St Mark's Church (dedicated to St Mark the Evangelist) is an Anglican church in the village of Hadlow Down in the district of Wealden, one of six local government districts in the English county of East Sussex. Founded in 1834 by a committed local resident who petitioned the Archbishop of Canterbury for permission to establish a chapel in the poor agricultural village, the church proved popular—despite the competing presence of two Nonconformist chapels nearby—and was extended in 1913. The stone-built church, with its tall spire and well-regarded "living churchyard" nature reserve, is now Hadlow Down's only remaining place of worship. English Heritage has listed it at Grade II for its architectural and historical importance.
History
Hadlow Down's name suggests that a settlement existed in Saxon times: it was first recorded as Headda's leah, a forest clearing (leah in Anglo-Saxon) governed by Headda. "Down" was appended in the 14th century to describe the hilly nature of the land, and the present name emerged by the early 19th century, when the present linear village began to develop.
The village straddled the boundary of two large rural parishes, Buxted and Mayfield, and was nominally served by those villages' churches—St Margaret the Queen's Church and St Dunstan's Church respectively. These were both more than three miles away, and the owner of Buxted Lodge (a large house in Hadlow Down), Benjamin Hall, was concerned about the number of villagers who could not attend church. Furthermore, a Nonconformist place of worship—the Providence Chapel—had been founded in the centre of the village in 1824, potentially attracting people away from the Church of England's ministry. In 1834, he wrote to the Archbishop of Canterbury, William Howley, seeking permission and funds to build a church in the village—adding that "very many poor children [were] wandering about the lanes in ignorance of almost every duty, moral or religious". The Archbishop supported Hall's idea, but advised that money would be limited—although within a few months, the reforms instituted by the Ecclesiastical Duties and Revenue Commission led to initiatives such as the founding of the Society for Building Churches and Chapels, whose purpose was to provide funds to establish new churches.
At the time, Hadlow Down's residents were mostly poor: most people worked as farm labourers, and the early 19th century was a particularly difficult time. Nevertheless, Hall sought to raise funds as quickly as possible. He published a document detailing his case for the building of the church—principally that a rapidly growing population of about 700 was served by two churches more than away—and the funding requirements for building work (estimated at £1,800) and the endowment for the vicar (suggested as £100 per year). He then listed the people and bankers who would be in charge of receiving donations—including himself, the 3rd Earl of Liverpool (owner of nearby Buxted Park) and the Vicar of Mayfield—and included a list of all benefactions received so far, with names, place of residence and value: from the £100 subscriptions from the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Vicars of Mayfield and Buxted and other prominent local figures to donations of five shillings from local farmworkers. This may have been an attempt to prompt others into donating or increasing their gift by playing on their sense of propriety or shame. A "Queen Anne's Bounty" of £200 was also received from the fund established in 1704 to help improve the incomes of Anglican clergy, and the 5th Earl De La Warr gave £200 worth of stone to build the walls.
A local building firm constructed the church to the designs of William Moseley. He worked mainly in London, but also designed several Gothic Revival churches in the north of Sussex—at Forest Row, Holtye Common, Horsham and Uckfield. His design for St Mark's Church was based on that of Holy Trinity Church at Forest Row, which was being built at the same time. The plan consisted of a nave without aisles, a chancel and a buttressed tower at the west end topped by a slim spire. Moseley adopted a cost-saving technique in his design for the tower and spire—which ended up damaging the building— and provided space for about 420 worshippers, in both private rented pews (82) and free seats (260, plus an 80-capacity gallery).