Remembering my eldest brother, Stephen Comerford (1946-1970), on what is his 80th birthday today

My eldest brother Stephen Edward Comerford was born 80 years ago on 22 August 1946

Patrick Comerford

Today would be the eightieth birthday of my eldest brother, Stephen Edward Comerford, who was born in Dublin on 22 August 1946 and died in Durham, North Carolina, at the age of 24 on 18 December 1970.

Now that I am in my mid-70s, five or six years is hardly an age gap between people of my generation. But they create a major chasm when you are a child, and that gap was compounded by the fact that he was the eldest child in a family of six and I was the fourth.

Steve was born in Dublin on 22 August 1946. He was named after our father, Stephen Edward Comerford (1918-2004), who in turn was named after our grandfather, also named Stephen Edward Comerford (1867-1921). The name Stephen had come into the Bunclody branch of the family because our grandfather was born on 28 December, three days after Christmas Day and two days after Saint Stephen’s Day.

As small children, we were all separated, going to different members and friends of the extended family: Steve was packed off to our grandmother Maria (Crowley) Murphy (1882-1957) and aunt Margaret (Murphy) Barrett (1920-2014) in Millstreet, Co Cork, while I went to George and Peggy Kerr in Dublin and the extended Hallinan family in Cappoquin, Co Waterford.

The accent Steve acquired in Millstreet brought him the nickname ‘Corky’ in his primary school when he returned to Dublin. By the time I was going to primary school, he was already at boarding school, so we never in the same school at the same time.

The Wexford historian Brendan Culliton, who has been the President of both the Wexford Historical Society and Wexford Wanderers Rugby Club, once recalled for me how they were friends throughout their shared years in primary school. ‘In those days, we were two to a desk and I had the privilege of sharing a desk with Stephen for the whole of that year.’

He told me, ‘Stephen was very well read and was a pleasure to sit beside. He was one of the quieter members of the class, but I can remember the interesting chats we had on every subject under the sun. Before Christmas that year, we had shared what present we hoped to get. I am sure my interests at the time didn’t move far from Meccano and Just William. Stephen told me he had asked for books on history. That struck me as a bit odd, but if that was what he wanted, then that was him.

‘After Christmas, he brought in two bound copies of Carty’s History of Ireland to show me. I remember the covers were green, and plain. Other classmates would have been dismissive of books like these as a ‘Christmas present’. What, after all, was wrong with Dan Dare or Billy Bunter? But what struck me most was that Stephen was thrilled to show off these treasures. He was genuinely happy and, to me that was the important thing.’

Brendan Culliton was a year younger and stayed back a year. ‘So, when I went to Gormanston, Stephen was a year ahead of me. He was also in a different Clann / House, so our paths didn’t cross that often. However, when we did meet, a short greeting was never enough. I always recall there being real substance to the conversation.’

Stephen and I both went to school in Gormanston but he had left by the time I arrived (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Stephen and I both went to school in Gormanston, Co Meath. But the five- or six-year gap was so wide that by the time I arrived, although there were teachers who remembered him, no-one in my year had ever come across him. We too were in different houses or clanns, and so any memories were few and rarely shared.

Yet, he was remembered for his achievements in maths and sciences, his fluency in the Irish language and in French, and for his interests in chess, swimming and, to a lesser degree, golf. He taught himself the harmonica. I remember his efforts to teach me to play chess – a pleasure that remains – but our academic and sporting interests seldom overlapped.

While I was at Gormanston, he was studying at University College Galway and at University College Dublin. When Brendan Culliton arrived in UCD, he recalled, they ‘encountered each other now and then around Earlsfort Terrace and, when we did, it was always cause for surprisingly lengthy conversations … There is no question that he was very intelligent and hugely talented. He was also genuine and sincere.’

By the time I left Gormanston in 1969, Stephen had completed his BSc and MSc degrees. We spent some time together that summer, sometimes going for meals together in Rathmines. I remember how we sat up together to watch the first moon landing on the night of 20 July 1969.

But by then he was moving to the US and Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, where he became a PhD candidate. He visited cousins in the Linders family in Bridgeport, Connecticut, and sent home a photograph of himself at the ‘Swords into Ploughshares’ sculpture by Yevgeny Vuchetich in the North Garden of the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. But I cannot recall that we ever met again. I was training to be a chartered surveyor with Jones Lang Wootton and working on a BSc in estate management with the College of Estate Management, then part of the University of Reading.

He died at 5 pm on 18 December 1970, aged 24, at 114 Buchanan Boulevard, Durham, close to the campus of Duke University. His death certificate gives the cause of death as ‘anoxia sustained during epileptic seizure.’ It mistakenly gives his date of birth as 12 August and misses my mother’ maiden name. Interestingly, it also says he was a US citizen, but perhaps it was a condition of becoming a graduate student at Duke that he also became a US citizen. He is buried in Maplewood Cemetery, Durham.

114 Buchanan Boulevard, Durham, close to the campus of Duke University, where Steve Comerford died on 18 December 1970

The news of his death came in a chilling ’phone call in the middle of the night, seven days before Christmas, just days after my father’s birthday. His carefully and individually wrapped Christmas presents for his parents and each of his brothers and sisters arrived in the post a few days later. But by then the Christmas tree and the decorations had come down, and the Christmas lights had gone off. It seems Christmas was cancelled that year.

The depths of a mother’s grief are unfathomable, I never fully understood or appreciated the ways in which my parents continued to suffer ever after, and at the time I never found ways to explain to friends and colleagues how I felt.

A colleague from his post-graduate days in Duke spoke of Stephen as ‘unfailingly courteous, and inclined to dress in jacket and tie … He gave the dining room a touch of class … dressed to the nines and carrying a rolled up umbrella.’ Perhaps he had retained a hint of that Cork accent he picked up in Millstreet as a child. ‘ We all had accents, but Stephen’s was a delight.’

Brendan Culliton told me some years ago that when he heard of Stephen’s death over 55 years ago, it ‘was sad news then. It’s still sad news today.’

The Annals of Irish Mathematics and Mathematicians includes his name in the Gallery of Irish Mathematicians. He would have been 80 on his birthday today, 22 August 2026.

May his memory be a blessing ז״ל

A Christmas-time photograph of Steve visiting Santa as a child

Saint Margaret of Antioch: exploring the legends and looking at some churches that remember her name

Saint Margaret of Antioch Church overlooking the harbour of Vernazza in Cinque Terre on the Italian Riviera … she is remembered on 20 July (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

The Church Calendar today (20 July) remembers Saint Margaret of Antioch, a martyr in the fourth century, and Saint Bartolomé de las Casas (1566), Apostle to the Indies.

I have written about Saint Bartolomé de las Casas and in his role as a founding figure of our modern concepts of human rights, an important figure to remember as international law and agreed principles of human rights come under growing threats, particularly from the US, which once saw itself as a defender of international law and human rights.

