Why the Chapel
Matters
This section brings together the Chapel’s history and the memories shared by local people. Placing heritage fact alongside remembered moments helps to see the Chapel more fully, to understand not just what the Chapel is, but what it means — together a mix of research, feeling and imagination shows why it matters and why its future holds the promise of change, opportunity and a richer more creative life for the community.
“This is a community where belonging is as much a part of its nature as the fog laden days of summer… These are stories of music, meeting, humour, learning, sadness, near misses, culture, hireth. These are stories of belonging”
A Sense of Place
You, Cathedral
Oh you, who towers with a watchful eye,
Over our town, future, present and times gone by,
Pleading, bleeding for our sorrows,
Cheering, hearing our joys tomorrow,
You, whose hallowed land does hold,
Our beloveds’ bodies, minds and souls,
You, whose walls have captured,
Each preach and prayer,
That’s gathered layer by layer,
For two hundred years so far,
You, whose ceiling height is a tower,
That is seen by those who first approach,
By road, or field, or path, or boat,
You, whose windows wept and weep,
With the thousand more who filled your seats,
Those beeswax polished pews,
That inspired daily patient queues,
That waited to hear this day’s learning,
That climbed from mine and home with yearning,
To join in prayer and join in song,
To feel how it feels to belong,
Belonging, that is our cathedral,
That feeds our soul a hearty meal,
You, who has seen the arrival of swallows and swifts,
Who has overseen the mighty rift,
Of prosper, poor,
Of prosper more,
Our community grew, and then it fell,
And now it’s turned around again,
And we gather now, in song and prayer,
To save you, layer by layer,
You host our children’s Christmas carols,
And house so many community choirs,
And give a home to many who,
Whose ancestors once did too,
Sit amongst your congregation,
Our cousin jacks who left our nation,
They travelled far, they travelled wide,
But you are home in to abide,
A beacon, holding our fine town,
You are our jewel; you are our crown.
It is December, a fog has sat over St Just for three days, drenching the streets in a mizzle barely perceptible to the eye. As evening begins to fall, there are whisperings of an east wind, the creaks and moans of timber framed windows are starting to punctuate homes, on Fore Street, the sign hanging from the Star Inn has begun its merry dance.
Inside the chapel, a woman has arrived early to begin turning on welcoming lights and check the settings for the supper later, there is a whistle, and it’s difficult to tell whether it is from her lips or the wind that has invited itself in between the slightest gaps in the granite. It is no matter, they are both singing the same tune. Across St Just, families are dressing in their nicest clothes, wrapping themselves in thick coats and warm hats, clutching at umbrellas as they begin to make their way outside and down Chapel Street. Neighbours, friends, family; they spot each other and gather into larger groups as they head towards the Chapel doors.
Inside they make their way to their pews. Stuffing umbrellas into the end hangings, deciding whether to remove garments. They have arrived early, for the purpose of the genial gossip. Someone nods to an empty pew; “Have you heard from the Rowes?” they ask their neighbour. A small child fidgets in her seat, “I need a wee” she says, and her grandmother bundles her up and heads to the lavatories. Nervous school children are lining up near the pulpit. Repeating lines of songs over and over again, their earlier confidence now blown away by the reverence of the building. A girl glances up at a boy sitting across the Gallery, he sees her eyelashes flutter and sets his eyes to the floor. In the back pews, a boy old enough to know better is carving his initials into the wood in front of him. Years later he will go back, and yes, they are still there, and so are his brothers’.
There is movement, a girl glances up and sees the choir taking their place by the organ. “Where did they come from?” she wonders and imagines secret passages within the thick granite walls. A hush, and then the organ begins, and everyone rises to their feet. The Chapel is filled with voices in near enough harmony.
“This is a Chapel that wants to be used, this is a Chapel that is alive. Every floorboard, pew, window, granite block breathes with the two hundred years of life that has sung and moved within it.”
