The North Yorkshire village with two historic churches

The village, close to the A19 between Yarm and Stokesley, has long been associated with the Crathorne family, whose landholding can be traced back to the 14th century.

Its historic core also includes Crathorne Hall, now a hotel, while 21 listed buildings sit within around a mile of the village.

But it is the two churches, almost side by side, which make Crathorne particularly unusual.

Grade II* status is reserved for “particularly important buildings of more than special interest” — a designation held by only a small proportion of listed buildings in England.

All Saints’ Church

All Saints’ Church is Crathorne’s Anglican parish church and dates principally from the 14th century, although the site had a church before the Norman Conquest.

The medieval building reused older material, and later restoration uncovered several Saxon stones in the west wall.

Most were reset inside the church, where they remain on display.

The church was altered and extended over the centuries.

Its chancel was partly rebuilt and raised in 1844, before a major Victorian restoration in 1887-88 by architect C. Hodgson Fowler added the west tower and south porch.

Built from sandstone and topped with Lakeland slate, the church has a three-stage tower with diagonal buttresses, gargoyles and an embattled parapet.

Inside are effigies believed to include William de Crathorne, who died in 1346, and a deacon.

All Saints’ was designated Grade II* in 1966.

St Mary’s Catholic Church

Just along the road is the equally significant Church of St Mary, a Roman Catholic chapel with a history that reflects the Crathorne family’s long-standing Catholic faith.

The chapel was funded by the Lords of the Manor, who remained Catholic after the Reformation.

Its relatively plain brick exterior was deliberately modest at a time when public Catholic worship still carried sensitivities, but its interior is far richer.

Historic England lists St Mary’s as a Grade II* building, while its heritage assessment describes it as an important survival of an early 19th-century Catholic chapel.

The church has box pews, a gallery, Tudor-arched windows and elaborate Gothic interior decoration produced by Italian craftsmen hired by George Crathorne.

Catholic heritage research records the present chapel as having been built in 1821.

The chapel has faced repair challenges, including rising damp and the impact of earlier unsuitable restoration, leading its congregation to fundraise for conservation work.

A village shaped by faith

The proximity of All Saints’ and St Mary’s gives Crathorne an unusually visible record of English religious history.

All Saints’ reflects the parish’s medieval and Anglican heritage, while St Mary’s stands as evidence of a Catholic family sustaining its faith across the centuries.

Together, they tell a story of continuity, change and local patronage in a village whose history reaches from the Domesday Book to the present day.

For visitors travelling through North Yorkshire, Crathorne is easy to pass by.

Yet its pair of Grade II* churches makes it one of the region’s most distinctive historic villages.