But as I was searching for images of Saint Margaret of Antioch to illustrate my prayer diary on my blog this morning, I came across memories of a visit back in 2012 to Vernazza in Cinque Terre on the Italian Riviera and the church that is said to hold a relic of her finger.

Saint Margaret of Antioch Church at the harbour of Vernazza in Cinque Terre on the Italian Riviera is said to hold a relic of the saint’s finger (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saint Margaret of Antioch, also called Marina, was martyred during the Diocletian persecutions at the beginning of the fourth century. Her preaching before her death is said to have converted many to the Christian faith.

According to the legend, she was the daughter of a third or fourth century pagan priest in Antioch. She was either thrown out of the house by her father when she converted to Christianity or was converted by her nursemaid. She was noticed by the local prefect who wanted to marry her, but she spurned him and vowed to keep her virginity for Christ.

He handed her over to the Roman authorities. In prison she was swallowed by Satan in the form of a dragon. But the cross she was carrying irritated his throat, and he spat her out unharmed.

Her persecutors tried to kill her by fire and by drowning, but each time she survived, converting the growing crowd of onlookers. Finally, she was beheaded, along with her many converts, by Emperor Diocletian (245-313 AD). She was buried at Antioch, but her remains were taken later to Italy where they were divided between shrines in Montefiascone and Venice.

Vernazza is one of the five towns that make up the Cinque Terre region in north-west Italy (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Vernazza, in the province of La Spezia in Liguria, in north-west Italy, is one of the five towns that make up the Cinque Terre region. Vernazza is the fourth town heading north, has no car traffic, and remains one of the truest ‘fishing villages’ on the Italian Riviera. It is the only natural port of Cinque Terre and is famous for its elegant houses.

Legend has it that in ancient times, a small wooden box was found along the coast of Vernazza, containing the bones of a finger of Santa Margaret’s hand. After finding the relic, the residents decided to build a church in her honour in the area of the town known as Isolotto.

However, the relic was lost sight of during a strong storm and it appeared only some time later, precisely where it was first found. The people of Vernazza then built a church there, overlooking the sea, where it stands to this day.

Inside the church of Santa Margherita d’Antiochia in Vernazza (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The church of Santa Margherita d’Antiochia was built in the 13th century in the Gothic-Ligurian style by the Antelami masters on a pre-existing Romanesque building. The church is mentioned for the first time in 1318. It stands next to the main square of Vernazza on a rock overlooking the sea. The octagonal tower, 40 meters high, is crowned by small arches and ends with a dome.

The church was enlarged and extended in 1500-1600, when the original mediaeval façade which was destroyed. During new works in 1750, the Romanesque interior was covered with Baroque-style decoration, the wooden roof was replaced with vaults, and the bell tower was raised.

The church was partially restored in 1964-1970, when the original internal structure was recovered, including the wooden roof. The church has two entrances: the main one is more hidden and less easy to reach, and a more comfortable one, in one of the apses overlooking the tree-lined square in front of the marina, opened in the 19th century. The interior with three naves is raised above the level of the square. The church has two 17th century canvases, the Baroque high altar dates from 1750, and there is an 18th century processional chest and a wooden crucifix attributed to Anton Maria Maragliano.

The people of Vernazza celebrate Saint Margaret of Antioch as their patron every year on 20 July.

Saint Margaret’s, Westminster Abbey … the parish church of the House of Commons (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Council of Oxford added her to the list of feast days in 1222, and so her cult grew in popularity in England. More than 250 churches in England are dedicated to Saint Margaret of Antioch, including Saint Margaret’s, Westminster, the parish church of the House of Commons.

Saint Margaret’s was built in the late 11th century, and a grant from Pope Clement III to the Abbot and Convent of Westminster in 1189 confirmed that Saint Margaret’s was outside the jurisdiction of the Bishop of London. In 1222, the abbey and its properties, including Saint Margaret’s, were declared to be outside the Diocese of London and also exempt from the authority of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Robert Stowell began to rebuild the church in 1482, and it was consecrated on 9 April 1523. Until the dissolution of the monasteries in 1540, the church was served by the monks of the abbey, and the close relationship between Saint Margaret’s and Westminster Abbey has continued ever since.

When Queen Elizabeth I re-founded Westminster Abbey as a collegiate church in 1560, she maintained its exemption from episcopal authority and made the new foundation a royal peculiar, subject only to the authority of the monarch as Visitor.

Saint Margaret’s became the parish church of the Palace of Westminster in 1614. The north-west tower of the church was rebuilt by John James in 1734-1738 and the interior was restored in 1877 by Sir George Gilbert Scott, who retained many of its Tudor features.

In 1972, the church and its churchyard were placed once more under the governance of the Dean and Chapter of Westminster Abbey, with one of the canons of Westminster Abbey serving as Rector of Saint Margaret’s. MPs and staff members of the House of Lords and House of Commons are permitted to marry in the church, and those who were married there include the diarist Samuel Pepys, and prime ministers Sir Winston Churchill and Harold Macmillan.

Saint Margaret Pattens, a guild church on Eastcheap, seen from Saint Mary-at-Hill (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saint Margaret Pattens, a guild church on Eastcheap, is dedicated to Saint Margaret of Antioch. The first church on the site dedicated to Saint Margaret of Antioch was recorded in 1067, when the church was probably built from wood.

The church was rebuilt in stone at a later date but fell into disrepair and was demolished in 1530 and rebuilt in 1538. The church was destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666. The present church was built by Sir Christopher Wren between 1684 and 1687.

The church exterior is notable for its 200-ft high spire, Wren’s third highest and the only one that he designed in a mediaeval style. It is sometimes referred to as Wren’s only ‘true spire.’

Saint Margaret Pattens is one of only a few City churches to have escaped significant damage in World War II. It ceased to be a parish church in 1953 and became one of the City’s guild churches. The church is the Guild Church of the Worshipful Company of Pattenmakers and the Worshipful Company of Basketmakers, two of the City livery companies.

Saint Margaret Lothbury, known as the Bankers’ Church, is one of the 51 Wren churches in the City of London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saint Margaret Lothbury is also dedicated to Saint Margaret of Antioch. It is known as the Bankers’ Church, because of its proximity to the back door of the Bank of England. Lothbury is a short street that runs east-west with traffic flow in both directions, from the junction of Gresham Street with Moorgate to the west, and the junction of Bartholomew Lane with Throgmorton Street to the east.

There has been a church on the site since the 12th century, and the earliest mention of Saint Margaret Lothbury is in 1185. It was rebuilt over the Walbrook in 1440, when a stone arch was erected over the brook in 1440 so that the church could be extended. The work was completed mostly at the expense of Robert Large, then the Lord Mayor of London. He is remembered as the Master to whom William Caxton, the printer, served his apprenticeship.

Like so many London churches, the church was destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666 and was rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren between 1686 and 1690. It is one of the 51 churches in London rebuilt by Wren after the fire. However, the tower may be the work of Robert Hooke.

