Last updated at 14:40, Monday, 30 November 2009

WHO’S that lady, a real fine lady? That is just one of the mysteries of St Paul’s Chapel in Alston which make it such a fascinating building.

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The lady stands tall in stained glass above the twin front entrances of the redundant chapel, which is for sale with planning permission to turn it into nine homes.

Hopefully, any conversion scheme would retain the striking frontage of the 1863 Wesleyan chapel, and preserve the unnamed lady of glass.

But who is she? Certainly this buxom, Greek-robed maiden is not St Paul, patron of the chapel! And with her bare arms, tight gold perm and no halo, she does not look much like a conventional saint.

The typical early Methodist chapel has an austere image – white walls and no frills. But by the time thriving communities like Alston were replacing their first chapels with new ones like St Paul’s, the fashion was for the rich and fun New Gothic.

If the congregation could afford it, architects let themselves go a little, adding pillars and columns, mouldings and stained glass.

And Wesleyan Methodists, clubbing together to fund new, improved chapels were not averse to adding the occasional, gaudy glass image of Faith, Hope and Charity, or The Good Shepherd.

But what would they have said about the Nine Muses of Greek mythology in their sacred space?

Our lady of St Paul’s is holding a couple of clues which may suggest a Mediterranean identity. In her right hand there’s a quill or pen, and in the left, a paper scroll. These could mark this Jane Doe as the Muse Clio.

As the Muse of Fame, Clio often carried a trumpet, but she was called the Muse of History too, which equipped her with a scroll and pen. Eureka!

Except there is another candidate for our lady. She could be Clio’s sister, Calliope, the Muse of Epic Poetry.

Calliope was always shown with a stylus or pen, and tablets to write on, or sometimes a long parchment. Aha!

And Calliope in Greek means ’fine voice’, and certainly her image, glowing in the sun above the top tier of St Paul’s huge mezzanine floor, would have inspired Alston’s minister and congregation as they prepared to belt out O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing, or any other Charles Wesley hit.

The St Paul’s congregation in full flow must have made an impressive sound. The chapel was huge, made to accommodate several hundred on two floors.

Its flamboyant gothic styling and its lofty position on Townhead suggest it was designed to be a status symbol for Alston as well as a place of worship.

St Paul’s has plenty of features to make an architect gush. Look at its huge, Romanesque window arches picked out in terracotta sandstone. This rich red stone gives an ancient Egyptian feel to the structure, so why was it used, and where was it imported from?

What about those twin front doors? Are they meant to be a reference to the early Methodist practice of having one entrance for men and another for women, or just a means to getting large numbers of worshippers in and out more quickly?

And inside, the glorious curved wooden gallery is supported on a dozen red cast-iron pillars. Some believe their number to have biblical significance, but as different sources say there are two, four or five Pillars of the Christian Church, it’s hard to do the sums.

From maths to music: There used to be a fine church organ in St Paul’s, said to have been made by the firm of F.C. Nicholson of Newcastle which equipped many North-East churches in the 1870s and 1880s.

There is a Nicholson organ in St Margaret’s, Scotswood in Newcastle, which was moved from the redundant St Peter's Church in Cambois, Northumberland. A Nicholson from 1879 – when it cost £165 – played in Holy Trinity, Tynemouth, and there’s another in Cramlington church.

But Alston will never again hear the ripe tones of St Paul’s pipe organ. It has been snapped up by a Dutch collector of musical instruments, and is now being restored to its former glory in Holland.

The sound of the organ at St Paul’s Chapel was probably familiar to the Little family, Alston blacksmiths for generations.

Thomas and Isabella Little were married in 1813 and had 10 children, many of whom were bap-tised in Alston’s old Wesleyan chapel at Back ‘o the Burn, which still stands as a home called Chapel House.

Thomas and Isabella Little lived at Townhead in the 1850s, where the trip-hammer which shared their Forge Cottage home could be powered by the waters of the millrace.

Later they moved to Front Street, and as keen Wesleyans it’s likely that the Little old couple – or their children – took an interest in the building of their sect’s fine new St Paul’s Chapel at Front Street in 1863.

l St Paul’s Chapel, Front Street, Townhead, Alston, is for sale via Smiths Gore of Corbridge.

First published at 09:36, Friday, 27 November 2009
Published by http://www.hexhamcourant.co.uk