St Leonard's Parish Church, Middleton
Introduction
The photograph on this page of St Leonard's Parish Church, Middleton by David Dixon as part of the Geograph project.
The Geograph project started in 2005 with the aim of publishing, organising and preserving representative images for every square kilometre of Great Britain, Ireland and the Isle of Man.
There are currently over 7.5m images from over 14,400 individuals and you can help contribute to the project by visiting https://www.geograph.org.uk
St Leonard's Parish Church, Middleton
Image: © David Dixon Taken: 14 Sep 2013
A notable feature of the exterior of St Leonard's Church is the curious wooden belfry; St Leonard's Church has one of the three remaining wooden church towers in existence in Britain. Described locally as "a wooden steeple for stubborn people", the wooden belfry was added on top of the mediæval tower in 1666, to enable a new set of bells to be added. It has been suggested that wood was used because the sandy foundations of the tower would not bear the additional weight of a stone extension. Another theory is that the wooden structure would allow a sweeter tone to be heard from the bells.
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Image Location
Latitude
53.55335
Longitude
-2.194223