BaR News Round Up May 2024

BaR News May 2024

St Bartholomew's Church, Newington Bagpath, Tetbury, Gloucestershire, GL8 8UE - now for sale

St. Bartholomew's Church is a grade II-listed church with an interesting architectural history. It is situated on a Norman foundation, and is described in David Verey's Buildings of England, Gloucestershire (1976) as having a 'simple and ancient nave and W tower', with a blocked doorway described as 'probably Norman and built of tufa'. There is some surviving work from the fifteenth century and the chancel was entirely rebuilt by the Victorian Gothic Revival Architect, S.S. Teulon in 1858.  It is grade II listed (LEN: 1341154).

We understand the church has been closed since 1978 and has been standing empty since then, slowly deteriorating as each year passes. It was deconsecrated and sold by the Diocese to a private owner in 1990. There is permission for conversion to residential use, but work commenced and then stalled. Now the church has come on to the market with Savill's at a guide price of £300,000.  See Savill's website for more details here.

By coincidence, a new volunteer photographer has taken some new images of the church which show what a beautiful building in a lovely setting it is.

The same photographer also sent us some photos of Charfield Railway Station.

Charfield Railway Station, Charfield, Gloucestershire GL12 8SY

The station buildings are listed as grade II (booking hall and waiting room: LEN:1114969, water tower and lavatory block: LEN:1114970) and were built 1843/4 for the Bristol and Gloucester Railway, whose engineer was Isambard Kingdom Brunel. They form the only intact group of buildings on this important line, which completed the through route from Exeter to Newcastle in 1844. There are in total three buildings, the two mentioned above and the former station master's house, but this is in separate ownership and not at risk. The booking office and the waiting room are now dilapidated, whilst the water tower and lavatory block is derelict. Both are attractive single-storey, brick buildings with freestone dressings and slate roofs in plain Tudor revival style.

Trains still run past the station, have not stopped at Charfield for many years. There are now plans to build and open a new station at Charfield but the old buildings are not part of the scheme which was approved in March 2023.  It is expected that the new station will open in 2027. This does seem like a massive missed opportunity to bring these historic railway buildings full of character back into use. The only glimmer of optimism is that a set of new buildings frequented by a new generation of rail travellers may serve to spotlight the condition of the historic station and lead to calls for these buildings to be found a new use.