The church has exceptionally fine 17th-century woodwork from other now-demolished Wren churches. This woodwork includes the reredos, the Communion rails and the baptismal font, which are thought to be by Wren’s carver, Grinling Gibbons. The pulpit is the original pulpit of the Wren church and the Baptismal Font is thought to come from the workshop of Grinling Gibbons.

Saint Margaret Lothbury still serves as a parish church in the Square Mile. It is also the official church of five Livery Companies, two Ward Clubs and two professional institutes. It also has connections with many local finance houses, all of which hold special services there each year.

The west end of Saint Margaret of Antioch Church, with Durham Castle (left) and Durham Cathedral (right) in the background (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

In Durham, Saint Margaret of Antioch Church at the bottom of Crossgate is a parish church in the Liberal Catholic tradition, with a diversity inherited from recent history – charismatic, catholic, contemplative – that is reflected in the congregations.

Crossgate is the ancient route west from the city, on a bluff overlooking Framwellgate Bridge. It connects the city centre with Neville’s Cross, where the remains of a stone cross are a reminder that Crossgate was once a pilgrim route for those travelling to Durham and the relics of Saint Cuthbert.

Saint Margaret’s was established in the 12th century as a chapel of ease in the Parish of Saint Oswald to serve the people of the Borough of Crossgate or the ‘Old Borough’. Saint Margaret’s was under the jurisdiction of the Priors of Durham, and their successors, the Dean and Chapter of Durham, remain the patrons of the living to this day.

The earliest surviving parts of the church date from ca 1150. After their own chapel was built, the people of Crossgate resented still having to attend the parish church at certain times and to pay certain dues. During one dispute, the prior removed the font from Saint Margaret’s in 1343. It was returned by the bishop, but he insisted, however, that the parishioners had no right to use it.

Eventually, the residents of Crossgate won the right to be baptised and married in Saint Margaret’s, and burials were allowed there from 1431. The church was restored in the second half of the 19th century, when the north aisle was largely rebuilt, and a full set of stained glass windows was added. The organ dates from 1917 and is by Harrison & Harrison. Their factory until recently was within the parish, and Arthur Harrison was the churchwarden of Saint Margaret’s at the time.

Saint Margaret of Antioch depicted in a statue above the north porch of Saint Margaret of Antioch Church, Crossgate, Durham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Mowbray Stephen O’Rorke, the bishop with the ‘tallest mitre in Christendom’ and his family roots in Ballinasloe

Memories of my eldest brother, Stephen Comerford, who died a week before Christmas, 55 years ago

Stephen Edward Comerford, born on 22 August 1946, died 55 years ago on 18 December 1970

Patrick Comerford

Tomorrow (18 December) marks the fifty-fifth anniversary of the death of my eldest brother, Stephen Edward Comerford, who died in Durham, North Carolina, at the age of 24 on 18 December 1970.

Now that I am in my mid-70s, five or six years is hardly an age gap between people of my generation. But they mark a major chasm when you are a child, and that gap was compounded by the fact that he was the eldest child in the family and I was the fourth of six.

Steve was born in Dublin on 22 August 1946. He was named after our father, Stephen Edward Comerford (1918-2004), who in turn was named after our grandfather, also named Stephen Edward Comerford (1867-1921). The name Stephen had come into the Bunclody branch of the family because our grandfather was born on 28 December, three days after Christmas Day and two days after Saint Stephen’s Day.

As small children, we were all separated, going to different members and friends of the extended family: Steve was packed off to our grandmother Maria (Crowley) Murphy (1882-1957) and aunt Margaret (Murphy) Barrett (1920-2014) in Millstreet, Co Cork, while I went to George and Peggy Kerr in Dublin and the extended Hallinan family in Cappoquin, Co Waterford.

The accent Steve acquired in Millstreet brought him the nickname ‘Corky’ in his primary school when he returned to Dublin. By the time I was going to primary school, he was already at boarding school.

The Wexford historian Brendan Culliton, later the President of both the Wexford Historical Society and Wexford Wanderers Rugby Club, has remembered him as his friend throughout their shared years in primary school. ‘We were two of the ‘brainboxes’,’ he recalled some years ago. ‘In those days, we were two to a desk and I had the privilege of sharing a desk with Stephen for the whole of that year.’

He told me, ‘Stephen was very well read and was a pleasure to sit beside. He was one of the quieter members of the class, but I can remember the interesting chats we had on every subject under the sun. Before Christmas that year, we had shared what present we hoped to get. I am sure my interests at the time didn’t move far from Meccano and Just William. Stephen told me he had asked for books on history. That struck me as a bit odd, but if that was what he wanted, then that was him.

‘After Christmas, he brought in two bound copies of Carty’s History of Ireland to show me. I remember the covers were green, and plain. Other classmates would have been dismissive of books like these as a ‘Christmas present’. What, after all, was wrong with Dan Dare or Billy Bunter? But what struck me most was that Stephen was thrilled to show off these treasures. He was genuinely happy and, to me that was the important thing.’

Brendan Culliton was a year younger and stayed back a year. ‘So, when I went to Gormanston, Stephen was a year ahead of me. He was also in a different Clann / House, so our paths didn’t cross that often. However, when we did meet, a short greeting was never enough. I always recall there being real substance to the conversation.’

Stephen and I both went to Gormanston, but the five- or six-year gap was so wide that by the time I arrived, although there were teachers who remembered him, no-one in my year had ever come across him. We are also in different houses or clanns, and so any memories were few and rarely shared.

Yet, he was remembered for his achievements in maths and sciences, his fluency in the Irish language, and for his interests in chess, swimming and, to a lesser degree, golf. He taught himself the harmonica, and I remember his efforts to teach me to play chess – a pleasure that remains. But our academic and sporting interests seldom overlapped.

While I was at Gormanston, he was studying at University College Galway and at University College Dublin. When Brendan Culliton arrived in UCD, he recalled, they ‘encountered each other now and then around Earlsfort Terrace and, when we did, it was always cause for surprisingly lengthy conversations … There is no question that he was very intelligent and hugely talented. He was also genuine and sincere.’

By the time I left Gormanston in 1969, Stephen had completed his BSc and MSc degrees. We spent some time together that summer, sometimes going for meals together in Rathmines. I remember how we sat up together to watch the first moon landing on the night of 20 July 1969.

But by then he was moving to the US and Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, where he was a PhD candidate. I cannot recall that we ever met again. I was training to be a chartered surveyor with Jones Lang Wootton and working on a BSc in estate management with the College of Estate Management, then part of the University of Reading.

A colleague from his post-graduate days in Duke spoke of Stephen as ‘unfailingly courteous, and inclined to dress in jacket and tie … He gave the dining room a touch of class … dressed to the nines and carrying a rolled up umbrella.’ Perhaps he had retained a hint of that Cork accent he picked up in Millstreet as a child. ‘ We all had accents, but Stephen’s was a delight.’

