Helmet. In the building of the former Orthodox church, previously unknown niches were found

– This building reveals more secrets to us. That’s the beauty of monuments. You just have to guess these mysteries. Sometimes it comes easier, and sometimes you have to make some effort – admits Paweł Wira, head of the Chełm branch of the Provincial Office for the Protection of Monuments in Lublin.

It is a building at St. Mikołaja 4 in Chełm, where renovation works have been going on for a long time. Today, there is an exhibition hall of the Chełm Land Museum. Wiktor Ambroziewicz. Years ago, there was a uniate church of st. Santa.

In July 2022, we wrote that a mysterious crypt had been found therewhich was not mentioned in the archives. Most likely, 10 people were buried there, including seven children. The burials are dated to the second half of the 17th or the first half of the 18th century.

A month earlier, a niche was found in one of the walls of the temple, the outline of which was marked by small cracks in the plaster. When the bricks were removed, it turned out to be the former passageway to the building of the nearby seminary. On the occasion of a comprehensive renovation in the mid-1970s, a time capsule was placed there. It contained elements of the main altar and a wooden crucifix from the 1920s, as well as bones of an animal placed in a bag.

In addition to this one, four more niches were discovered in the building. Two of them are located on both sides of the passage where the time capsule was discovered. They are slightly smaller.

– In one, we discovered traces of paint on the wall, which the temple was originally painted with. On the other hand, in the second one we found fragments of wallpaper and traces of it serving as a kind of cabinet where paraments were probably kept. That is, the items needed to celebrate the liturgy. I think it was a secondary function of this cavity. Maybe from the interwar period, when a Roman Catholic temple functioned here – says our interlocutor.

He adds that while – analyzing archival documents for example – one could expect the existence of these three alcoves, the other two are a big surprise.

– It’s about the window opening that we discovered above the alcove with the time capsule and the door opening on the other wall. Everything indicates that the latter was the entrance to the now non-existent – probably wooden – annex in which the sacristy was located. I guess that in the 19th century the passage was no longer needed, so it was walled up – reports Wira.

The renovation is to be completed in the first half of 2023. Discovered niches will be shown to visitors.

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– Of course, there will be descriptions with a historical outline. There are also plans to change the color scheme of the exhibition hall. Everything indicates that originally the interior of the temple was not white, but painted with several colors. We would like to bring these colors back. Because you have to remember that originally there was a Baroque temple here. And in the Baroque, Orthodox churches or churches were not only whitewashed, emphasizes the conservator.

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Sources say that the building was most likely erected after 1720-1721, and before 1730 as a Uniate church, which was not only a parish church, but also a part of the building complex of the Uniate seminary. After the diocese of Chełm was liquidated in 1875 (as a consequence of the dissolution of the Union of Brest in 1596, under which the Uniate Church was established), the buildings housed an Orthodox seminary. The temple became a seminary chapel.

– After the German and Austro-Hungarian troops arrived in Chełm in mid-1915, during the First World War, a military hospital was located in the seminary complex. So it can be assumed that the temple was also taken over for similar purposes – described Wira in June last year.

After Poland regained independence, the chapel of St. Nicholas was taken over by the Catholic Church. Reconciliation – a liturgical rite restoring the sacral character of profaned places – took place on October 15, 1922.

During World War II, the chapel was occupied by German troops. However, after the war, religion classes were held here. They were attended by students of the public school, which operated in the buildings of the former seminary (today it houses the Dr. Jadwiga Młodowska High School No. 4). The temple served this function until 1961, when religion was no longer taught in public schools.

After 1961, the building was still used by the school, but its condition deteriorated. For some time there was a fuel depot there. After the Chełm Voivodeship was established in 1975, a monument protection office was established in the city. It was thanks to the efforts of the then conservator Leszek Samocki that the building underwent a comprehensive renovation in the second half of the 1970s. It was implemented by Polskie Pracownia Konserwacji Zabytków, a state-owned enterprise that renovated monuments throughout the country.

The ongoing renovation of the building is therefore the first on such a scale in almost half a century.