Richard Bell's Wild West Yorkshire Nature Diary, Wednesday, 28th July 2010
ST
GILES in Pontefract gives the impression that it's a Georgian town church but
go around the back and these Gothic windows suggest that it goes back to medieval
times. The town's original parish church was All Saints, down beyond the castle,
but that was so damaged during the Civil War siege that St Giles, which had
originally been built as a chapel of ease in the town centre, was adopted as
the main church.
There's no churchyard around St Giles, a pointer to its original status as a chapel. After partial restoration, All Saints is in use again today but it stands in the ruined shell of a larger structure.
These
were drawn from Pontefract Library, an airy space with views onto streets behind
the church which today were busy with market stalls. The original library is
now the town museum.
I briefly sketched The Shepherd's Arms, Horbury (left), when I was
waiting for a few minutes in the car park on Cluntergate.