HIDDEN away among the fields and woods of Wensleydale is a gem of a church which has, in various forms, been close to the heart of the Catholic community since the 16th century.

The first St Simon and St Jude’s Church at Ulshaw Bridge, near Middleham, was built over a cockpit which had helped to ruin at least one generation of the Scropes of Danby Hall.

It was hard enough for the family to survive the centuries of harsh penal laws instituted against Catholics after 1559, let alone the gambling addiction of Simon “The Cockfighter” Scrope in the early 18th century.

It is said that his sons were so angry with him that, after he died in 1723, they took his portrait outside the hall and shot it to pieces.

The present Simon Scrope said that the family was prominent politically until the reign of Elizabeth I. In the previous three centuries, Scropes (or Scroopes as they were then) had held such high offices as Lord High Chancellor, Chief Justice and Archbishop, as well as being earls, barons, Knights of the Garter and Wardens of the Marches.

All that changed with the imposition of the penal laws and the decision by the Scropes of Danby to remain Catholics, and so become known as recusants.

During the centuries of penal law, Catholics could be fined each week for not attending Anglican services; could not be commissioned into the army or navy; could not work as solicitors or become MPs; and could not buy, sell or own a horse worth more than £5.

But, as Mr Scrope told me, there has been an unbroken line of Catholics at Danby Hall since the 16th century. He said: “The place has had hard times, but they held on by the skin of their teeth, and it has never been sold.

“They had to keep their heads down, but they had a happy time as country gentlemen, farming and hunting.”

Their story is intertwined with the survival of Catholicism in Wensleydale, as Sally Doyle has so clearly illustrated in her recentlypublished book The Catholic Missions of Danby Hall and St Simon and St Jude.

She wrote: “The Scroopes achieved this by taking in and maintaining priests at risk of their own lives, and Danby became the heart of the small and secret community of Catholics in Wensleydale.”

Her interest in Danby and the church nearby began when she and her husband, Tony, moved to Middleham in 1995. “We found the little church at Ulshaw and fell in love with it,” said Mr Doyle.

His wife became so captivated with it that she decided to make it her last writing project. “She had been working on it for years bit by bit – down different avenues of research,”

he added.

But then, early last year, she was told she had cancer of the colon.

In the last few months of her life, assisted by her daughter Shelagh, she saw her small book prepared for publication. She died on June 25 and was buried at Ulshaw.

It was during her research that she discovered that the crypt of the present church delineated the extent of the 1788 chapel and, therefore, the site of that cockpit. Construction of that church began just before the first Catholic Relief Act in 1787. Until then, Catholics in the area gathered at Danby Hall to worship.

“Mass was covertly celebrated in a room in the tower on the east side of the house before it was safe to make a chapel in a large room on the ground floor, now the drawing room,” wrote Mrs Doyle.

Mr Scrope said: “Things started to ease in the 18th century – the old penal laws became unenforceable, just like the anti-hunting law today.”

Once the church was built, it was possible to move the Scropes’ coffins from Spennithorne church to its crypt. But many of the priests who had resided at Danby Hall since the 16th century had to remain hidden, even in death.

“It is said that six, or even eight, priests – the number is uncertain – are buried under the drawing room”, said Jane Scrope. “Well, I was brought up on that story,”

added her husband.

In her book, Mrs Doyle lists the priests who ministered from the hall, often under aliases, such as grooms or gardeners.

In 1865, Joseph Hansom (of Hansom cab fame) was commissioned to rebuild the church in the Byzantine style, enlarging it, adding the bell tower and linking it to the house next door, now known as the Old Presbytery or Ulshaw House.

When the church was completed in 1896, Hansom was asked to turn an upstairs room at Danby Hall into the present family chapel.

When Ulshaw church was closed for redecoration some years ago, the Scropes invited members of the parish to their home, and the congregation could barely squeeze into the small room for mass.

That would not be possible now, as each Sunday about 60 people attend the simple, low mass service at the church, celebrated by Fr Pat O’Neill, the parish priest for Leyburn and Bedale, into which the parish of St Simon and St Jude has been incorporated.

“It’s a very special place,” said Middleham artist Nancy Murgatroyd, whose husband, Keith, is buried there.

“I like the fact that it is an early mass, which is very quiet and contemplative in nature because there are no hymns. The church is normally nearly full and you always know lots of people. It is a thoughtful start to a Sunday morning – you come out and hear the river rushing past or you smell the wild garlic.”

The Doyles have been very involved in fundraising to renovate the church, which is a Grade II listed building. “What we have tried to do in the last 15 years is to work right through the church and restore it completely. We have more or less done it,” said Mr Scrope, who is chairman of the church committee.

They started with Ulshaw House.

In the cockfighting days, it was a pub, said Mr Scrope. Then it became the presbytery and home to a succession of priests until 1978, by which time the church was part of the Middlesbrough diocese.

It was then used as a diocesan holiday cottage until it was renovated and rented out by the diocese for the benefit of the church.

For Mrs Doyle, the fascination of the church lay in its style, architecture and location, as well as the interesting way it had been connected with the Scrope family, her husband said.

They were very aware of that connection whenever they went to Danby Hall for meetings because, on the way to the large, airy kitchen, they would pass the many portraits and coats of arms of Scrope forebears, as well as the two priest holes where priests hid when magistrates raided the house.

Mr Scrope, of course, grew up among this important aspect of Dales history. “I have always enjoyed it. It is part of the motivation of my existence. I am proud of it,”

he said.

It is this proud history which Mrs Doyle researched so well and has left as a gift to future generations.

● Sally Doyle’s book, The Catholic Missions of Danby Hall and St Simon and St Jude, costs £7.50 and is available from Castle Hill Bookshop, in Richmond, and Central Stores, in Middleham. For further information, contact Tony Doyle at tonybcdl@gmail.com.

Mrs Doyle also co-authored, with Ann Hartley, The Catholic Missions of Danby Hall, West Witton and Ulshaw Bridge, Middlesbrough Diocesan Archives: Occasional Publication No 4.