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- Last Updated: Saturday, 09 October 2021 18:45
- Written by GRAHAM BROOKS
SHAP GRANITE MEMORIALS.
Shap granite has been used for both grave markers as well as War memorials. They are usually found polished, but some are in the natural state. The form of the stone is such that it does not show detail very well and some inscriptions are difficult to read.
Recently there has been a renewed use of Shap granite for modern memorials and commorative statutes etc. these are usually the plinth and they are usually natural stones.
CHURCHYARD MEMORIALS
I first started noting and photographing Shap Granite memorials for a friend and I did not note any details for these early recordings. Although they are a beautiful stone especially when polished, unfortunately it is a masons nightmare to carve a name on. Unless the letters are highlighted or very deeply carved they can be very difficult to read.
This is an ongoing project the map below shows the graveyards and cemeteries that have been inspected in Cumbria and the surrounding area to date for examples.
1. SHAP
2. CLIFTON
3. DALSTON
6. CANONBIE
8. THORNTHWAITE
10. CROGLIN
14. ASPATRIA
15. WARWICK ON EDEN
16. WEST NEWTON
18. CUMREW
19. ARMATHWAITE
20. TEBAY
21. HALTWHISTLE
22. LAMBLEY
23. RENWICK
25. GRINSDALE.
26. WARCOP
27. KNARSDALE.
28. GARRIGILL
29. ST. GILES ORTON.
30. CUMWHITTON
31 GREENHEAD
32. LANERCOST
33. CASTLE SOWERBY
35. LONG SLEDDALE
36. EWES.
37. LOWESWATER
39.SELSIDE.
40. MUSGRAVE
41. HURWORTH ON TEES
42. SKELTON
43. THURSBY
44. BARTON
45. HUTTON ROOF
47 WREAY CEMETERY.
48. APPLEBY CHURCH.
There has been a recent spate in the use of unpolished granite boulders as the base for modern monuments and memorials.
FRANCES THOMPSON DIED FEBRUARY 1875.
Nancy Pattinson died August 1885. George Liddle Died Aug 1942.
HAYTON (near Brampton) CHURCHYARD
Mary Graham died January 1928. ....... Woodhead died December 1880.
ST KENTIGERN ASPATRIA CHURCHYARD
James Douglas Wilkinson July 1960.
SAINT LEONARDS CHURCH, WARWICK ON EDEN
This must be the most unusual gravestone yet a bird bath
Georgina Louisa Chapman died October 1940.
Supplied by Beattie, Carlisle.
Agnes Jane Mary Parker John Stewart Muirhead . Mary Evelyn Little
died january 1939 died March 1964 died June 1959
Unreadable inscription.
Henry Isaac Wilson died December 1947.
A grave marked out with shap granite curbs. inscription unreadable on inside of kerbs.
Gravestone in shape of a cross. Sarah Whitehead . Lorenzo Harsley, Station master Tebay
inscription unreadable. died September 1904. died March 1918.
Margaret Binks died June 1901.
Only a single tombstone in this churchyard. Alas it has fallen over obscuring the inscription. This is an unfortunate all to frequent finding in a lot of churchyards.
William Bell died June 1938. Christopher Hewetson died February 1923.
Margaret Armstrong Edith Annie Forster died October 1934. Tom Jackson died May 1933.
died June 1949.
Robert Atkinson died October 1950. Geoffery Hind died April 2004. John Joseph Carruthers
died September 1947
Frederick Hind died April 1955. Robert Holliday died November 1941. Robert Hunter died September 1949.
William James died March 1947. Margaret Jane Atkinson Mary Jane Hind died February 1954.
died November 1941.
Andrew Murchie died January 1947. Thomas Ritson died July 1941. William Atkinson died May 1940.
Labeled Beattie & Co.
ST. KENTIGERNS CHURCH CASTLE SOWERBY
John Bowes Died January 1940. Olive Southern died March 1939.
A pair of small columns. Presumably they were part of a curb system around a grave.
THOMAS HENRY ARMSTRONG jANUARY 1958.
WARD died February 1941. ERIC CRAGG died 1964.
2 gravestones with unreadable inscription.
Mary Rothery no date.
Margaret Isabella Thomson Unreadable inscription. Margaret Percival died November 1938
Died February 1943.
John Forster Thomas Pratt died April 1958. Harriet Henderson died May 1940.
died March 1945.
William Stephenson David Scott Phillips Joseph Campbell died August 1942.
died July 1949. died June 1884. labelled by Beattie & co ltd Carisle
Isabella Murray died April 1941 George Abbott died November 1932. George Tertius Glover June 1953.
Maria Sturdy died January 1875. Frances Tatters July 1946. Richard Atkinson died June 1940.
Mary Louise Clarke died October 1961. Michael Dennis died July 1972. Herbert William Hodgkinson died Janauary 1957.
Mary Holiday died October 1945.
Lizzie Huck died June 1941. Ethel Mason died March 1942.
Philip W Rudd died February 1940.
A plain cross. Ruth Bullock died August 1885. Henry Douthwaite died December 1885.
Agnes Ion died June 1888.
SHAP CHURCHYARD COLUMNS AND OBELISKS
Elizabeth Jane Robson died 1944 George Armstrong Rawlinson died May 1948 Unreadable.
Unreadable. Sarah Forster died September 1945. Unreadable.
