St Bartholomew's, Langford

St Bartholomew's, Langford in the 1920s.

A grant of £8,500 was awarded to this church in April 2007 as a contribution towards the costs of stripping of unsound plaster, replastering and limewashing in the chancel, nave, south aisle and vestry. The project was the latest the church had undertaken as part of an overall restoration scheme which included work on several parts of the roof and completely rebuilding the east wall of the chancel. Churchwarden, Major Jeremy Steele, said that the grant from the Nottinghamshire Historic Churches Trust made a huge difference because the plastering work, not being structural, was ineligible for grants from some other funders - and yet made a huge difference, not only to the internal appearance of the church, but also to the spirits of the clergy and congregation as it was the first stage of restoration that was actually visible.

Although there is yet more to be done - the next stage is to tackle the wood flooring under the pews - Major Steele said that everyone associated with St Bartholomew's is very grateful to the Trust for its grant, and they feel the end of their massive restoration project is in sight.

St Swithun's, East Retford

St Swithun's, East Retford.

A grant of £4,500 was awarded in September 2007 to enable this church to carry out emergency repairs to the towers. The church has eight towers in total, each with a pinnacle weighing half a ton, so when it was discovered that several of the pinnacles had twisted and were in danger of collapse the church immediately arranged for scaffolding cradles to be erected to support them. Mr John Coates, Churchwarden, explained that they hoped to be able to keep the pinnacles cradled like this until they began a major project to deconsecrate part of this very large church and turn it into a community resource centre, incorporating the repair of the towers into that scheme. However, the weather got the better of St Swithun's and it became essential that the work was done immediately, leaving the church facing the decision of whether to remove the pinnacles altogether, or have them repaired and reinstated. Mr Coates says that the Nottinghamshire Historic Churches Trust's grant was a key factor in their decision to repair and reinstate as they simply could not have afforded to do so otherwise, and everyone at St Swithun's is very grateful that the appearance of their magnificent church has been maintained.