St Bertoline's Church, Barthomley

St Bertoline’s Church stands on Barrow Hill in the village of Barthomley, Cheshire. It is an active Anglican parish church, built in red sandstone with a lead roof in Perpendicular style. The church occupies an elevated position in the centre of the village and is reached by a flight of steps. It was the scene of a massacre during the English Civil War when Royalist forces trapped Parliamentarian supporters inside. The church is dedicated to Saint Bertoline and is one of the most beautiful in the county. It is listed as a Grade I building on the National Heritage List for England. The church’s nave and tower date from the late 15th century, while the Crewe chapel was added around 1528. The chancel was rebuilt in 1925–26 as a memorial by the Marquess of Crewe. Inside, the parclose screen from the Crewe Chapel now encloses the organ, and the stained glass includes work by Clayton and Bell and Shrigley and Hunt. The altar, from the late 16th century, features carvings of the Nativity and other scenes. The Crewe Chapel contains the alabaster effigy of Sir Robert de Foulshurst, dated around 1390, and a recumbent figure of a clergyman who died in 1529. Visitors find a four-bay nave with clerestory and north and south aisles, a tower with embattled summit and crocketted pinnacles, and a north porch with a holy water font. The churchyard holds war memorials to two local brothers killed in the First World War. The church also appears in Alan Garner’s novel *Red Shift*, which draws on the 1643 massacre. The interior retains historic fittings and memorials, including work by J. Edgar Boehm and a ring of eight bells, the oldest dating from 1743.