Welcome to Cornwall Historic Churches Trust

About Us

CHCT’s essential task is to support the historic fabric of religious buildings throughout the Duchy. Parishes can apply to us for funds which will go towards the restoration and repairs of Cornish churches.
Read more here

Grants

We offer grants, primarily for fabric repairs, to Cornish churches of all denominations which are used as places of worship. Unfortunately we cannot help closed churches or chapels. In February we launched Grants for a Hostile Climate: Maintenance and Kickstart Scheme 2023. Jill Hore from Par PCC writes "We do hope that other churches seize the opportunity to apply, as – like us in Par – the church congregation no longer feels safe climbing on long ladders in order to clear gutters as part of the routine maintenance each year."
Read more here.

CHURCH OF THE MONTH

St Nun, Pelynt

The present church sits within an oval enclosure which may have started out as an Iron Age settlement site with the old churchyard still surrounded by a road that could once have been the enclosure ditch. It consists of a nave, chancel, north aisle, south transept with vestry aisle attached, and a west tower and south porch. The church contains some good slate monuments dating from the 17th and 18th centuries and also has the crook that was carried in the funeral procession for Bishop Sir Jonathan Trelawny, remembered in the words of the song ‘Trelawny’ adopted as the unofficial anthem of Cornwall, who was baptised and buried within the church.
The west tower, which contains six bells, was probably erected in the 15th century and, before the Reformation, the north transept was replaced by the present north aisle. This aisle now has an arcade of Tuscan columns of late 17th or early 18th century date. Of the monuments, the largest (in the chancel) is in memory of Francis Buller who died in 1615. He and his wife are depicted kneeling with their 4 sons and 8 daughters. Also in the chancel can be seen an interesting plaque to the memory of Edward Trelawny of Bake, who is described as ‘an honest lawyer’. He died in 1630. Next to his memorial can be seen the effigy of William Achym 1589. It is said he died of a stroke, hence his crooked smile. Originally his monument was in the south transept but was moved when the Trelawny family took over that area of the church. Now known as the Trelawny aisle, the south transept contains several monuments to members of the family who are buried in the vault beneath.
In September CHCT made a Small Projects Grant if £1,000 towards repairs to the tower roof. For more information about the church see chct.info/histories/pelynt-st-nun/

GET INVOLVED

Beating the bounds at Ladock

Why your support is essential

To enable us to offer the invaluable assistance for the preservation of our Cornish heritage, we need every church in the Duchy to support and work with us so that we can be there for all in times of need.

To support more projects, we need more funds and your community can help. If each of our 218 parishes could fundraise just £100 a year for CHCT we would have in excess of £20,000 additional funding to offer annually.  Find out more here.

Cornwall Churches Day

Our main fundraising event is Cornwall Churches Day which can be held at any time during the year. We hope all parishes will get involved and raise some essential funds for both themselves and CHCT.
Find out more here.

£200 was raised for CHCT and the same for Veryan church.
A celebration of cupcakes!

Next CHCT Event

Next Community Event

Recent Fundraising

The mist cleared and spectacular views of the sea were revealed at Boskenna for our Garden Open Day on 30th April. Thank you to David and Anna Wilson for being such welcoming hosts and to the 76 members and their guests for attending. Anna also very kindly offered 3 of her children's books for sale with 50% of the proceeds in aid of CHCT raising an additional £75 to bring our total for the day to £885.

A huge thank you to all the communities who raise funds for us. Your support really does make a difference and together we can help to keep Cornish churches & chapels open for future generations.
See recent fundraising results here.

EXPLORE CORNISH CHURCHES

St Winnow, Lostwithiel PL22 0LF

Church Histories

Over the years, CHCT has been encouraging individual parishes to write a local history of their church. This is a short, informative piece and is written by the local parish with the help of our historian and archivist.

Is your local church missing from the archive? Full details of how to send us your information are included in the archive here.

Arches in the Decorated Style

Reading Cornish Churches

Over the past three years, thanks to Joanna Mattingly, we have been privileged to be addressed by renowned experts on different stages of church architectural development. To date we have worked through the Romanesque, Early English and Decorated periods. In 2021 we hope to move on to Perpendicular period. We have records of the lecture notes from each talk which you can view here.

Visit an interesting selection of churches on a guided drive

Drive About Tours

The annual driveabouts are created by Carole Vivian as a way of discovering 3-4 churches in a day. She writes about the history of the buildings and features to look out for and directs you from one church to another with suggestions for good places to stop for lunch en route. Trails from previous years are available for a donation of £5. Find out more here.

We are very greatful for the ongoing support of Scott & Co.
sponsors of this website.