St Dona's Church, Llanddona

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}} {{Use British English|date=November 2025}} {{good article}} {{Infobox church | name = St Dona's Church, Llanddona | image = Eglwys St Dona Church, Llanddona - geograph.org.uk - 937590.jpg | alt =

| caption = The church seen from the south | pushpin_map = Wales Anglesey | pushpin_map_alt = | map_caption = Location in Anglesey

| coordinates = {{coord|53.305121|-4.140838|region:GB|display=title}} | location = Llanddona, Anglesey | country = Wales | denomination = Church in Wales | website = | founded = 610; present church built in 1873 | founder = | dedication = St Dona | status = Parish church | architectural_type = Church | functional_status = Active | heritage_designation = Grade II | designated = 30 January 1968 | style = Gothic revival | architect = Reverend Peter Jones (1873)  | materials = Rubble masonry | parish = Beaumaris with Llanddona and Llaniestyn | deanery = Tindaethwy and Menai | archdeaconry = Bangor | diocese = Diocese of Bangor | province = Province of Wales | rector = Reverend Neil Fairlamb }}

'''St Dona's Church, Llanddona''' ({{IPA|cy|ɬanˈdɔna|lang}})) is a small 19th-century parish church in the village of Llanddona, in Anglesey, north Wales. The first church on this site was built in 610. The present building on the site dates from 1873, and was designed by the rector at the time. It reuses earlier material including a decorated 15th-century doorway and a 17th-century bell.

The church is still used for worship by the Church in Wales, and is one of seven churches in a combined parish. It is a Grade II listed building, a national designation given to "buildings of special interest, which warrant every effort being made to preserve them",<ref name=Cadwlist>{{cite book|url=http://cadw.wales.gov.uk/docs/cadw/publications/What_Is_Listing_EN.pdf|format=PDF|title=What is listing?|publisher=Cadw|year=2005|isbn=1-85760-222-6 |page=6}}</ref> in particular because it is regarded as "a simple late 19th-century essay in Gothic revival".<ref name=List>{{Cadw|num=5474|desc=Church of St Dona|access-date=16 February 2011}}</ref>

==History and location== St Dona's Church is on a steep hill near the coast on the eastern side of Anglesey, about {{convert|1|mi}} from the village of Llanddona itself.<ref name=Anglesey/> The village takes its name from its parish church: the Welsh word {{lang|cy|llan}} originally meant "enclosure" and then "church", and "–ddona" is a modified form of the saint's name.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/whatsinaname/sites/themes/pages/religion.shtml|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071017154001/http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/whatsinaname/sites/themes/pages/religion.shtml|url-status=dead|archive-date=17 October 2007|title=Religion and creed in place names|publisher=BBC Wales|access-date=24 June 2010}}</ref> St Dona's is surrounded by a churchyard, entered through a lychgate dated 1906 which bears a memorial to Henry Stanley, 3rd Baron Stanley of Alderley, "Patron and Benefactor of this church".<ref name=Anglesey>{{cite book|title=Anglesey Churches|pages=72–73|isbn=1-84527-089-4|publisher=Gwasg Carreg Gwalch|last=Jones|first=Geraint I. L.|year=2006}}</ref>

According to the 19th-century Anglesey historian Angharad Llwyd, a church was built here in 610, dedicated to St Dona, who lived on the sea shore nearby.<ref name=Llwyd>{{cite book|last=Llwyd|first=Angharad|author-link=Angharad Llwyd |page=110|title=A History of the Island of Mona|orig-year=1833|year=2007|publisher=Llyfrau Magma|location=Llansadwrn, Anglesey|isbn=1-872773-73-7}}</ref> The presence of a church here was recorded in the Norwich Taxation of 1254.<ref name=List/> Repairs were carried out in the 1840s: one 19th-century writer, Samuel Lewis, recorded that the internal state of St Dona's was "wretched in the extreme" until the rural dean at the time put it "into a state of creditable repair".<ref name=Lewis>{{cite book|url=http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=47844#s15|title=A Topographical Dictionary of Wales |year=1849|chapter=Llanddona (Llan-Ddona)|last=Lewis|first=Samuel|author-link=Samuel Lewis (publisher)}}</ref> In 1873, the rector (Peter Jones) had the church entirely rebuilt to his own design.<ref name=List/>

