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According to The Christian Travelers Guide to Great Britain, the other church of note in Keswick is St Kentigern, Crosthwaite. It is located on the outskirts of Keswick a 10-15 minute walk north of the town centre. (I blogged Keswick's first church of note here.)
You may be wondering "Who the heck is St Kentigern?" I'd never heard of him before we got to Britain, but it turns out that he was quite significant in western Scotland and the Lake District of England. St Kentigern (c. 518-603) is known as the evangelist of Strathclyde and Cumbria. He established a Christian community in what is now Glasgow where he was consecrated the first bishop of Strathclyde; later he was exiled to Cumbria, where in 553 he founded a church where St Kentigern Crosthwaite now stands. Later in his life, he was able to return to the Glasgow area where he died and was buried; Glasgow Cathedral is dedicated to him.
(To confuse matters slightly, he is also known by a childhood nickname Mungo. So, churches dedicated to St Mungo and St Kentigern refer to the same saint. Generally speaking, Mungo is more popular in Scotland while Kentigern is more usual in Cumbria.)
In the photo at left, the StatWife and StatDaughter are standing in front of the main gate to the churchyard. The oldest parts of the present church building date to 1181, although it was extensively renovated in 1553 and restored in 1844.
(Click on photos for larger views.)
The next photo shows the nave of the church looking toward the chancel and east window. The central three panels of the east window's stained glass show the Crucifixion, while the right-most panel shows St Kentigern and the left-most panel shows St Herbert. St Herbert (d. 687) was an anchorite who lived on an island in nearby Derwentwater Lake.
Canon Drummond Hardwicke Rawnsley (1851-1920), vicar of this parish between 1883 and 1917, was an ardent conservationist who worked to preserve the Lake District from excessive commercial exploitation. He was also co-founder of Britain's National Trust, which is charged with preserving hundreds of British heritage sites and places of natural beauty. Canon Rawnsley was also a friend of children's story-telling: he encouraged Beatrix Potter, whom he first met when she was only 16, to publish her first book, The Tale of Peter Rabbit, in 1902.
Several monuments are found inside the church building. This is the one for Robert Southey (1774-1843), poet laureate of England from 1813 and member of this parish for the last forty years of his life. (He is buried in the churchyard.)
In addition to his poetry, Southey is known for writing Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Although not well-remembered today, he was widely influential in his time. Among his many friends were William Wordsworth and Sir Walter Scott. Wordsworth wrote a poem in Southey's honour which is engraved on the east side of the monument.
Southey was one of the leading figures of the Romantic Movement that swept through British art in the late 18th and 19th centuries. As well as poetry, Southey wrote about politics and society. In his youth, he held very radical views and, in emulation of the French Revolution, hoped to establish a utopian egalitarian commune in North America. After the rise of Napoleon, however, he moderated his views, although he continued to reject slavery and champion the cause of the poor. When he announced his belief that maintenance of social order was the primary good of politics, and then accepted appointment as Poet Laureate, his former radical friends denounced him as a hypocritical sell-out.
One of Southey's admirers was Anthony Ashley Cooper (1801-1885), the 7th Earl of Shaftesbury–evangelical Christian, Tory MP, and arguably the leading social reformer of Victorian England.
Links to all my blog posts about British churches and Christian sites can be accessed through the box located at the top of the page.