When do you imagine this scene takes place? 1850, perhaps? 1900, maybe. Or could it have been 2024? If the granite walls could talk, they would tell you that this is a scene that has taken place (nearly) every year since 1833.
The windows might mention that the fashions have changed, the roof timbers will say the weather hasn’t. The pews will say, the names haven’t, not really. Families have grown, arrived; finding a place here to belong, they have left; yet their names are carved in stone, and this is a home for them to return to. The fabric of the building has soaked up every conversation, every song, sermon or service; burials, weddings, baptism, every performance, every missed line, every applause. It is etched as deeply as its foundations, absorbed and reflected back; ready for the next time the doors open. If you have ever wished to go back in time, then stand in the Chapel, close your eyes and open your heart.
But this is only part of the story, an archive is not just the old, battered, browning documents or curled photographs, it’s what is happening right now. In this modern age, it’s easy to leave photographs on phones or computers, to see adverts on social media, news on websites. Collect them, view them not as mayflies, but the future fossils of our social lives.
“Our memories remind us who we are. They are the architects of our identity. They can teach us things from the past. And because of that, they can shape our sense of self and they can actually make us understand in a deeper level how we react to things”.
Pau Garcia.
This Social History document can be downloaded as a pdf here in its entirety.
It has been part-funded by the UK Government through the UK Shared Prosperity Fund.
The funding was allocated through Cornwall Council’s Town Regeneration and Investment Programme,
which is part of the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Good Growth Programme.
Timeline of Adaptations
Heritage Statement
Seen from a distance (the building is a prominent landscape component from many parts of the St Just landscape), the St Just Miners’ Chapel externally resembles a huge white box of a building, prominently set on the crest of the hillslope above the Kenidjack Valley, dwarfing the modern houses on Bosorne Road which now occupy what was formerly the open hill crest to its west; it was clearly constructed as a statement building at the western end of the town.
Approach it from Chapel Street however, along a road deliberately aligned on it to form a visual corridor linking it to the heart of old St Just around Bank Square and Market Square, and its architecturally confident neo-Tuscan facade dominates the view; a recognition of its significance in the development of the town and its society is unavoidable.
Open the substantial double doors in its facade, and move from the transverse lobby area with its its staircases to the upper floor into the body of the chapel and the quality of the building immediately becomes apparent. Lit by tall arched windows, the area was formerly dominated by box pews (replaced in pitch pine in the 1890s and each with a brass holder for the occupants’ family name), the walkways between these are focussed on the pulpit and organ at the western end of the building; above, an oval gallery is carried on pillars, and above this three colourful plaster ceiling roses are visible, the central one having originally ventilated the building via a cowl protruding through the roof. Behind the re-sited communion rail, its ironwork cast at the Holman’s Foundry in Tregeseal and the double deck pulpit is a colour glazed screen in the Art Nouveau style visually blocking off the original communion area and its circular window.
Upstairs, the comb-painted box pews which fill the gallery space were installed in the 1860 refurbishment of the building, and form the largest group of such features anywhere in Cornwall. Each has a clear view of the pulpit; graffiti scratched in the book rests of those at the back suggest that they were occupied by members of the congregation whose attentions wandered elsewhere during the sermon and lessons. Despite being substantially revamped three decades after its original construction, the interior of the building feels architecturally coherent, and it is, quite frankly, a rare, delightful and inspiring space to experience.
This Heritage Statement can also be downloaded as a pdf here in its entirety.
A Social History
The following document outlines a social history of the St Just Miners Chapel. Beginning before its construction and ending with the voices of the young people of the Community. The content has been captured through the generosity of the community, and, as with any undertaking of this nature, it has demonstrated the wealth of knowledge that sits under the rooftops of St Just, waiting to be unleashed. Great care has been taking regarding factual accuracy, but we have left room for the lore that has surfaced; these stories come from somewhere, even if we can’t find the evidence. And evidence is unfortunately missing, at some point in the last century, great swathes of documents and information that would be the backbone of the Chapel’s archive, disappeared, highlighting why it’s essential that work such as this takes place.