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Origin and history

The church of Saint-Martin de Jeumont, located in the department of the North, is a religious building built between 1787 and 1789 to replace a first church of the 15th century, which became old and threatening. This new building, erected according to a Latin cross plan, was immediately marked by the upheavals of the French Revolution. As early as 1793, under the Terror, it was closed, sequestered and transformed into a feed shop, while the Abbey of Liessies — on which its cure depended — was demolished. Damaged in 1794 by fire from Austrian cannons, it was not restored to worship until 1802, after the revolutionary period.

The church houses black marble baptismal fonts dating from 1516, classified as historical monuments, as well as five funerary slabs in blue stone (15th–15th centuries), including that of l ́écuyer Jean de Kessel and his wife Anne de La Biche. These elements testify to its local historic anchor. The stained glass windows, installed in 1929, illustrate episodes of Jesus' life, while a statue of the Sacred Heart (1931) adorns its southern flank. The 19th century high altar, withdrawn in the 1960s, recalls modern liturgical developments.

The first church, built in 1454 on a hill overlooking the village, was surrounded by a parish cemetery that disappeared in the late eighteenth century. Its demolition was motivated by its state of disrepair. The site, linked to the diocese of Lille, thus preserves architectural and funerary traces of five centuries of religious and community history, between the Middle Ages and the contemporary era.

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