St. Bartholomew’s Church, #Meltham is delighted to have received confirmation of a grant of £142,300 for reroofing the church and doing ancillary work; improving internal access to the roof and providing insulation. The Church will remain open as normal during this work which has commenced this week.

Thanks to money raised by National Lottery players the project aims to secure the church for safe and continued use, not only for the congregation but for use by the wider community. It is already used for none church events and the church are keen to enhance this use. Local brass bands, choirs, musical groups, children’s play groups and coffee mornings have been a regular feature of wider use and these will continue.

The church is in the centre of the village and plays a prominent part in the many events throughout the year organised by local groups and individuals.
Special events to commemorate the ending of the 1st world War will be held in the church in 2018. The village war memorial is a feature on the church wall. This is not common as most memorials are not on religious buildings.

The roof has withstood 231 years of weathering and raining in with patch repairs being carried out over the years. The use of buckets in the church to catch rain water is an unwelcome feature, but not for much longer with the aid of this award.

The church, built in 1786 is a Grade II listed building and is the second on the same site and within the Meltham Conservation Area. The first church was built in 1651, of which only 2 treasured artefacts remain. This in itself is fairly unique because few churches were built in the Commonwealth Period of Oliver Cromwell, 1649-60. There is only one church known to the congregation, still original, from that period and this is in Berwick on Tweed.

The parish is in a period of Interregnum. The good news was however passed to the former Vicar, Rev. Maureen Read at her new parish in Shropshire who commented “I am truly delighted that all the hard work of the church has yielded a good result. Without the valued assistance of HLF this would not have been possible.”