St. James's Church, Louth

It is all but impossible to take in a complete view of the church as it is surrounded by other buildings The only way to get an overall impression of its size and the height of the tower and steeple is from a model which can be seen inside the church:



As I approached the church from the shopping area of the town the great East window could be seen:



Viewed from inside:



I had only set out to visit the market but on impulse I decided to have a quick look round the parish church as well.  I hoped the cafe would be open as I was looking forward to a sit down with a cup of tea. Fortunately it was so I ordered a pot of tea and a toasted teacake to enjoy in pleasant surroundings:



While I sat looking around to my great pleasure the organist decided to have a practice session. I started up a video just to capture the sound. I only managed a short recording before I was interrupted:



The camera wasn't able to capture the rich bass sounds which could be felt as well as heard from the organ positioned at the opposite end of the church.  I said I was interrupted, though in a pleasant way. A lady with her daughter and two grand-daughters asked if they could join me as this was the only table with enough room for us all. We had a long chat while I enjoyed my toasted teacake. They were hoping to climb the tower to take in the fantastic views but it was locked. I think, for safety reasons, someone has to make a note of how many people go up and make sure they all get back down safely. Hopefully someone would be available to allow them access before they left.

The cafe is situated under the tower and from where I was sitting I could see one of the many stained glass windows:



Looking straight up I could see the sunburst decoration on the roof of the tower over 85 feet above my head:



The sides of the Nave are full of stained glass windows. As far as I can work out they were all installed from the mid 1800's to early 1900's. All told there are some 33 windows with stained glass.







The Chancel with the high altar and choir stalls:



An old font positioned near the organ loft:



The 19th Century font made from Staffordshire alabaster:

    

     

Four of the panels show biblical scenes:
The Garden of Eden, Christ's Baptism and the Crucifixion seen here:



The fourth shows Noah's Ark.

A view of the roof of the Nave:



There is much more detail to be seen in and around the building which I will have to explore on a future visit as it was time to think of meandering back to the car. Next time I will take another camera and a flash gun.

A Peek Inside the Village Church

I had to leave the car at my local garage as its air con had developed a leak and lost all the Nitrogen. (Expensive stuff to replace!) In fact it needed a replacement part as well as re-charging.  On the walk back home I followed a footpath which lead me to the back of the churchyard. As I was on my own I decided to have a quick look inside the village church. There were a couple of things I wanted to see and photograph where possible.

So I headed to the porch doors hoping they would be unlocked:



I opened the extra, fragile looking, door which is mainly wire mesh and normally kept shut to keep birds out when a main door is open. Yes. The doors were unlocked.

Once inside the porch I could see the small stained glass window on the West side:



and the inside of the porch doors:

 

Ahead of me was the main door to the Nave:



Unusual, I think. It is really hefty at about 4 inches thick as the inside is lined with planks of wood:



In spite of its weight it moves easily on those three large iron hinges.

Walking down to the East end I could see the screen dividing the Nave from the Chancel.



It was worth a closer examination as the panels are carved:





About half of the panels contained carved faces:



Hanging above the screen is a beautifully painted carved crucifixion:

 

To the left is the pulpit:     To the right, the organ:

   

Walking back to the West end of the Nave lead me to the font:



On which I found one of the things I was hoping to see.
Carved in one shield on the font:



Graffiti. Not any old scribbled carving. Medieval graffiti. What looks like a W is in fact two overlapping Vs, a reference to the Virgin Mary / Virgo Virginum. A design which can be found in many churches up and down the land. Thought to have been used to keep evil spirits away from the baby being christened. I only found out about this from an article in the latest Village News.  A group called U3A Louth Church Mice had visited the church to search for and record any Medieval graffiti.

In the article they suggested a book for those interested in the subject.
Medieval Graffiti: the Lost Voices of England's Churches by Matthew Champion.
 
There are many places where a copy can be bought as well as an electronic version for Amazon's Kindle and an epub version from Kobo. The latter is the version I bought and am now working my way through its 263 pages. Very wordy and discusses many of the different theories about the meanings behind all sorts of Medieval church graffiti. Some illustrations. I wish there were more.

Whilst in the Nave I photographed the stained glass windows:
     




Finally, a carved head supporting a roof timber in the porch:

As always the photos can be clicked to take you to my Flickr account where they can be viewed larger. They were all taken with the Nikon Coolpix S9050 pocket camera.

You may have noticed various non churchy items strewn about. Every Saturday there is a sale of donated items organised by a local resident. All proceeds are given to various local or national charities. The chosen charities being different each month.

Oh, yes. I said I was looking for a couple of things. The other was a plaque commemorating one of the village war dead. Unfortunately I couldn't find it. There is more Medieval graffiti to be found - another day maybe.

Wings on Wednesday - Bread

From time to time I put a slice of bread in one of the feeders.
As often as not a corvid will drag it out and drop it on the grass.

If you are a Jackdaw then you pull off beak sized pieces.
If you are a Blackbird you pull off beak sized pieces.
If you are a Starling you grab the lot and fly off with it:

Stained Glass Windows Revisited

There hasn't been a lot of bird activity in the garden recently. I had expected that the numbers would increase with the drop in temperature. One interesting observation has been the activity in and around the nestbox. Not only did a Great Tit investigate the inside early in the morning but later on a Blue Tit was seen to show interest. It spent most of the time checking the outside of the box. With luck there will be some video of them on Friday.

On yesterday afternoon's walk I popped in the village church again to take some closer shots of the stained glass windows. I took the usual +1 0 -1 EV series of shots to use with Photomatrix Pro 3 but was disappointed with the results so I tried using the ReDynaMix plugin in Paintshop Pro using only the darkest photo from each batch. That worked very well most of the time as it picks out detail from the dark section and enhances them., at the same time it tones down the bright parts.

The first view is looking East along the nave. The end window is plain glass. .


Facing east to the side of the main aisle is this window which is dated  1908


Facing west is another window dated  1898


This visit the porch window had lost the box of plants. The window here is undated. It is the most difficult to photograph and bring out the surrounding stonework as it is so very dark in that part of the church. Maybe I will try added flash another time though I quite like the 'heavenly glow' effect.


There is one other stained glass window but unfortunately it is behind a what appears to be a chamber organ so impossible to get at.

Walkabout

When we go for our afternoon perambulation Bobby and I usually cut through the back of the churchyard. More often than not there are some chickens from the nearby smallholdings diving for cover. The other day there were two which had made themselves a comfortable hollow under one of the small trees. They were not going to move unless they really had to.



One day I tied Bobby outside the church while I went in to see if it was possible to photograph the stained glass windows. For these I took three photos at +1 0 -1 EV and process them as HDR. This window facing East was difficult as there was a green tint to the light which was reflected from trees nearby.



This small one is in the porch and again is so close to vegetation that it receives very little direct light.



It is not very often these days that farm machinery is left out in the open as quite a few tractors have been stolen in the county.



There is very little Autumn colour at the moment as the plants are changing colour at different times but I did spot this on the way home.



On damp nights it is as well to take a torch when I let Bobby out for his last look round as I never know what may end up underfoot.



 I wonder how many different types of slug there are.