Oakley: St John's Church demolished (From This is Hampshire)
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Oakley: St John's Church demolished
12:00pm Saturday 7th July 2012 in News By Emily Roberts, Chief Reporter
St John's Church site, after demolition
A CHURCH which has stood in the community for nearly 100 years has been demolished.
St John’s Church, in Oakley, was knocked down following a review by Winchester Diocese and The Church Commissioners in London.
The church, in St John’s Road, was built in 1914 as an extra place of worship, but The Church Commissioners decided that the building should be demolished after it was made redundant in June 2009 because of a dwindling congregation.
A group of villagers fought an unsuccessful battle to save St John’s but gave up their fight after realising the challenge of raising enough money to save it in time was too great.
The church has been carefully demolished to protect graves and memorials.
The churchyard will be landscaped to include seating for families visiting the graveyard and be renamed St John’s Garden of Remembrance. It will still have space for burials until it becomes full.
The war memorial will also be refurbished and relocated to where the communion table used to be inside the church. It will also have additional names of men from the village who died in the Second World War.
The Bishop of Basingstoke is expected to dedicate the new garden of remembrance later this year.
The Reverend Jeremy Vaughan, rector of Oakley with Wootton, previously told The Gazette the church was constructed as a temporary building with short-life materials.
Comments(11)
klorane
says...
1:37pm Sun 8 Jul 12
rufus_bolt
says...
3:38pm Sun 8 Jul 12
klorane
says...
4:00pm Sun 8 Jul 12
rufus_bolt
says...
1:18pm Mon 9 Jul 12
klorane
says...
6:37pm Mon 9 Jul 12
klorane
says...
11:02pm Mon 9 Jul 12
rufus_bolt
says...
8:39am Tue 10 Jul 12
klorane
says...
9:33am Tue 10 Jul 12
It became listed after then Cllr Cecilia Morrison put through a petition from campaigners.
rufus_bolt
says...
10:14am Tue 10 Jul 12
To answer your question, how can you be so sure it was!
A few local oddballs suggested trying to get it listed when the Reverend Brian Nicholson brought up the thorny subject of demolition, but it never happened.
You can search yourself here:
http://list.english-
heritage.org.uk/
rufus_bolt
says...
10:30am Tue 10 Jul 12
However, the planning application to demolish it (BDB/74878) shows that 'conservation' had no issues with it being demolished, and B&DBC - who could have issues a BPN (Building Protection Notice) chose not to do so. So effectively local listing is worthless in terms of protecting a building, and totally irrelevant.
It is also noted that Oakley Parish Council (aka old people with pitchforks and the board self interest preservation society), had no comment on the matter - which is incredibly unusual for them.
klorane says...
7:27am Sun 8 Jul 12