St Dona's is still in use for worship and belongs to the Church in Wales. It is one of seven churches in the combined benefice of Beaumaris with Llanddona and Llaniestyn.<ref name=CinW/> It is within the deanery of Tindaethwy and Menai, the archdeaconry of Bangor and the Diocese of Bangor.<ref name=SMP>{{cite web|url=http://www.churchinwales.org.uk/bangor/diocese/parish_details/tindaethwy_menai/stmarypentraeth.html|title=Deanery of Tindaethwy and Menai: St Mary, Pentraeth|publisher=Church in Wales|access-date=4 January 2011|archive-date=7 June 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110607183333/http://www.churchinwales.org.uk/bangor/diocese/parish_details/tindaethwy_menai/stmarypentraeth.html|url-status=dead}}</ref> As of 2012, the rector is the Reverend Neil Fairlamb.<ref name=CinW>{{cite web|url= http://www.churchinwales.org.uk/rb/ben.php?dosommat=detail&which=825 |title=Church in Wales: Benefices |access-date=19 April 2012|publisher=Church in Wales}}</ref>

==Architecture and fittings== St Dona's is built of rubble masonry, dressed with freestone. The roof is made from slate, and has a bellcote made from stone at the west end. There is a stone cross finial at the east end of the roof. The church is entered through a porch on the south side which leads to a doorway dating from the 15th century. The rounded doorway is decorated with figures of a bird, a dog and a human face on the left, and a cherub on the right. Inside, the nave is separated from the chancel by a step, and the sanctuary is itself raised one step above the chancel. The roof timbers can be seen from inside. The window at the east end has three lights (vertical sections separated by mullions) topped with ogee curves, and is set within a pointed arch with an external hoodmould.<ref name=List/> It contains stained glass added in 1963, depicting Christ with sea in the background (centre), St Curig (left) and St Dona (right); above them are images of a lion, dove, lamb and eagle.<ref name=List/><ref name=Pev/> A stone bearing the date 1566 has been set upside down into the wall above the east window. The other windows are plain and smaller, with one or two lights.<ref name=List/> The glass in the other windows has been described as "unusual opaque leaded glass".<ref name=Anglesey/>

The fittings are from the late 19th century, although the octagonal font (made of gritstone) is of uncertain date,<ref name=List/> possibly 14th century.<ref name=Pev/> The bell is dated 1647. A survey in 1937 by the Royal Commission on Ancient and Historical Monuments in Wales and Monmouthshire recorded the presence of an 18th-century communion table, an Elizabethan cover-paten dated 1574, and a silver cup dated 1769–1772.<ref name=RC>{{cite book|title=An Inventory of the Ancient Monuments in Anglesey|orig-year=1937|year=1968|author=Royal Commission on Ancient and Historical Monuments in Wales and Monmouthshire|author-link=Royal Commission on Ancient and Historical Monuments in Wales and Monmouthshire|publisher=Her Majesty's Stationery Office|page=45|chapter=Llanddona}}</ref>

==Churchyard== The churchyard contains two Commonwealth war graves. One is of Hugh Williams, a Royal Welsh Fusiliers soldier of World War I who died in 1918.<ref>{{CWGC|id=670603|name=Hugh Williams |access-date=2 June 2022|fewer-links=yes}}</ref>

The other is the grave of Robert W. H. Everett, a Fleet Air Arm fighter pilot killed when his aircraft crashed on a nearby beach in 1942. Before World War II, Everett had been a jockey, and had ridden the winning horses in the 1929 Grand National and the 1934 Irish Grand National.<ref>{{CWGC|id=2716074|name=Robert William Hanmer Everett |access-date=2 June 2022|fewer-links=yes}}</ref> In 1941, he had been awarded the DSO for shooting down a German Fw 200 Condor bomber.<ref name=nhsa>{{cite web | last = Payne | first = Alan | title = The Catapult Fighters | publisher = Naval Historical Society of Australia | date = December 1975 | url = http://www.navyhistory.org.au/the-catapult-fighters/ | accessdate = 2 June 2022}}</ref>

==Assessment== St Dona's has national recognition and statutory protection from alteration as it has been designated as a Grade II listed building – the lowest of the three grades of listing, designating "buildings of special interest, which warrant every effort being made to preserve them".<ref name=Cadwlist/> It was given this status on 30 January 1968, and has been listed because it is "a simple late 19th-century essay in Gothic revival". Cadw (the Welsh Government body responsible for the built heritage of Wales and the inclusion of Welsh buildings on the statutory lists) also notes that "its simple character" is "appropriate to its scale and site".<ref name=List/> A 2009 guide to the buildings of the region described St Dona's as "drably rebuilt".<ref name=Pev>{{cite book|title=The Buildings of Wales: Gwynedd|page=145|chapter=Anglesey|publisher=Yale University Press|isbn=978-0-300-14169-6|year=2009|last=Haslam|first=Richard|last2=Orbach|first2=Julian|last3=Voelcker|first3=Adam}}</ref>

==References== {{Reflist|colwidth=30em}}

==External links== {{commons category}} * [http://www.photosofchurches.com/anglesey-llanddona.htm Photographs of the church]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Donas Church Llanddona}} Dona Llanddona, St Dona Llanddona Category:Churches completed in 1873 Category:Llanddona