Church Heritage Record 621176

The Church of St Botolph is a basilica plan church with a square termination. The plan of the church consists of a nave with north and south aisles, a chancel, south porch with two chapels adjoining and a tower steeple.

The church stands 83 meters high, and has a nave 74 meters long and 32 meters wide.

Early History/Eleventh Century

Before the Norman Conquest, the current site of Boston was held by Earl Godwin. After the defeat of King Harold at the Battle of Hastings in 1066, the greater part of Skirbeck, that on the east side of the river, was granted by the Norman victor, to his nephew Alan Rufus, Count of Brittany. Though Boston itself is unmentioned in the Domesday Book, it is believed that by 1086 the town existed as a small hamlet as part of Skirbeck.

Domesday references two churches which are believed to be St Nicholas’s of Skirbeck and St Botolph’s of Boston in its early form. Nothing can be seen of the earliest church to stand on this site, despite the remains found by G. G. Place in the 1850s. It is thought that Place's discovery was of aisles added  later as the town grew  in the thirteenth century. The vast majority of buildings being timber framed prior to this period.   This suggests that the stone required to build the found church would not have been imported to Boston until the late thirteenth century. Alan Rufus later gave the church of St Botolph to St Mary’s Abbey at York, shortly before his death in the late 1000s.

Twelfth Century

The twelfth century saw the growth and development of a booming market and merchant trade through Boston, largely due to its position at the mouth of the River Witham. Boston grew as a port as it provided a route between Lincoln and the North Sea. As a result, the wealth and the population of Boston continued to expand. One of the most frequently cited causes for the growth of Boston’s wealth was the St Botolph’s fair.  Due to its location as an east coast port and Boston grew due to the expansion of wool exports to Flanders The abundance of high quality Lincolnshire wool and its proximity to Lincoln stood Boston in good stead for a thriving wool trade.

Thirteenth Century

In the thirteenth century was when Boston's basic medieval topography was established with the centre of the town laying to the east of the bridge and a road to the church. The wealth, importance and expansion of Boston through its industrious trading meant that it was only a dozen towns in England which had four friaries.23 Dominican, Carmelite, Augustinian and Franciscan orders were all founded within Boston in the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries.

Fourteenth Century

The fourteenth century saw the start of St Botolph’s as it stands today. The town was accumulating wealth which continued to grow and in 1334 it was the fifth richest town in England and, in 1377, the tenth largest. This is reflected in the monumental building project of St Botolph’s, as well as the pride the town’s people took in the church.

The stone for St Botolph came from Barnack by water,  utilising the town’s greatest asset to enable the building of the church. It is likely that the south side of the nave was completed in the early 1350s, but work continued into the 1360s when indulgences were offered to those who gave money for the repair of the church and chancel of St Botulph.

Boston’s economic fortunes changed considerably in the fifteenth century as the number of market attendees fell, as did the amount of wool being shipped and traded.  However, work on the church continued. In the fifteenth century the chancel was extended and the tracery used was Perpendicular Gothic. By now the standard Decorated gothic of the majority of the church would have seemed outdated. The tracery designs of the eastern windows are extremely similar to those on the tower, suggesting that construction was underway at similar times.

Sixteenth Century

During the Dissolution of the Monasteries, by the end of August 1536, the majority of the monasteries in Lincolnshire had been closed. This had a direct impact on St Botolph, though the four friaries of Boston also suffered at the hands of Henry VIII and his agents. The most quoted story of iconoclasm at St Botolph’s comes from musician and agent to Thomas Cromwell, John Taverner, who reported in 1538 that the Rood had been burnt in the market place. This seems to have been the most violent and symbolic expression of Henry VIII’s Protestantism within the church. St Botolph’s suffered more, however, from the 1547 act for the dissolution of the chantries, including guilds. The guilds were responsible for much of the wealth flowing through Boston, but would also have had vibrant chapels within the aisles of St Botolph’s. The removal of the guilds meant that the physical shape of the space inside St Botolph’s was changed.

Seventeenth Century

John Cotton became minister at St Botolph’s in 1612 and stayed for 20 years. He was a popular Puritan preacher and is said to have attracted a large congregation. After much religious turbulence in England, he boarded a boat to New England in 1633 to settle in Boston, Massachusetts and become part of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and many of his fellow townsfolk joined him.

Eighteenth Century

Boston remained an important regional port in the first half of the eighteenth century, but its international trade was much depressed in comparison to its seventeenth century boom. The town’s wealth remained rather stable due to the supporting income of the markets, though the town was not as wealthy as it once had been. However, support for St Botolph’s continued and the incumbency of Revd John Rigby (1732-46) saw the purchase of a new organ and an organist appointed, the installation of a ring of eight bells, the  paving of the aisles, new alter piece and alter rails, new pews, new communion plate purchased, and the expansion of the parish library over the south porch. The church also contributed to the wider life of the community as the setting for parliamentary meetings and the store for the town’s fire engine.

