Churches in Corbridge: St Andrew's, the Vicar's Pele and the Old Chapels

Corbridge has one working church, but it is one of the oldest in Northumberland. St Andrew's has stood beside the Market Place for well over a thousand years, and much of it is built from stone carried up from the Roman town half a mile to the west. Around it are the traces of the village's other places of worship: a fortified vicarage, and Methodist chapels that now house a bookshop and a community hub.

This guide covers St Andrew's first, then the buildings that tell the rest of the story, and finishes with the nearest churches of other denominations, which are in Hexham.

St Andrew's Church

St Andrew's Church is the Church of England parish church and the only active congregation in the village. It is listed Grade I by Historic England, and it is the building most visitors to Corbridge notice first, set back from the Market Place in its churchyard.

A Saxon church built from Roman stone

A church at Corbridge is first recorded in 786, when a "monastery called Corbridge" appears in the written record. It was probably founded in the late 7th century, and the parish traces worship on the site back to around 670. Historic England dates the nave to the late 7th or 8th century.

The original west porch was raised into a tower in the early 11th century. Inside, the plain round-headed arch between the tower and the nave is thought to be a complete Roman arch, taken down at Corstopitum and rebuilt here. Much of the rest of the early masonry is reused Roman stone too.

The church was remodelled in three phases in the 13th century, which gave it most of its present shape. Later changes include a vestry of 1835, new east windows in 1853 and the rebuilding of the aisle and transept walls in 1867. Look out for the 12th-century south doorway, medieval cross slabs set into the floor, a sundial dated 1694 on the south wall and old fonts lying outside to the north.

In 1107 Henry I gave the church to his chaplain, Richard d'Orival. About 1122 it passed to the Augustinian priory at Carlisle, which held it through the Middle Ages.

Services and visiting

The parish is St Andrew's Corbridge with St Oswald, Halton and Newton Hall. According to the parish website, the regular pattern at St Andrew's is:

• Sunday 8am: Holy Communion from the Book of Common Prayer on the second and fourth Sundays
• Sunday 10am: Parish Communion with organ and choir
• Sunday 4pm: Messy Church on the second Sunday, an all-age service called River on the fourth, and Simply Worship, a Service of the Word, on the first, third and fifth Sundays
• Wednesday 10am: Holy Communion (Book of Common Prayer)
• Daily: Morning Prayer at 8.50am and Evening Prayer at 4.15pm

St Oswald's at Halton, a few miles north of the village, has a 9am Holy Communion on the first Sunday of the month and at Christmas and Easter. Check the parish website before travelling, as times change around festivals.

The church is open for private prayer from 9.30am to 4pm every day, so you can look round outside service times.

The Vicar's Pele

In the corner of the churchyard stands a small, thick-walled stone tower. This is the Vicar's Pele, a fortified house built for the parish priest in the troubled years of Border raiding, probably in the early 14th century, although sources differ on the exact date. Like the church, it is built of Roman stone. It appears in a 1415 list of fortified buildings in Northumberland as the vicar's tower, and it served as the vicarage until the early 1600s.

The pele is Grade I listed and a scheduled monument. Today it is The Pele, a small bar, so you can have a drink inside a medieval tower house.

Corbridge's former chapels

Like most Northumberland villages, Corbridge once had several Methodist chapels as well as the parish church. Two of the buildings are still in everyday use.

The former Primitive Methodist chapel on the Market Place is dated 1867. It was later used by the Brethren and is now Forum Books, an independent bookshop.

Corbridge Methodist Church on Princes Street closed as a place of worship in April 2022. The building is now run by Corbridge Community Partnership, a local charity, as a community hub. It houses the Corbridge Heritage Centre and hosts a weekly Warm Welcome Cafe and other village groups, so it is still a gathering place.

The medieval town had more churches still, including Trinity Church and St Helen's Chapel, which have disappeared entirely. We cover them in our guide to the lost buildings of Corbridge.

Churches of other denominations nearby

There is no Catholic, Methodist or other free church congregation meeting in Corbridge today. The nearest are in Hexham, about four miles west and a short bus or train ride away.

• St Mary's Catholic Church on Hencotes is the Roman Catholic parish church for the area, a Grade II* listed Gothic Revival building of 1828 to 1830. Mass times are on the parish website.
• Hexham Trinity Methodist Church on Beaumont Street holds Sunday worship at 10.30am and streams its services online.
• Hexham Abbey is the town's Church of England parish church. Its Saxon crypt, like St Andrew's, was built partly from Roman stone taken from Corbridge.

Exploring further

St Andrew's is a stop on the Corbridge heritage walking trail, and the Roman town that supplied its stone is covered in our guide to visiting Corbridge Roman Town. For more on the village's past, see interesting facts about Corbridge.

Know of a congregation meeting in Corbridge that we have missed? Get in touch and we will add it.