St Wilfrid

There has been a church on the site since Saxon times and it is recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086. Parts of the present church are 11th & 12th century with the west tower being 14th century. It is believed that the church was founded on a site used for earlier worship or the site of a Romano British pagan temple or burial ground. The church’s dedication to St Wilfrid also suggests a Roman connection.

Records of the church going back to 1215 are in the archives of York Minster. Until the dissolution of the Monasteries by Henry VIII, the church belonged to Worksop Priory and thereafter passed into the hands of the Childers family. The church suffered from neglect from the 17th to the early 19th centuries but magnificent restorations were carried out in 1874 by George Gilbert Scott and in 1894 by John Ninian Comper. In order to cater for the expanding population of the parish, an extension was added to the north side of the church in 1989, designed by Donald Buttress, a well known architect who was Surveyor of the Fabric to Westminster Abbey and a recognised authority on the work of Sir Ninian Comper.

St Wilfrid’s church is considered to have one of the finest examples of the early work of Sir Ninian Comper. He recreated at St Wilfrid’s the atmosphere of an English medieval Parish Church with his elaborate rich decoration, rood screens, reredos and other furnishings. There are also examples of both early English and medieval decoration and a number of beautiful statues throughout the church. The oldest part of the present church is believed to be the dog tooth moulding on the external part of the main south door, similar to moulding around the west door of Lincoln Cathedral, which is known to date from 1032.