Qualla: Church of St Helen, Kilnsea

Church of St Helen, Kilnsea: Introduction

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Paul Glazzard, CC BY-SA 2.0. The first St Helen's stood near the cliff edge. Between 1826 and 1831 the North Sea took it, stone by stone, as it had already taken the graveyard. The villagers of Kilnsea watched their church slide into the water and then they did what people on this coast have done for a thousand years: they moved further back and started again. The replacement opened in 1865, paid for largely by a stranger passing through. It cost four hundred and twenty pounds. It still stands. And buried in the design, almost unnoticed for over a century, is the signature of one of the most flamboyant architects of Victorian England.

Image: Paul Glazzard | CC BY-SA 2.0

Church of St Helen, Kilnsea: A Gift From a Lighthouse Engineer

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Tom Corser, CC BY-SA 2.0 uk. Alfred Burges was a civil engineer. He worked in partnership with James Walker, Chief Engineer for Trinity House, the body responsible for British lighthouses. In the 1850s Trinity House was funding the construction of a new Low Lighthouse at nearby Spurn Point, which is why Alfr...

Image: Tom Corser | CC BY-SA 2.0 uk

Church of St Helen, Kilnsea: The Architect They Forgot

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit MortimerCat, CC BY-SA 3.0. William Burges was about to become one of the most extraordinary architects of the High Victorian period. Cardiff Castle, Castell Coch, churches dripping with gold and medieval revivalism, interiors so densely decorated they make the eyes ache. But here in remote Kilnsea, working...

Image: MortimerCat | CC BY-SA 3.0

Church of St Helen, Kilnsea: Empty Now

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Stephen McKay, CC BY-SA 2.0. The hamlet of Kilnsea has had a hard hundred and fifty years. Erosion never stopped. The Crown and Anchor public house still serves locals, but the congregation that filled the pews shrank to almost nothing, and on 20 June 1993 the last service was held at St Helen's. The diocese...

Image: Stephen McKay | CC BY-SA 2.0