He died on 18 December 1970, aged 24, and is buried in Maplewood Cemetery, Durham, North Carolina. The news of his death came in a chilling ’phone call in the middle of the night, seven days before Christmas, just days after my father’s birthday. Steve’s wrapped Christmas presents for his parents and each of his brothers and sisters arrived in the post a few days later, but by then the Christmas tree and the decorations had come down, and the Christmas lights had been switched off. It seems Christmas was cancelled that year.

The depths of a mother’s grief are unfathomable, I never fully understood or appreciated the ways my parents continued to suffer ever after, and at the time I never found ways to explain to friends and colleagues how I felt.

Brendan Culliton told me five years ago that when he heard of Stephen’s death it ‘was sad news then. It’s still sad news today.’

The Annals of Irish Mathematics and Mathematicians includes his name in the Gallery of Irish Mathematicians. He would have been 80 at his next birthday on 22 August 2026.

May his memory be a blessing ז״ל

A Christmas-time photograph of Steve visiting Santa as a child

Four churches dotted around Durham with different stories and roles in the city’s life

Saint Nicholas Church and the Market Place, Durham … the church gave the title to Archbishop George Carey’s book ‘The Church in the Market Place’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025; click on images for full-screen viewing)

Patrick Comerford

During my recent visit to Durham, I visited Durham Cathedral and Durham Castle, visited the locations of the former synagogues in Durham, crossed the bridges and walked through the steep narrow cobbled streets and along the banks of the River Wear.

It was my first visit to Durham, and it was also all too brief. But I also I also managed to visit four other churches in Durham. Although I did not manage to get inside any of those churches – this time – their stories, nevertheless, illustrate the variety and diversity of church life in Durham over the centuries, and one of them brought me on a pilgrim trail while another brought me back on what I like to think of as the ‘Pugin Trail’.

Earlier in the day I had also seen Durham Presbyterian Church, first built as Durham Synagogue and described in a blog posting on Friday evening (12 September 2025). But I also visited four other churches, three Anglican and one Roman Catholic:

• Saint Nicholas Church on Durham Market Place, once celebrated in Archbishop George Carey’s book The Church in the Market Place

• The former Saint Mary-le-Bow Church, which housed the Durham Museum until it closed at the end of last year

• Saint Margaret of Antioch Church on Crossgate, a parish church in the Liberal Catholic tradition, dating back to the 12th century, and once part of a mediaeval pilgrimage trail

• Saint Godric’s, built by EW Pugin on a raised site looking across the city.

The east end of Saint Nicholas Church at the junction of Silver Street and Durham Market Place (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Saint Nicholas Church, Market Place:

Saint Nicholas Church, commonly known as Saint Nics, is a Grade II listed building on the north side of the Market Place, and was once celebrated in Archbishop George Carey’s book The Church in the Market Place.

The original Saint Nicholas Church is thought to have been founded in the early 12th century by Ranulf Flambard, Bishop of Durham. He cleared Palace Green, between the cathedral and his castle, and established the current Market Place below the castle, with Saint Nicholas Church beside it. The first known vicar was Galfrid de Elemer in 1133.

This church had a buttressed nave and chancel, and a square tower with battlements. Its north wall formed part of the city walls, and abutted the ancient Clayport Gate until the gate was demolished in 1791. A graveyard lay between the church and the Market Place, and there was another behind the church.

The building was extensively modified over the centuries, the east end was shortened to allow street widening, and a market piazza was built against its south wall in the 19th century. But by 1803 it was said to be ‘very ruinous’.

The architect James Pigott Pritchett junior from Darlington was still only 24 when he was commissioned to renovate the church in 1854. However, when the market piazza was demolished, the church was found to be beyond repair, and instead Pritchett was commissioned to design and build a new church.

The old church was demolished in 1857, and all that remains from it is a font dating from 1700 and five bells dating from 1687.

Pritchett designed the new church in the Decorated Gothic style, and it opened in December 1858. The Illustrated London News said at the time it was ‘the most beautiful specimen of church architecture in the north of England’, and the architectural historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner said it is one of Pritchett’s best.

A statue of Saint Nicholas above the south porch of Saint Nicholas Church, looking out over the Market Place (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Pritchett’s church was the first in Durham to have a spire. Although it was not part of Pritchett's original plan, it was added at the behest of the Revd George Townshend Fox, who paid for it himself.

George Carey, later Archbishop of Canterbury, was Vicar of Saint Nicholas in 1975-1982. He removed the pews and the majority of the Victorian interior features to make the church more flexible and adaptable. His book The Church in the Market Place (1984) describes the changes and their impact on the life of the parish.

The parish is small, covering only the area around the Market Place, Claypath and the Sands. It is bounded by three other ancient parishes in Durham: Saint Giles, Saint Oswald’s and Saint Margaret of Antioch. Historically, the parish was densely populated. However, slum clearance and commercial developments in the 1920s greatly reduced the parish population parish, and the church draws the majority of its congregation from outside the parish.

Durham Market Place and Saint Nicholas Church on a busy Saturday afternoon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The church has a long evangelical tradition, and since the mid-19th century its patronage has been held by the Church Pastoral Aid Society. The church had a long involvement with the fair trade movement and with Richard Adams, the founder of Traidcraft.

The clergy of Saint Nicholas have included Alfred Tucker, a curate in the 1880s who became the first bishop of Uganda; John Wenham (vicar, 1948-1953), New Testament Greek scholar and author of The Elements of New Testament Greek; David Vivian Day, former Principal of Saint John’s College, Durham (1992-1999); Bishop Pete Broadbent, former Bishop of Willesden (2001-2021); and Maeve Sherlock, Baroness Sherlock, a Labour life peer and Minister of State for Work and Pensions.

The Revd Dr Will Foulger has been the Vicar of St Nicholas since 2023. Before that he taught theology and mission in Durham. The main Sunday services are a 9 am, 11 am and 6:30 pm, although I could not find out on the church noticeboard on the Market Place or on the church website when the Eucharist is celebrated.

The former Saint Mary-le-Bow Church on Bow Lane faces the east end of Durham Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Saint Mary-le-Bow Church, Bow Lane:

The former Church of Saint Mary-le-Bow, which housed the Durham Museum until last year, is a Grade I listed building on the corner of the North Bailey and Bow Lane, near Durham Cathedral. It is bounded on the north and east by Hatfield College, on the south by Bow Lane, and on the west by North Bailey.

Saint Mary-le-Bow was founded in 1241, and the mediaeval parish church served people living in the North Bailey. It is said to stand on the site of the White Church, or Tabernacle of Boughs, in which Saint Cuthbert’s body was kept until the cathedral was completed. An arch connected the church tower to the fortifications, creating a gateway or ‘bow’, with a room in the tower for a chantry priest.

The gateway, the tower and much of the west end of the church collapsed in 1637, and the church lay in ruins for decades and was not rebuilt until 1685, with the support of the Bishop of Durham and the Dean and Chapter of Durham Cathedral.

