Sacred Heart

Introduction

Sacred Heart church in Hanley, in the Archdiocese of Birmingham, was constructed in 1889-91 and is an example of late-C19 Catholic Gothic Revival architecture.

History

Bishop Ilsley laid the foundation stone in July 1889. Bishop Ilsley opened the church on 22 September 1891, assisted by Henry Vaughan, Bishop of Salford. The church was consecrated in 1911. H V Krolow of St Helens and Liverpool originally designed the church; after his resignation, Robert Scrivener and Sons took over the work.

The organ, the pulpit, and many of the fittings were donated. In 1890, assistant priest Matthias O'Rourke went on a fund-raising tour of the United States of America, which produced well over £1,000 after expenses. William Molloy died in 1890, so the completion of the church fell to his successor, James Keating. The church was built after the congregation was very poor, and William Molloy grew vegetables and kept pigs on the land before the church could be started. The church was built on a site that was found to be pitted with old coal workings, requiring many tons of concrete to be poured into the holes before foundations could be made secure.

Architecture and furnishings

The church is built of red brick with stone dressings and fenestration, under clay tile roofs. The church has a rectangular nave, an apsidal chancel to the east, north and south aisles, and a gallery at the west end. The west front faces Jasper Street and is an imposing, wide, three-bay elevation with a central gable end and a projecting porch. The tympanum of the porch holds a relief figure of Christ revealing the Sacred Heart within a trefoil headed niche.

To the right of the central doorway is a brick tower with stone banding, slit openings to three floors and an arcaded stone spire above. The interior has a rectangular, aisled nave with two-bay stone arcades, comprising three columns to each side with stiff leaf capitals in various designs, some incorporating sunflowers. The gilded altar and reredos rear of the chancel are of stone with statuary, and have mosaic decoration with colourful painted biblical scenes in relief, framed by an arcade, above. At the front of the chancel is a carved marble altar rail, with a stone and marble pulpit to the right, which has rich mosaic detailing and stands on truncated marble columns.

The baptistry in the west end of the north aisle has a carved stone font on a plinth and stands behind iron railings. Framed, pictorial, Stations of the Cross line the walls of the nave, above a tiled dado, interrupted by a number of pointed-arched doorways. Above the west end of the nave is a gallery with a carved oak balustrade, supported by oak brackets. The windows throughout the church have coloured panes, and those in the apse and north chapel have figurative stained glass.

Visiting

The parish is part of a Cluster Youth Group for the Parishes of Stoke, Hanley and Fenton. The church is located in Jasper Street, Hanley, a short walk from the Victoria Hall, the Potteries Museum and Library, and the Hanley Bus Station.