THURNING. CHURCH : ST JAMES

Easter Day 2008, and my Hunts/Northamptonshire churchcrawl continued. After leaving Winwick I crossed over the border in to Northamptonshire and headed for Thurning. Well, to say that I headed towards Thurning is probably a little bit misleading. I actually got lost, due to a combination of poor road signs and poor sense of direction and just cycled aimlessly for a few minutes until I arrived at a village. More by luck than judgement this turned out to be Thurning, which was my intended destination.

  Just after I had dismounted a man in a bright red open top sports car pulled up and asked me if I knew the way to Polebrook. I did point him in the direction that I thought but given my lack of directional sense mentioned above I would be interested to hear if he actually headed in the right direction!

  There is precious little information regarding the church of St James on the internet. What I have found though is that there has been a church on this site since the 12th Century. Two periods of extensive restoration came about in Victorian times. The building is a curious one to look at. This is a very large church, with a tiny tower which is totally out of proportion to the rest of the building.

  As you may see from the photograph below left, this is not going to win any architecture awards with a ventilation grill mounted two thirds of the way up the tower. Quirky and unusual nonetheless.

  This church was locked, continuing a sequence in that part of the country! Winwick was locked, as was Luddington In The Brook and Hemington, which was to be my next point of call. According to the internet there is a 12th Century font inside this church. Would like to have seen that.

  Church grounds were well maintained and was pleased to see a grotesque with tongue stuck out in typical medieval gesture. Really though, there was little to keep me here for too long.

  Back in the saddle and off in search of Hemington. A good day out this one. A day out of the rat race, the sun on my back, exercise, fresh air and some nice places to look at.

  This was Easter Sunday 2007. Interestingly, the corresponding Easter Sunday 12 months later saw the whole of the catchment area for this site covered with a couple of inches of snow!