The east end of Saint Mary-le-Bow … the church was rebuilt in the 1680s using earlier material and elements (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Saint Mary-le-Bow was rebuilt on the same site, using earlier material and elements from different dates. The roof dates from the 15th century, the panelling is 18th century, and present tower dates from 1702, with a bell cast by Dalton of York in 1759.

The church had intricate wood carvings. The altar rails dated from 1705, the wooden screen from 1707, the wainscoting was installed in 1731, and the west gallery and vestry were built in 1741.

The church closed in 1968 and many of the fittings were removed. Saint Mary-le-Bow became Durham Museum and Heritage Centre and then Durham Museum. The museum opened in 1972, and the Bow Trust was formed in 1975 to maintain Saint Mary-Le-Bow as a centre for history and culture.

Fenwick Lawson’s sculpture of Saint Cuthbert was carved from an elm tree that grew in front of Durham Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The museum told the history of Durham from the Middle Ages, with displays on industries and trades in Durham, the manufacture of organs, and aspects of Durham’s social history. Works by the Durham sculptor Fenwick Lawson in the sculpture garden include one of Saint Cuthbert carved in 1984 from an elm tree that grew in front of Durham Cathedral.

The museum was mainly run by volunteers, but the costs of maintaining the building and the prospect of extensive and expensive repairs forced the museum to close at the end of last year (2024).

A ‘pop-up’ museum has opened at Prince Bishops Place, on the High Street off Durham Market Place.

The west end of Saint Margaret of Antioch Church, with Durham Castle (left) and Durham Cathedral (right) in the background (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Saint Margaret of Antioch Church, Crossgate:

Saint Margaret of Antioch Church at the bottom of Crossgate is a parish church in the Liberal Catholic tradition, with a diversity inherited from recent history – charismatic, catholic, contemplative – that is reflected in the congregations.

Crossgate is the ancient route west from the city, on a bluff overlooking Framwellgate Bridge. It connects the city centre with Neville’s Cross, where the remains of a stone cross are a reminder that Crossgate was once a pilgrim route for those travelling to Durham and the relics of Saint Cuthbert.

Saint Margaret is Grade I listed, with substantial parts that date from the 12th century. Saint Margaret’s was established in the 12th century as a chapel of ease in the Parish of Saint Oswald to serve the people of the Borough of Crossgate or the ‘Old Borough’.

Like Saint Oswald’s Church, Saint Margaret’s was under the jurisdiction of the Priors of Durham, and their successors, the Dean and Chapter of Durham, remain the patrons of the living to this day.

Saint Margaret of Antioch depicted in a statue above the north porch of Saint Margaret of Antioch Church, Crossgate (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The earliest surviving parts of the church date from ca 1150. At that time, the church probably consisted of the nave, south aisle and chancel; a north aisle was added at the end of the 12th century. The north nave arcade is taller and more elaborate than the south nave, though both are in the Norman style.

The font is believed to date from the 12th century. Two Norman windows survive from that period: one in the chancel, one in the south nave clerestory. The south aisle was remodelled in the 14th century, and new clerestory windows were inserted above the nave.

After their own chapel was built, the people of Crossgate resented still having to attend the parish church at certain times and to pay certain dues. During one dispute, the prior removed the font from Saint Margaret’s in 1343. It was returned by the bishop, but he insisted, however, that the parishioners had no right to use it. Eventually, the residents of Crossgate won the right to be baptised and married in Saint Margaret’s, and burials were allowed there from 1431.

Crossgate was once part of the pilgrims’ route to Durham Cathedral and the relics of Saint Cuthbert (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Further expansion in the 15th century included the addition of a Lady Chapel to the south of the chancel, and the tower. Two of the church’s three bells date from this period, while third is from the 16th century.

The memorials in the church include a large ledger slab on the nave floor marking the burial place of Sir John Duck, a 17th-century mayor known as ‘Durham’s Dick Whittington’ because of his poor origins.

The church was restored in the second half of the 19th century, when the north aisle was largely rebuilt, and a full set of stained glass windows was added. The organ dates from 1917 and is by Harrison & Harrison. Their factory until recently was within the parish, and Arthur Harrison was the churchwarden of Saint Margaret’s at the time.

Saint Margaret’s was a leading centre of charismatic worship from the 1960s to the 1980s.

Father Barnaby Huish is the Rector of the parishes of Saint Margaret and of Saint John, Neville’s Cross and Saint Edmund’s, Bearpark. The services include the Parish Eucharist on Sundays at 10:30 am, the Eucharist on Wednesdays at 10 am, and Choral Evensong on Fridays with Saint Cuthbert’s Society Choir.

Saint Godric’s Church was designed by Edward Welby Pugin and built in 1863-1864 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Saint Godric’s Church, Castle Chare:

Saint Godric’s Church, Castle Chare, formally known as the Church of Our Lady of Mercy and Saint Godric, is part of the Roman Catholic parish of the Durham Martyrs, which also includes Saint Bede’s Chapel and Saint Joseph’s Church. It is part of the Finchale Partnership in the Diocese of Hexham and Newcastle, and was Grade 2 listed after a fire in 1985.

Saint Godric (1065-1170) was a merchant from Norfolk who travelled to Rome and Jerusalem, a ship’s captain and possibly a pirate, before his conversion to the religious life. He retreated to Finchale, four miles from Durham on the banks of the River Wear. There he lived the rest of his life as a monk and hermit, and it is said he died at the age of 105.

Saint Godric’s stands dramatically on a raised site close to Durham city centre, and its design takes full advantage of the location. The church was designed by the architect was Edward Welby Pugin (1834-1875), son of the leading architect of the Gothic Revival, Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin (1812-1852).

Pugin’s original designs included a tower and spire, but funds were not available for building them. The church originally consisted of just the five-bay nave and aisles. The foundation stone was laid by Bishop William Hogarth on Whit Monday 1863 and the church was opened by the bishop on 15 November 1864, when the preacher was the future Cardinal Henry Manning.

Fundraising for completing the church began in 1906 and plans were drawn up by Pugin & Pugin, the successor practice to EW Pugin. The tower was completed and reopened on 27 October 1909. It appears likely that the east end was built at the same time; it has seven gables, each surmounted by a stone cross.

A statue of Saint Godric at Saint Godric’s Church (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The interior continued to be enriched with new fittings. A marble and alabaster high altar was erected in 1914 by Canon Robert Thornton in memory of his parents, incorporating the earlier tabernacle. The altar is probably by Pugin & Pugin, although this has not been established with certainty. The alabaster altar rails may also date from this time.

Stained glass windows were installed In 1913-1914 in the baptistry by the widow of Edward Gannen. A stone war memorial was unveiled outside the church in 1923, and electric light was installed in the church. After Canon Thornton died in 1934, the Lady Chapel was redecorated and panelling and a screen erected there in his memory. The church was consecrated by Bishop Séamus Cunningham on 23 September 1959.

