Tattingstone

St Mary, Tattingstone

Tattingstone is one of the first Suffolk villages I ever visited. I cycled out here one Autumn in the 1980s, shortly after I'd moved to the county. A few months before, Tattingstone Vale had been flooded for Anglia Water's massive new Alton Water reservoir, and the village was full of tourists gawping at the vast sheet of blue-grey that cuts the village in half. The shape of the lake is a diving shark, with the two halves of Tattingstone clustering around the narrowest bit. A wide bridge joins the parts of the village, quite out of scale with them, but no doubt a useful thing to have.

On that occasion, newly-arrived from the agro-industrial wastelands of Cambridgeshire, I found Tattingstone quaint and sleepy. Today, I think it rather suburban, but it is me that has changed, rather than the village; I've seen so much else of Suffolk.

Tattingstone opening onto the street - I like that in a church.

The church is in the southern half of the village, directly opposite Tattingstone Hospital. On my first visit here, this hospital, the former workhouse, was a hive of industry; but it closed soon afterwards. It became a ghostly relic, with boarded windows and overgrown flowerbeds, the whole thing surrounded by a security fence. Today, it is rather luxurious flats.

The church, is neat, bright and well-kept; all pink-cheeked, as if fresh from its Victorian makeover.

This makeover, the work of Henry Hall, was rather a drastic one; there is evidence surviving of the medieval life of St Mary, but very little atmosphere. Here is a typically functional CofE church, which serves its village very well.

The north porch opens straight onto the road, which I always like. It is as if the church were thoroughly integrated with its village. The graveyard spreads beyond, to west and south.

But it does not have the secluded atmosphere of many in this district. Tattingstone is where the Shotley Peninsula begins, with its own customs, language and time zone, a place apart.

Not really. However, despite being close to both Ipswich and Colchester, but some of the villages of the peninsula are wild and remote; Erwarton and Harkstead, for instance.

If you stand across the road from St Mary, you will notice that the tower has two curious buttresses which emerge from the roof of the nave.

These are much later than the tower; its decorated bell openings reveal a 14th century origin, but the buttresses were probably part of a major overhaul in the 1680s, a time of confidence in the Anglican church. The nave appears 14th century too, suggesting that the church is all of a piece; but the font, and a window in the north wall, are at least 100 years earlier.

Henry Hall at work. (Thanks to Alan Thurkettle).

Inside, honestly, there's not much to get excited about, beyond the fact that this building is clearly used and loved. There is a classy late-classical memorial by John Flaxman, the woman far too life-like to provoke us to consider death. There are some fine 19th century stained glass saints, which I'm always a sucker for.

At first sight, you might think that St Mary has a sister church across the reservoir. In fact, this is the 'Tattingstone Wonder', a row of cottages built in the shape of a church by Thomas White in the 18th century.

The view to the west, Flaxman's memorial to the right. (Thanks to Alan Thurkettle).

My most recent visit to Tattingstone was at the end of a cycle journey, during which I had visited and photographed all 12 of the Shotley Peninsula churches. I'd set out from Ipswich in the blazing heat of a June afternoon, describing a clockwise route along the north and then the south of the peninsula. Tattingstone was my final stop, partly because it was an easy march back to Ipswich from here, but also because the village has one of South Suffolk's best pubs, The White Horse. After 4 hours and 30 miles, Adnams had never tasted so good. This ancient inn is hidden away on a road that disappears beneath the lake just beyond it, and has been threatened with closure. The more visitors it receives, the better.

St Mary, Tattingstone, can be found in the village to the east of the A137 Ipswich to Manningtree road. I found it open.

PLEASE NOTE that two of the photographs on this page are by Alan Thurkettle, and retain his copyright.