Unreadable. John Graham died June 1957. Wood died March 1842
Richard Metcalfe Winn died October 1876. Joseph How died September 1864.
A unusal design for Shap Granite with columns A coped stone.
Thomas Bewsher died July 1846. Ann Atkinson died July 1844.
A group of 4 coped stones with crosses carved on top Ethel Edmundson died April 1969, Amy Gertrude Edmondson died February 1927.
Hugh Campbell rawley died August 1922, Mary Harriet roal died April 1916.
Margaret Ann Atkinson died February 1942. John Hobson died june 1937.
John Brough died December 1957. John Blacklock died February 1941. Fanny Jane unreadable
SAINT MICHAELS CHURCHYARD, APPLEBY
Dorothy Christian Hare died 1967. Rev. J Richardson died 1868 a panel in a sandstone base.
John Nicholson died June 1879. Edward Richardson died December 1857.
John Rowlandson died February 1870. Capt Henry Noel Clifton Gudgeon died June 1943.
NON CUMBRIAN CHURCHYARDS
SCOTLAND
David Cowan died
DORNOCK CHURCH.
A celtic style cross.
Thomas Williams died January 1889.
NORTH YORKSHIRE
COATHAM CHURCHYARD, REDCAR
Alfred Bulman Died 1937.
ESTON CEMETERY,
John William Philips died October 1947.
NORTHUMBERLAND
Thomas Errington died December 1874.
LAMBLEY CHURCH
Thomas Dobson Died May 1874.
John George Gill died July 1910
Edith Lowe died December 1975
Neville Scott died February 1975.
Joseph Makepeace died July 1960.
COUNTY DURHAM
A coped slab to james Nicholson Collyer died March 1870. This grave is still surrounded by its low iron railings.
A coped stone with cross on top to George John scurfield died May 1914.
A similar slab to Alice Joanna Sarah Scurfield died Sept 1913.
Return to list
WIRRAL
St Peters Rockferry
Edith Lois Parry Died January 1948.
A partially destroyed grave to Rev Thomas Fisher Redhead. Incumbent of the parish.
OBELISK MEMORIALS
THORNTHWAITE CHURCH.
RENWICK CHURCH. Obelisk with urn on top.
BOWNESS ON SOLWAY CHURCH
James Irving died March 1877.
Joseph Beck Died march 1884.
CARLISLE CEMETERY
Sandstone obelisk with a shap granite tablet inset.
Memmorial signed by CORBETT
Richard Pattinson died April 1871.
William Hudson died Originally a column surmounted by an urn John Irving died April 1895.
September 1908. John Winster died February 1906
.
A small obelisck alas now broken to Margaret Stirling died February 1873.
Shap Granite in church furniture
Tebay Church pulpit. (1930) And Font.
Watermillock church font.
Kirkby Stephen church pulpit. Italian marble and Shap granite. Dates fron 1871.
St Augustines Church, Alston.
Two slim Shap Granite columns with fat foliage caitals in sandstone, seperate the south aisle from the nave. The church dates from 1869 1870 and was designed by J. W. Walton.
The panels on the outside of the Lowther Mauseleum in Lowther churchyard are filled with polished Shap granite slabs. It is not known if these were intended to carry future memorials or not.
Renwick village war memorial in the churchyard.
A polished tablet set into the internal wall of St. James church Tebay.
War memmorial at Skelton church.
War Memorial at Shap Church.
'The Response' St. Thomas's Church Newcastle on Tyne.
Raised by Sir George Renwick and Lady Renwick to commemmorate the rising of B Coy 9th Battalion and 16th, 18th and 19th service battalion Northumberland Fuyssiliers by Newcastle and Gateshead Chamber of Commerce between August and October 1914. It aqlso commemorates Sir Georges 50 years of commerce in Newcastle and the safe return of his 5 sons from the Great War. Unveiled on 5th July 1923 by HRH the Prince of Wales.
The design is by Sir William Goscombe John RA.
The front has a drummer leadinh Northumberland Fusiliers and ordinary men of the district with their trade tools and rifles. The bronze was cast by A13 Burton, Thames Ditton.
The rear shows a Northumberland Fusiliar of 1674 and 1919 seperated by Sir George in medieval military dress.
SHAP GRANITE BUILDINGS.
BUILDINGS
St. James Church Tebay built externally from rough faced blocks of red Shap granite. (Inside is in brick work see article)
Memmorial to the men killed in the Tebay rail accident.
Millenium Stone Yanworth.
Set up to commemorate the 2000AD millenium this 50 ton block of Shap granite has a christian cross and 2000 carved on the face facing the road and the Alpha and Omega symbols on the other two faces. Alpha is the first letter of the Greek alphabet and faces Mayburgh Henge and stands for the early people of the Eden valley who built the Henge. Omega the last letter of the alphabet stands for Posterity as yet unborn.
MONUMENT TO ADAM SEDGEWICK, CHURCH GATES, DENT.
Adam Sedgewick born 22nd March 1785 died 27th January 1873. He was son of the vicar at Dent and was educated at Sedbergh School and Trinity College, Cambridge were he qualified BA in 1808 and MA in 1811. He became Professor of Geology there in 1818 and remained in post till his death in 1873.
He worked on various groups of rock including Cambrian, Carboniferous and Devoninan strata.