The church was badly damaged in a fire on 13 January 1985. The roof was destroyed, but many internal furnishings survived, including the high altar and some of the stained glass. After two years of careful restoration, the church reopened in 1987.

The church celebrated the 150th anniversary of the church in 2014. Sunday Mass is celebrated at 9 am and weekday services usually take place at 10 am.

Saint Godric’s Church takes full advantage of its location on a raised site close to Durham city centre (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Finding Irish links and links with CS Lewis in a plaque in the cloisters in Durham Cathedral

The monument to Archdeacon George Hans Hamilton in the cloisters in Durham Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

As I was walking through the cloisters in Durham Cathedral during my recent visit, I noticed a plaque commemorating George Hans Hamilton (1823-1903), who was Archdeacon of Lindisfarne (1865-1882), Archdeacon of Northumberland (1882-1905), and a Canon of Durham Cathedral.

The plaque caught my attention because his name indicated and the fading coat-of-arms on the memorial indicated, to me at least, not only that Archdeacon Hamilton was Irish but that he was part of the Hamilton family who are closely identified with both Balbriggan and Skerries in north Co Dublin.

I have been familiar with both towns since my schooldays, until recently I regularly went for walks on the beach in Skerries, and I often did Sunday duty in Holmpatrick Church, Skerries, and Saint George’s Church, Balbriggan.

There is a large monument to one branch of the Hamilton family in the centre of Skerries, and some memorial tablets from an older church that have survived in the new church when it was being built in the 1860s.

One curious monument to the memory of James Hamilton of Sheepshill and Holmpatrick reads in part: ‘A gentleman who during a long and most active life displayed that zealous energy and ingenious integrity that forms a useful and virtuous man … He died the 20th of October 1800, in the 73rd year of his age … Of the uncommonly numerous offspring of thirty six children he was survived by eight sons and eight daughters.’

James Hamilton’s descendants include Richard Branson. However, with 36 children born over 200 years ago, Hamilton must be the ancestor of thousands upon thousands of people today. But … 36 children? A most active life that displayed zealous energy indeed! Useful and virtuous? What about his poor wife or wives?

Archdeacon Hamilton, on the other hand, is directly related to the Balrothery and Balbriggan branch of the Hamilton family, and my search for his family background led to the discovery that he was also related to interesting Irish literary figures too.

The future archdeacon was born on 21 January 1823, the third son of Henry Hamilton (1780-1854) of Tullylish, Co Down, and a grandson of Hugh Hamilton (1729-1805), Bishop of Clonfert and Kilmacduagh (1795-1799) and then Bishop of Ossory (1799-1805).

Bishop Hugh Hamilton was born in Balrothery, near Balbriggan, Co Dublin, in 1725. He was an older brother of Judge George Hamilton (1732-1793) of Hampton, Balrothery, who was MP for Belfast and a Baron of the Exchequer. Judge Hamilton is remembered mainly for developing the town of Balbriggan. As part of the development of Balbriggan, he sold the Lower Mill to the business of Comerford and O’Brien in Balbriggan in the early 1780s. His son, the Revd George Hamilton built Saint George’s Church, Balbriggan, in 1813.

The most elaborate memorial in Saint George’s Church recalls George Alexander Hamilton, who died on 17 September 1871. His wife Amelia Fancourt Hamilton is remembered on a similar memorial that says: ‘Her clothing and coal clubs were for many years a great benefit to the poor of this neighbourhood.’ It also mentions that she set up an infant school in 1836 at Hampton Gates.

The elaborate memorial to George Alexander Hamilton, who died in 1871 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Hamiltons were a clerical family with seemingly innumerable priests in the Church of Ireland. Bishop Hamilton was a Professor of Philosophy in Trinity College Dublin, Vicar of Saint Ann’s, Dublin, and Dean of Armagh before he became a bishop. Three of his sons were priests: Hans Hamilton of Knocktopher, Co Kilkenny, who fled Co Kilkenny during the ‘Tithe War’ in the 1830s; George Hamilton (1783-1830), of Killemogh, Co Laois, a Biblical scholar; and the Revd Hugh Hamilton (1790-1865) of Innishmacsaint, Co Fermanagh.

Another son of Bishop Hamilton, Henry Hamilton (1780-1854), grew up in Dublin, but lived much of his life in Tullylish, Co Down. As well as the archdeacon who is commemorated in Durham Cathedral, Henry Hamilton was the father of two other priests: the Revd Hugh Hamilton (1811-1884) of Dublin, and Canon William Alfred Hamilton (1824-1897), Rector of Taney, Dundrum, Co Dublin. His daughter Sarah was a doctor’s wife who lived in the family home, Hampton Hall, Balbriggan; her son, the Revd Rowland Scriven (1859-1944), was a curate in Balbriggan from 1898 until 1920, when he moved to England.

The Hamilton family was intermarried with many of the great literary figures in Ireland, and both John Millington Synge and CS Lewis are direct descendants of Bishop Hamilton.

Archdeacon George Hans Hamilton was a first cousin of the Revd Thomas Robert Hamilton, the first Rector of Saint Mark’s, Dundela, in Belfast, and the grandfather of CS Lewis.

In the cloisters in Durham Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The future archdeacon, George Hans Hamilton, was born on 21 January 1823, He was educated at Shrewsbury School and Trinity College, Dublin and was ordained in 1847.

After a time as a curate in Sunderland he became chaplain of Durham Prison and then Vicar of Berwick. He was chaplain to the High Sheriff of Durham in 1884.

Hamilton first married Arabella Sarah (Bella) Best on 9 May 1848. Her father John Best (1791-1825) was an accountant with the East India Company in Bombay; her mother Arabella née Robinson (1795-1855) was from Sunderland. Best seems to have spent much of his time travelling between Bombay and Sunderland. When he died in Bombay at the age of 33, he left a pregnant widow in India with four other children under the age of 10.

Bella Hamilton died in January 1868. She was the mother of two sons and a daughter: Hans Alfred Hamilton (born 1849), who seems to have been the ‘black sheep’ of the family; and Henry (Harry) Best Hans Hamilton (1850-1935); and Eliza Arabella Sarah (1858-1919), known as Ella.

Soon after Bella’s death, Hamilton married his second wife Lady Louisa Frances Clements (1843-1939) in 1869. She was a sister of Robert Bermingham Clements (1847-1892), 4th Earl of Leitrim. The couple were the parents of another daughter and three more sons: George Francis Clements Hamilton (1870-1900); Robert Charles Clements Hamilton (1871-1901), a refrigeration engineer, who was killed in an explosion on the first refrigerated ship bringing bananas to Britain from the West Indies; Sir Collingwood George Clements Hamilton (1877-1947), an electrical engineer and Conservative politician; and Louisa Lindisfarne Clements (Hamilton) Maitland (1878-1952).

