Stained Glass window viewed from inside St. Catherine's Church

THE WAGON ROOFS at
SAINT CATHERINE'S CHURCH, WHITESTONE, DEVON


Recent building works in preparation for the repair and re-slating of the roofs of Saint Catherine's Church at Whitestone, Devon have resulted in the removal of all the roof coverings of the nave chancel, transept and north aisle. This has exposed the roof timbers and associated fabric of four mediaeval wagon roofs. Most of the carpentry details of these structures are not usually visible, as all of the roofs are currently ceiled with plaster within, below the level of the rafters, leaving only the moulded ribs of each fourth truss and the longitudinal side and crown purlins extruding below the plaster and visible within the church.

The carpentry details of the roofs reveal them to be of different phases of construction. Some of the relationships – such as that of the transept roof with the nave roof – are relatively clear; however, in other places there is either no physical relationship or the relationship between the roofs is still obscured. This is true of the junction between the nave and chancel roofs with the north aisle roof which are concealed by the structure of a valley gutter.

Both the nave and north aisle roofs retain extensive survival of sarking boards. The nave is covered on both pitches, and the aisle on one pitch. The boards bear thousands of short square or faceted pegs fitted into drill holes, evidently for the fixing of the roofing material. In those places where the boards do not survive the upper surfaces of the rafters are marked by small drill holes, revealing that this treatment was formerly ubiquitous. The sarking boards seem to be contemporary with the roofs and were probably regarded by the builders as an essential part of the structure. The sarking boards also show areas of former voids and patching which relate to dormer windows or roof lights – one near the gallery at the west end and the other near the chancel arch, possibly connected with a light for the rood.

This is usually taken as evidence of the obsolete practice of roofing churches with wooden shingles and, at Whitestone, the survival and reuse of many wooden shingles under the (Victorian?) slate roofs show that this was indeed the case. Evidence of shingled roofing is now extremely rare: none are known to survive complete with their shingles. Only a few church spires, such as the rebuilt spire at Hatherleigh, and the steeples at West Worlington and north Tawton still remain as a testimony to the durability and ubiquity of this material. Stuart Blaylock writes:

“The scarcity of surviving examples of shingled roofs and relative paucity of knowledge of this roofing material belies its frequency in the past. The scarcity is reinforced by the lack of investigation of church fabric, and research and transcription of churchwardens’ accounts and other sources that might provide information on shingled roofs. The dearth of surviving examples emphasises the fragile nature of this vernacular roofing technique, and thereby the importance of recording any surviving evidence of its former existence and the varied crafts and processes associated with it”
(Blaylock 2003, 16).

Like the evidence for shingled roofs, the form of arch-braced common-rafter trussed roof wagon roof found at Whitestone is also under-researched and poorly understood. The medieval wagon roof seems to have been utilised in Devon solely and specifically for churches. It has not yet had the serious study that the subject deserves and, due to the paucity of research and recording of such roofs the dating and typological development of these exceptional structures as yet remains uncertain . John Thorp writes:
“In the past few decades archaeological, academic and dendrochronological interest has concentrated on historic houses in the Westcountry, whilst medieval churches have been relatively overlooked. Part of the reason for this state of affairs is that church roofs are high and inaccessible, whereas medieval roofs in houses can usually be easily examined, recorded and sampled from low ladders into roof spaces. Consequently, few church wagon roofs have been archaeologically recorded and hardly any published”…

“The establishment of a typology of the wagon roof, based on recorded examples backed up by documentary research and dendrochronological analysis, has slipped far behind equivalent research on secular buildings”.
(Thorp 2013, 39-40).

The chronology and dating of these roofs has previously been misunderstood and the assumption has usually been made that they were a late-medieval development. Recent research, by Thorp and others, indicates that this type of roof is probably of continental origin and much earlier in date than has been previously assumed, with some dendrochronologically-dated examples dating from the early 13th century (Thorp 2013, 41).

The level of access to the roofs now possible at Whitestone is an unusual opportunity for a detailed examination of the relationships and carpentry of the roof structures and for the preparation of drawings of typical truss elevations and details, without any requirement for internal scaffolding. The very rare survival of sarking boards in situ, with the evidence for their fixing and for successive phases of wooden shingles (and eventually slates) at Whitestone is also highly significant. Here is an opportunity to record and understand the chronology, behaviour, design and original appearance of these roofs and to inform further research on the subject of Westcountry church roofs. Since fully understanding a building is an essential prerequisite of its proper maintenance and would be of possible advantage to the church community in the event of further repairs, this is not an opportunity that should be missed.

Thorp, J. 2013 The Wagon Roofs at Saint James's Priory, Bristol Vernacular Architecture, Vol. 44 (2013) 31 to 45
Blaylock, S. R. 2003 Evidence for shingled roofs in some Devon and Somerset churches Devon Buildings Group Newsletter No. 21 Summer 2003.