs and other sources. The entrance vestibule has an L-shaped staircase either side of the central entrance door giving access to the U-shaped gallery of the double-height church. Next to the stairs is a door into an east and west room (former vestries), the east room gives access to the east wing with stairs with a C21 platform lift. Two mid-C19 south vestibule doors (sealed in 2007) led into the nave and they are decorated with a moulded wooden architrave with a pulvinated cornice and panelled door. Access is now provided by a central C21 glazed entrance, with a two-leaf half-glazed door, and subsidiary early-C20 doors. The double-height chapel has a suspended early-C20 ceiling with ventilation roundels. The choir and rostrum are panelled, with pilasters decorated with laurel leaf and floral stops below a moulded top rail. The east and west walls below the gallery have mid-C19 three-over-three sashes, four to the west and two to the east (some boarded in 2021). There is also a narrow light well and an east door gives access to the early-C20 hall. The U-shaped gallery has wood panelling around the north wall and stairwell entrances with wooden raked pews set behind a panelled parapet, each panel ornamented with a floral medallion motif, and a C21 raised brass handrail. It is partially supported by decorative cast-iron brackets which project forwards from ten columns.

At the south end of the church is the organ by Forster and Andrews of Hull set within panelled casework, ornamented with sunburst carving, behind a central rostrum and choir by Chapman of North Shields. Within Dobson’s church are also six stained glass windows, four facing south and one first-floor window facing east and west. The two south ground-floor windows are by the highly regarded creative artist Leonard Evetts, two first-floor south windows are by Abbott and Company and one first-floor east window is by the Atkinson Brothers. Some of the early-C20 woodwork furniture, with trademark mice, is by Robert Thompson (of Kilburn). The church also contains wall tablets, one erected for 16 servicemen who lost their lives during the First World War.

The floor levels of both wings do not relate to those in the church. The east wing is accessed through the early-C20 porch into an entrance hall with stepped access west into the main church, a corridor running east to the kitchen, a staircase and an early-C20 door leading into the church hall. It also contains facilities on the ground floor and first-floor rooms. The 1925 church hall has a main hall with a wooden planked dado rail and framed panels to the walls. Access doors in the south elevation lead into a store room and stairwell. The first floor has a segmental barrel-vaulted ceiling with rib panelled bands and similar framed panels and dado rail. A south access door leads to the stairwell and bathroom facilities. The west wing is now four apartments.

This entry was formerly named CHURCH OF ST COLUMBA.

History

In 1796 John Wright (1730-1806), lawyer and property developer, purchased 50 acres of land between Norfolk Street and Newcastle Street from Frederick Howard, fifth Earl of Carlisle, for the development of the New Town of North Shields. He developed several elegant streets and it is suggested Northumberland Place, Northumberland Square and Howard Street were originally part of a high-status street scheme that Wright and his sons devised and implemented before selling freehold building plots to individuals. A substantial mansion, Wakefield House, was built by George Wakefield (c 1764-1806, banker) as the northern vista to the intended grand principal way from Howard Street to Northumberland Square, but due to financial difficulties and the death of George Wakefield, it was demolished in the 1800s. Northumberland Place and the south foot of Howard Street, below Saville Street, were developed first with housing and public buildings, with the earliest documentary evidence for Northumberland Place an 1800 release for premises. Between 1810 and 1816 Northumberland Square began development as a residential garden square when houses were built on the site of Wakefield House, re-using its materials and stylistically matching those already built on Northumberland Place. Further housing, public buildings and churches were built on Howard Street and Northumberland Square through the mid- to late C19.

This church, known as the Northumberland Square Presbyterian Church, was located at various premises until a site was purchased on Northumberland Square. The foundation stone was laid on 20 October 1856 by William Shaw Lindsay, Independent MP for Tynemouth, and it was opened for public worship on 27 December 1857 by the Reverend John Ker of Glasgow. It was built by James and Matthew Robson of North Shields to a commissioned design by John Dobson (1787-1865), one of the most eminent architects to be born and work in the north-east of England. Dobson set up his practice in North Shields in 1810 and by 1815 was involved in planning several residential developments in Newcastle. He was known for his work with Richard Grainger (1797-1861) and designed a wide range of buildings, including churches, public buildings, villas and major country houses. Dobson's designs usually cost between £3,000 and £7,000, this church cost nearly £2,500. This church is sited near to three of Dobson’s other designs: the Baptist Church, the former Scotch church (Salvation Army Citadel) and the former public building on the corner of Howard and Saville Street.

The central five-bay two-storey building designed by Dobson is first shown on the 1:528 Ordnance Survey (OS) Town Plan of 1861 (surveyed 1860). It projected into Northumberland Square, with open land either side and occupied an area of 76 feet by 50 feet and seated 660 persons. Between the 1:2500 OS map of 1865 (published 1865) and the OS 1898 (revised 1894 to 1895) map brick wings and a single-storey church hall were added to the church, the east wing was designed by James Aiston and built around 1870 to match the pre-existing west wing. An undated C19 drawing of the front elevation (held by the church) shows the building with the new wings stylistically matching each other, both with central entrances and the full frontage set behind metal railings. The west wing is shown with a two-storey bay window facing Howard Street and it is suggested it was built as a house, with a party wall to the church. Around 1884 an organ was installed at the south end of Dobson's church at a cost of £900, with the casework, rostrum and choir by Chapman of North Shields, which led to the blocking-in of arched windows in the south elevation.

Around 1908 the west wing, then in use as business premises, was brought into church use as meeting rooms, with doorways punctured through to the church. The hall to the rear of the east wing was re-built around 1925, at a cost of £4,250, as a two-storey five-bay brick hall facing Norfolk Street, and extended in 1926 to a design by William Stockdale. In the early-C20 the central doors of both wings were reconfigured to windows and the east wing had a new projecting rusticated porch and door punctured through the western window. The two Presbyterian churches of Howard Street Church and Northumberland Square Church were united in 1949, and became the Presbyterian Church of England, with four stained glass windows relocated from the church on Howard Street (now the Salvation Army Citadel). The railings were also removed, leaving their stone footings. In 1972, the Congregational Church of England and Wales merged with the Presbyterian Church of England to form the United Reformed Church (URC), and the Congregational chapel of St Andrews and the United Presbyterian church of St Columba merged to become the URC of St Columba. Some alterations have been made in the late C20 and early C21, including the creation of disabled access, the re-setting of iron railings and the widening of a door opening between the church’s vestibule and main hall in around 2007 for the insertion of a new spiral staircase. The west wing was also sold and re-modelled into four maisonettes, with access doors blocked into the church and a central doorway, with steps, re-inserted. A three-manual digital organ was installed behind the 1884 organ in 2015.

Reasons for Listing

The former New United Presbyterian Church, now the United Reformed Church of St Columba, 1856 to 1857 by James Dobson, with late-C19 wings and early-C20 hall, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* for its good-quality symmetrical classically-styled principal elevation that enhances the surrounding streetscape;
* as a good example of the work of John Dobson, one of the most eminent C19 architects in the north-west of England;
* the interior contains fittings of merit including the mid-C19 U-shaped gallery, the late-C19 organ, and C20 stained glass by the highly regarded creative artist Leonard Evetts and woodwork by Robert Thompson.

Historic interest:

* as one of the principal buildings on Northumberland Square and Howard Street which formed a high-status residential square, and which marks the growth and development of the new town of North Shields.

Group value:

* it has strong group value with a range of listed buildings within the area, particularly those buildings designed by John Dobson.

External Links

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