Hamilton was a great advocate of prison reform. His character was drawn upon by Charles Reade in It Is Never Too Late to Mend (1856). He was Archdeacon of Lindisfarne (1865-1882), Archdeacon of Northumberland (1882-1905), and a canon of Durham Cathedral. He died on 23 September 1905 – he was 80 and still in office; his widow, Lady Louisa Hamilton, died on 31 August 1939.

As for Archdeacon Hamilton’s first cousin, the Revd Thomas Hamilton, he baptised his grandson, Clive Staples Lewis, in Saint Mark’s Church, Dundela, on 29 January 1899.

A portrait in Saint Mark’s Church, Dundela, of the Revd Thomas Hamilton, grandfather of CS Lewis (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Durham Cathedral has the shrines of Cuthbert and Bede. Is it England’s Prague or Avignon?

‘Durham is one of the great experiences of Europe … and … can only be compared to Avignon and Prague’ (Nikolaus Pevsner) … Durham castle and cathedral above the River Wear (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

‘Durham is one of the great experiences of Europe to the eyes of those who appreciate architecture, and to the minds of those who understand architecture. The group of Cathedral, Castle, and Monastery on the rock can only be compared to Avignon and Prague.’

So wrote the architectural historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner (1902-1983) in The Buildings of England.

Pevsner was still in his 20s and on his first English tour, when he wrote about his visit to Durham to his wife Lola (Carola Kurlbaum) in 1930: ‘From the bridge it is a Romantic dream, a fantasy by Schinkel. This morning in the mist it was wonderful … the first thing that has made my heart pound … the cathedral in itself, just like the Matterhorn in itself – gigantic, grey, on its own.’ He fled Nazi Germany three years later and settled in England in 1933.

More recently, Bill Bryson wrote in Notes from a Small Island: ‘I unhesitatingly gave Durham my vote for best cathedral on planet Earth.’

Durham Cathedral is a place of pilgrimage associated with Saint Cuthbert, the Venerable Bede and Saint Oswald (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Durham Cathedral has been a place of worship and learning continuously for more than 1,000 years, and through those centuries it has been a centre of prayer and pilgrimage associated with the relics of Saint Cuthbert and the Venerable Bede and the head of Saint Oswald of Northumbria.

It has been described as the ‘largest and most perfect monument of Norman style architecture in England.’ It is generally regarded as one of the finest Romanesque cathedrals in Europe and the rib vaulting in the nave marks the beginning of Gothic ecclesiastical architecture. Durham Cathedral and Durham Castle are both are Grade I listed buildings and together they became a Unesco World Heritage Site in 1986. The site is one of the most powerful symbols of the Norman Conquest of England.

Durham Cathedral is formally the Cathedral Church of Christ, Blessed Mary the Virgin and Saint Cuthbert of Durham. It attracts about 750,000 visitors a year, although my visit last weekend was curtailed and restricted. I was visiting Durham for the first time, and a day of ceremonies and commemorations meant I only had a short visit to the cathedral and never managed to visit the shrine of Saint Cuthbert.

The cathedral story dates back to the seventh century and the foundation of Lindisfarne Priory, founded ca 635. The See of Durham was founded by Saint Aidan as the Diocese of Lindisfarne at the invitation of King Oswald. The see was moved to York in 664, but it returned to Lindisfarne in 678. Saint Cuthbert, whose story is central to the development of Durham Cathedral, was Bishop of Lindisfarne from 685 until his death in 687.

After repeated Viking raids, the monks fled from Lindisfarne in 875, bringing Saint Cuthbert’s relics with them. They settled at Chester-le-Street from 882 until 995, when they moved to Durham. I was recalling the legend of the Dun Cow in a posting on Thursday evening (11 September 2025). Eventually, the monks arrived at a peninsula formed by a loop in the River Wear, and there they built a new shrine that marks the beginning of Durham, both the cathedral and the city.

The east end of Durham Cathedral, one of the finest Romanesque cathedrals in Europe (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The first shrine or church was a simple, temporary wooden structure built to house the relics of Saint Cuthbert. A sturdier, wooden building, known as the White Church, was itself replaced in 998 by a stone building also known as the White Church, which was complete in 1018 except for its tower.

The shrine of Saint Cuthbert soon made Durham a centre of pilgrimage, the early pilgrims included King Canute and a town grew up around the cathedral.

The present cathedral was built between 1093 and 1133 under Bishop William de St-Calais. He founded the Benedictine Priory at Durham in 1083, and replaced the secular canons with monks from the monasteries at Wearmouth and Jarrow, appointing Aldwin as the first prior.

Bishop William de St Calais demolished the old Saxon church, and he and Turgot of Durham, Aldwin’s successor as prior, laid the foundation stone of the new cathedral on 11 August 1093. Since then, there have been many additions and reconstructions, but the greater part of the cathedral remains the original Norman structure.

William de St-Calais died in 1096 and was succeeded by Ranulf Flambard, who built Framwellgate Bridge, the earliest crossing of the River Wear from the town.

The rib vaulting in the nave marks the beginning of Gothic ecclesiastical architecture (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The remains of Saint Cuthbert were transferred to the new shrine in the new cathedral in 1104. The walls of the nave were finished by 1128, the high vault by 1135, and the chapter house was built in 1133-1140. It is a significant example of the Romanesque architectural style, and the nave ceiling is the earliest surviving example of a pointed rib vault.

Hugh de Puiset added the Galilee Chapel at the west end of the cathedral in the 1170s. The five-aisled building occupies the position of a porch and functioned as a Lady Chapel with the great west door being blocked during the mediaeval period by an altar to the Virgin Mary. The west towers also date from the early 13th century and were built ca 1200.

Richard le Poore, Bishop of Salisbury, moved to Durham in 1228 after rebuilding Salisbury Cathedral in the Gothic style. He commissioned Richard Farnham to design the east end of the cathedral as a place where the monks could say the Daily Office together. The east end was expanded in the Early English Gothic style in the 1230s, and the building that was erected became the Chapel of the Nine Altars.

The Shrine of Saint Cuthbert was at the east end of the cathedral. The shrine was said to be one of the ‘most sumptuous in all England, so great were the offerings and jewels bestowed upon it, and endless the miracles that were wrought at it’.

The north aisle of Durham Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The original roof was replaced in 1250 by a vault that is still in place. The central tower was damaged by lightning and was replaced by the Perpendicular Gothic central tower, built in two stages in the 15th century.

The cathedral is notable for the ribbed vault of the nave, with some of the earliest transverse pointed arches supported on relatively slender composite piers alternated with massive drum columns, and lateral abutments concealed within the triforium over the aisles.

The skilled use of the pointed arch and ribbed vault made it possible to cover far more elaborate and complicated ground plans than before. Buttressing made it possible to build taller buildings and open up the intervening wall spaces to create larger windows.

The main entrance to the cathedral is now on the north side, facing onto Palace Green and Durham Castle.

The shrine of Saint Bede in the Galilee Chapel (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The relics of Saint Bede were brought by a monk to Durham from Jarrow in 1022. At first they were placed with Saint Cuthbert’s remains, but they were moved to the Galilee Chapel around 1370. The simple Latin inscription on his tomb reads, ‘Here lie the bones of the Venerable Bede’.

