Guyhirn, Cambridgeshire

Like Parson Drove Guyhirn has two churches - the CCT Guyhirn Chapel, open, and the redundant St Mary Magdalene, obviously locked.

I thought St Mary was in a dire state until I saw the Cambridgeshire Churches entry and Simon Knott's 2015 visit and realised that someone, or some people, are trying to take - or perhaps that should read are taking - this church in hand. This, it seems to me, is a good thing. To kill off, by willful neglect, a perfectly fine Scott building seems mindless.

Meanwhile down the road is the delectable Chapel in the care of the CCT -  it is a simple delight.

In brick and stone and glass and wood
Three centuries has this beacon stood
“Puritan relic of the past”
Built to shine and built to last
Long on its one East Anglian level
It praises God and shames the devil.

Without doubt THE church of the day - until St Wendreda in March.

ST MARY MAGDALENE, by Sir George Gilbert Scott, consecrated in 1878. Yellow brick, with lancet windows, and not at all typically Scottian.

MORTUARY CHAPEL, 1/2 M. NE. The former church, or perhaps a nonconformist church of the Commonwealth. The money for the building was left in 1651. The date above the door is 1660. The church is a plain parallelogram, ashlar-faced, with four-light mullioned windows which have arched lights. The E end has a window in no way different from the others. The W window is higher up. The N and W sides are of brick, or repaired in brick. Thin Gothic bell-cote.

Inexplicably Mee missed Guyhirn in my edition.

Flickr.