Nineteenth Century

The mid to late nineteenth century saw the commencement of an extensive restoration project at St Botolph’s. George Gilbert Scott undertook a survey of the condition of the church in 1843 and was responsible for removing the plaster coverings from the walls. Though these were whitewashed, it is possible that medieval paintings existed underneath the whitewash. Gas lighting was introduced into the church in 1844. Due to financial constraints, the most urgent works such as repairing the roof, were carried out first, and lesser tasks postponed until 1851 when the vicar and committee placed the works under the supervision of G.G. Place with G.G. Scott consulting.

Place was reportedly given the position of architect to the church after winning a competition to design a complete pew refitting for the church, however no records of entries to this competition exist and the only documentation does not put Place in the final shortlist. During this phase of restoration the pews were installed, executed by William Mallard Cooper of Derby. The decision to install the pews was made by Reverend George Beatson Blenkin who was a young vicar at the time. This phase of restoration also saw the installation of the lierne vault in the tower. This is rumoured to be the point of contention over which Scott left his role.

Scott did not believe that the tower would be able to sustain the weight of the lierne vault, and was apparently not consulted on its construction. The works extended much beyond this, however, including; re-glazing upper tower windows, restoration of mullions and tracery in the east windows; the floors lowered for the installation of hot water heating and then covered in concrete. It is claimed that a crowd of nearly 3000 people attended the re-opening of St Botolph’s on the 21th May 1853.

Twentieth Century

Further restoration work carried out by  Sir Charles Nicholson in 1928-30 included strengthening the tower and renewing the roofs in nave and aisles. These roofs have hidden the vaulted nave and aisles. In 1989 the library above the south porch received a modern window under the direction of Ronald Sims. In the recent past St Botolph’s has seen the additions of a café at the base of the tower and the gift shop/parish office, installed by Buttress.

The windows of the nave aisles and the chancel are Decorated gothic until the extension/restoration work in the chancel means that the final two windows of the chancel are in Perpendicular style. The Decorated gothic windows have intersecting tracery, comprised of four lights with cusped heads and alternate in an ABAB formulation. The aisle windows are separated by stepped buttresses which culminated in crocketed pinnacles. The smaller lights above are pointed arch in shape and contain cusped trefoil heads and two ogee arches. The Perpendicular chancel windows are contrasted by a Decorated east window which is the result of the nineteenth century restoration works. This window has seven lights with trefoil heads and the mullions have a similar design to the interior piers with apparent compressed Doric capitals appearing to act as springers for the ogee arches and curvilinear tracery above.

The aspect of the distinctive tower is principally Perpendicular in style. At its base is the Decorated porch which projects from the tower’s face. The door is situated inside a large ogee arch portal with decorative cusping. The portal is flanked on each side with tabernacles, and has blind arcading in the spandrels, with square crenulation on top. The West tower window is of eight lights, with the side tower windows of the same height but four lights. All sides then have two two-light windows under ogee arches, and all windows and buttresses are decorated with blind trefoil cusped Perpendicular panelling.

The Nave

The internal elevation of the nave bays follows a basic two level structure of an arcade and clerestory. The clerestory windows are of alternating ABAB Decorated Gothic bar tracery designs, echoing the nave aisle windows in style and formulation. Each clerestory pointed arch window is hood-moulded and contains two lights separated by mullions. The first window design has lights that are circular at the top with cusping. These are surmounted by two mouchettes and culminates in a wheel of four daggers. The second window design contains ogee moulded lights, culminating in a wheel of four small daggers creating a quatrefoil effect. The arcade arches are typically pointed, wave moulded, and spring from compressed Doric capitals. The piers are compound quatrefoil piers with fillets and chamfers between the rolls sitting on a stepped pedestal. The internal elevation is joined together visually due to its logical subdivision of space. The gaps between the clerestory windows align with the peak of each arcade arch and the spandrels between them. Each arcade arch frames a corresponding window of the aisle.

The Aisles

Behind the main arcade, the aisle walls have windows of alternating ABAB Decorated Gothic bar tracery. Each pointed arch is hood-moulded and contains four lights separated by mullions. The first window design splits the four lights into two groups of two lights with trefoil heads under an ogee arch. The space created between the heads of the ogees is separated into two cusped mouchettes and is surmounted by a quatrefoil. The second window design also groups two lights into one window. These lights have ogee heads and trefoil cusping, but are contained within a pointed arch. The gap between the ogee heads is a quatrefoil. The head of the window also has cusped mouchettes and a quatrefoil.

The Cotton Chapel

The Cotton Chapel is a significant space within the church, dedicated to notable Boston non-conformist minister and coloniser of Boston, Massachusetts, John Cotton. The chapel restoration was partly funded by subscription from inhabitants of Boston’s American counterpart that believed the church should contain a memorial to John Cotton, and included the repair of the western window and the installation of stained glass. The chapel is generally closed to the public during the church’s opening hours.

The Choir and Chancel

The choir and chancel are also significant spaces within the church due to their primary liturgical functions. The aesthetic contrast of the vaulted ceiling to the nave’s flat one, and the wealth of intricate carving of the choir stalls and reredos in particular, highlight the space as being of particular importance and interest, both spiritually and architecturally. The shift to perpendicular tracery in the final two bays is representative of the multiple phases of restoration undertaken, but the straight lines are overwhelmed by the focus of the decorative eastern window and the elaborate carvings of the wooden furniture within the space.