The Galilee Chapel in front of the former great west door was home to the chantry, which Cardinal Thomas Langley opened in 1414 to provide free grammar and music lessons to children who could not afford them.

The Great West Door was blocked by Langley’s tomb after he died in 1437 and so the two doors were built to the north and south in the 19th century.

The Great West Door was blocked by Cardinal Thomas Langley’s tomb after he died in 1437 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

During the Tudor Reformation, Saint Cuthbert’s tomb was destroyed in 1538 and the monastery’s wealth was transferred to the crown. When Saint Cuthbert’s body was exhumed, it is said, it was discovered to be uncorrupted. It was reburied under a plain stone slab now worn smooth by the knees of pilgrims, but the ancient paving around it remains intact.

The Benedictine monastery at Durham was dissolved on 31 December 1540, and the last Prior of Durham, Hugh Whitehead, became the first dean in the cathedral’s new chapter.

After the Battle of Dunbar in 1650, Durham Cathedral was used by Cromwell as a makeshift prison to hold Scottish prisoners of war. As many as 3,000 were imprisoned in inhumane conditions, without food, water, or heat.

The prisoners destroyed much of the cathedral woodwork for firewood, and 1,700 of them died inside the cathedral. It is said the dead prisoners were buried in unmarked graves, and the survivors were shipped as slave labour to the American Colonies. The remains of some prisoners were identified recently in a mass grave uncovered during building works outside the cathedral precinct near Palace Green.

Durham Cathedral was used by Cromwell to hold up to 3,000 prisoners of war in inhumane conditions (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

After the Caroline restoration, Bishop John Cosin was Bishop of Durham in 1660-1672. He set about restoring the damage and refurnishing the cathedral with new chapter and choir stalls, the litany desk, and the towering canopy over the font, while an oak screen replaced a stone screen pulled down in the 16th century. Dean John Sudbury founded a library of early printed books on the remains of the old refectory.

George Nicholson, who had completed Prebends’ Bridge across the Wear, persuaded the dean and chapter in 1777 to allow him to smooth off much of the outer stonework of the cathedral, altering its character. His successor William Morpeth demolished most of the chapter house.

James Wyatt drew up plans to transform the cathedral in 1794, including the demolition of the Galilee Chapel. But the chapter later rejected many of his proposed changes. Wyatt renewed the 15th century tracery of the Rose Window, inserting plain glass to replace glass that had been blown out in a storm.

The architect Anthony Salvin removed Cosin’s wooden organ screen in 1847, opening up the view of the east end from the nave, and he restored the cloisters in 1858.

The cathedral tower was restored in 1859-1860 by George Gilbert Scott (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The cathedral tower was restored in 1859-1860 by George Gilbert Scott, working with Edward Robert Robson. Scott was responsible for the marble choir screen and pulpit in the crossing in 1874. Scott’s pupil Charles Hodgson Fowler rebuilt the chapter house in 1892 as a memorial to Bishop Joseph Barber Lightfoot.

The great west window, depicting the Tree of Jesse, was the gift of Dean George Waddington (1867). It is the work of Clayton and Bell, who were also responsible for the Te Deum window in the south transept (1869), the Four Doctors window in the north transept (1875), and the Rose Window of Christ in Majesty (1876).

Dean Cyril Alington began restoring the Shrine of Saint Cuthbert behind the high altar in the 1930s, and the work resumed after World War II. The four candlesticks and overhanging tester (1950) were designed by Sir Ninian Comper. Two large batik banners by Thetis Blacker depicting Saint Cuthbert and Saint Oswald were added in 2001. Several stained glass windows by Hugh Ray Easton in the cathedral were added in the 1930s and 1940s.

A window by Alan Younger in the Galilee Chapel commemorates the 1300th anniversary of the birth of the Venerable Bede (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The artwork behind Saint Bede’s tomb in the Galilee Chapel is a wooden memorial with glistening gold writing and quotes from his commentary on the Book of Revelation: ‘Christ is the Morning Star who, when the night of this world is past, brings to his saints the promise of the light of life, and opens everlasting day.’

It was designed by Frank Roper (1914-2000).and George Pace (1915-1975) in 1971 as a memorial to Cyril Alington, Dean of Durham in 1933-1951, and his wife Hester.

A wooden statue of the Annunciation (1992) in the Galilee Chapel is by the Polish artist Josef Pyrz and Leonard Evetts’s Stella Maris window was added the sane year.

A window by Alan Younger was installed in the Galilee Chapel in 1973 to commemorate the 1300th anniversary of the birth of the Venerable Bede in 672/673 AD.

In the cloisters in Durham Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

At the beginning of the 21st century, two of the altars in the Nine Altars Chapel at the east end were re-dedicated to Saint Hild of Whitby and Saint Margaret of Scotland. Two wooden sculptures by Fenwick Lawson, Pietà and Tomb of Christ, were placed in the chapel in 2004, and a new stained glass window of the Transfiguration by Tom Denny was dedicated in 2010 in memory of Michael Ramsey, former Bishop of Durham and Archbishop of Canterbury.

The 17th century Smith organ was replaced in 1876 by ‘Father’ Willis (Henry Willis & Sons). Harrison & Harrison worked on the organ from 1880. It was restored in 1905-1935, rebuilt again in 1970, and there were more changes in 1981 and 1996.

The organists have included the composers Thomas Ebdon and Richard Hey Lloyd, editor of the Ancient and Modern Revised hymnbook John Dykes Bower, and the conductor David Hill. present Master of the Choristers and Organist is Daniel Cook. The Sub-Organist is Joseph Beech. There are ten bells in the central tower hung for change ringing in the English style.

The north transept and north door of Durham Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Sir Walter Scott in his poem ‘Harold the Dauntless’ wrote in 1819:

Grey towers of Durham
Yet well I love thy mixed and massive piles
Half church of God, half castle ’gainst the Scot
And long to roam those venerable aisles
With records stored of deeds long since forgot.

Other listed churches and former churches I managed to see during my short visit to Durham include Saint Margaret of Antioch, Crossgate; Saint Mary-le-Bow, now Durham Heritage Centre; Saint Cuthbert’s Roman Catholic Church; and Saint Nicholas Church. But more about them another day, hopefully.

Saint Oswald’s’ head was buried in Durham Cathedral alongside Saint Cuthbert of Lindisfarne (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

• The Very Revd Dr Philip Plyming has been the Dean of Durham since 2023. The chapter includes the vice-dean and precentor, treasurer, chancellor, canon pastor and the Van Mildert Professor of Divinity at Durham University, the Revd Canon Professor Simon Oliver. The Sung Eucharist on Sundays, the main service of Holy Communion, begins at 10 am. The cathedral church and the cloisters are open to visitors throughout the year.

Durham Cathedral glimpsed through the narrow, cobbled streets of Durham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)