Our Lady and the English Martyrs Church

Our Lady and the English Martyrs Church stands at the busy junction of Hills Road and Lensfield Road in south-east Cambridge. Built between 1885 and 1890 in the Gothic Revival style, it rises 65 metres with its spire, making it the tallest building in the city. The church is a Grade I listed building and follows the traditional cruciform plan with a polygonal apse and central lantern tower. Its stone comes from Casterton, Ancaster, Combe Down, Bath, Plymouth and Newbiggin, giving the interior warm tones. The stained-glass windows show dedications to Cambridge colleges and scenes from the lives of English martyrs such as St John Fisher. The church’s history is tied to notable figures and events. The parish priest Monsignor Christopher Scott led the fundraising after Canon Thomas Quinlivan secured the site with help from the Duke of Norfolk. The largest single gift came from Yolande Lyne-Stephens, widow of the reputedly richest commoner in England, who gave £70,000 for construction. The church was consecrated in 1890 in the presence of all the Roman Catholic bishops of England and Wales except two. In 1941 an air-raid bomb blew a six-foot hole in the roof and shattered most windows, but repairs restored the original designs. Inside, the sanctuary was reordered in the 1970s by Gerard Goalen to meet new liturgical directives. The high altar now serves mainly for reservation of the Blessed Sacrament, while the central altar was consecrated in 1973. The church houses a mid-16th-century oak statue of the Virgin and Child, said to be the one ordered removed by Thomas Cromwell in 1538. The belfry contains eight change-ringing bells cast in 1895 and a ninth for the Angelus, with the tenor bell weighing over 1,600 kilograms. The choir performs weekly solemn Latin Mass with polyphony and Gregorian chant, accompanied by an organ built by Abbott and Smith to a design by Charles Villiers Stanford.