This is a text-only version of an article first published on Friday, 5 August 2016. Information shown on this page may no longer be current.
MEMBERS of the congregation of St.
Margaret's, Mapledurham in South Oxfordshire are grateful for a recent grant of £13,000 from the Government's Listed Places of Worship Roof Repair Fund.
Approval came just in time as there was an urgent need to replace worn tiles on the roof of the tower and the nave of this Grade One listed building and the church could not afford to fund the full cost itself.
A close inspection by the church architect, Robin Nugent, indicated that the lead flashing protecting a large Celtic cross directly above the chancel step needed replacing and the cross itself, weighing well over a hundred kilos, was likely to come down soon through the ceiling below as the oak support beneath it had all but rotted away. The work was carried out by Stone Technical Services Group Ltd of Darlington who had recently carried out remedial work on St.
Paul's Cathedral and on Westminster Abbey's Chapter House.
The cross was taken to their Durham workshop and returned, looking just as good as it did when first placed on the roof in 1863, under the direction of William Butterfield, the well known, Victorian, Tractarian architect.
It is thought he designed the original cross on behalf of the then Vicar of Mapledurham, the Revd.
Richard Coleridge, a nephew of the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
Peter Stratton, a churchwarden at St.
Margaret's, who supervised the contract on behalf of the parish, was very pleased to see the work completed.
He said: "The cross is a clear sign of our Christian fellowship here and will be appreciated by all who visit this peaceful location at Mapledurham in a beautiful part of South Oxfordshire."St.
Margaret's is a pilgrim church and is open throughout the year for Sunday worship and for private prayer and meditation.
There has been a place of Christian worship on the site for over nine hundred years and it achieved world fame by featuring extensively in the film The Eagle has Landed with Sir Michael Caine, Jenny Agutter, Donald Sutherland and Donald Pleasence.
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