Disaster Averted

The conservation of the building is an ongoing challenge, and the 1800s saw a few near-collapses averted through the diligent work of John Chapple, Clerk of Works, and Cathedral Architect, George Gilbert Scott.

In 1870, Chapple alerted Gilbert Scott to suspicious ‘cracks and crushing’ in the fabric around the presbytery and Ramryge chapel near the base of the Norman Tower. Closer inspections revealed the full danger of a possible tower collapse. In October 1870 all services were moved to the nave while work began to shore up a huge cavern in the foundation of the south-east pier. The void was backfilled with brickwork, grout and several feet of cement, making safe this last remaining roman brick tower on a medieval cathedral church.

Then in 1875 a report found that the south wall was leaning out by 28 inches at the upper level, threatening another collapse of the nave. Immediate steps were taken to shore up the building both internally and externally with timber. Meanwhile Gilbert Scott devised a hydraulic system whereby the roof would first be raised to take the weight off the wall and then pushed back to a true vertical position. This operation, using iron rods and screw jacks on the exterior, was carried out on 2 May 1878, five weeks after Gilbert Scott’s death, and took just two and a half hours to complete. The exterior walls were then heavily buttressed and ‘flying’ buttresses put in the roof space of the south aisle.

George Gilbert Scott was dedicated to the preservation of the building, writing in his report on the fabric “no church in Great Britain more thoroughly deserves a careful and conservative restoration, nor would any more richly repay this labour of love” (published in The Times, 1872).

Conservation of the fabric is ongoing – from restoring the shrine of Amphibalus to cleaning the black and white marble pavement of the presbytery platform, removing layers of Victorian wax.