Our Lady and the English Martyrs Church
A Grade I Gothic Revival Catholic church of 1885-90 at Hills Road, with a 65-metre spire.
Locals call it OLEM, and it faces the Hills Road and Lensfield Road crossing, a few minutes' walk from the Fitzwilliam Museum. This Roman Catholic parish church was put up between 1885 and 1890 in the Gothic Revival manner and was raised to Grade I in 2022. At 65 metres overall including the spire, it is reckoned to be the tallest structure in Cambridge.
How it came to be
St Andrew's, opened in 1843, had been the only Catholic church in the city. The Lensfield estate was bought in 1879, and In 1884, Yolande Lyne-Stephens, a onetime ballerina whose late husband was said to be the wealthiest commoner in the country, promised 70,000 pounds for a new church. Dunn and Hansom drew up the designs and Rattee and Kett did the building. Consecration came on 8 October 1890. A Catholic church in such a visible spot, given the dedication to the English and Welsh Forty Martyrs, stirred controversy among Anglicans and university people.
The building
The plan is a cross, with a many-sided apse and a lantern tower at the crossing. Outside it uses Combe Down, Ancaster and Casterton stone; indoors the materials are Newbiggin stone, Plymouth marble and Bath stone. Stained glass shows the dedications of Cambridge colleges with episodes from the stories of the English martyrs, St John Fisher in particular. Among the furnishings is a mid-16th-century oak Virgin and Child, said to have turned up at Emmanuel College in 1850. A bomb in 1941 holed the roof and a chapel wall and broke most of the windows.
Practical notes
The parish website carries Mass and visiting information. It gives no opening hours in the text used here, so check before going.
Nearby
Within a few minutes' walk
