Church Recording

One thousand records have been recorded by Nadfas volunteers nation wide and the information in these records has been used by researchers, insurance companies and the police. Each item of note is also photographed and the final record goes to the Church. Copies are held in the County Record Office, the Victoria & Albert Museum, the Council for the Care of Churches and the National Monuments Record Centre.

Val Goodhart-Riley writes:

The final work on the recording of the Church of St Mary Magdalene in Littleton is now taking place, but we have still been busy recording.

We have been updating the record of the Church of St. Andrew’s at Cobham; this Church was recorded in 1986 but some substantial changes have taken place in recent years so an appendix to the record was needed.

St. Andrew’s dates back to the middle of the 12th century, and parts of the original building still survive despite heavy restoration during the 19th century. One of the items recorded by our team was a stained glass window which had been in the Church for 150 years. In 1986 the window was hidden by the pipe organ so could not be recorded, but recent refurbishments, and the removal of the organ revealed this richly coloured narrative window.

Most of our sections had things to record and it was an enjoyable time particularly for one of our group who had been involved in the original recording in 1986.  

These two images show angels from totally different dates. The cherub’s head above the West Door is dated 1600, while the angel (one of a pair) on the reredos in the North aisle was painted by Martin Travers in 1941.

Here are two embroidered angels found in a heavy oak chest on a discarded altar frontal, only large enough for a side aisle altar. They must have been worked by a member of the congregation.