Building Stones of Malvern
Kate outlined the role and purpose of the EHT and in particular the current project to research 1000 years of building with stone in Herefordshire and Worcestershire. This is a National Lottery funded (~£400k) programme employing 3 staff with the following aims:
· Re-discover local building stone quarries
· Research the skills, techniques and people involved in exploiting this resource
· Raise awareness and appreciation of local stone, providing people with a sense of place
· Create a database linking stone to quarries and particular buildings
The two counties have some of the most diverse geology in the UK resulting in a wide variety of building stone from most periods in the Earth’s history from the Precambrian to the Holocene, a period of ~700 million years. In the immediate Malvern area the building stones are mainly:
· Igneous rocks – granites (pink), diorites (salt and pepper)
· Sandstones – red, grey green, grey green with iron staining and deep olive green
· Imported stone – mostly Jurassic Oolites
Kate then showed examples of all of these rock types in pictures of houses in and around Great Malvern. The origins of most of these building stones have been traced back to the quarries and Kate showed pictures of many of these including:
· Westminster Bank (Granite)
· Dingle (Diorite, Dolerite and rarer Ultramafics)
· Tank (Granite, mainly used for road aggregate)
· Tollgate (Ultrabasic Amphibolite)
The extent of quarrying across the two counties was massive during the late 19th and early 20th century. In Worcestershire around 155 quarries are recorded and in Herefordshire the figure is 380. Health and safety were not paramount in these times and the toll of injuries and deaths to quarrymen was very high with many incident not even being reported.
Kate then presented a detailed account of the building of the ‘Reredos’ memorial in Hereford cathedral. This commemorates an action by Welsh Guards in 1917 near Chambray in Northern France where most of the 370 men were killed. The study of the records reveals how the memorial was commissioned, the choice of designer, the choice of the stone and supplier together with the stonemason's names and work records.
Kates talk was followed up in May 2016 by a building stone walk around Great Malvern.
Dick Harris