The Bell Tower is all that remains of this ruined Catholic church, which once stood within Denbigh's medieval town walls. Its solitary silhouette is a striking landmark on the approach to the castle grounds.
St Hilary's was originally built as a chapel of ease for the garrison and townspeople within Denbigh's walls, serving alongside the parish church of St Marcella's outside the walls at Whitchurch. Its position within the fortified town made it the natural place of worship for the castle garrison and the merchants and craftsmen who made up medieval Denbigh's walled community.
The chapel fell into disuse and gradual ruin over the centuries as Denbigh's population grew beyond the confines of the walls and worship increasingly centred on the town's other churches. Only the sturdy bell tower has survived intact, its stonework a rare surviving fragment of everyday religious life inside the medieval walled town, standing today as a quiet counterpoint to the grander ruins of the castle and Leicester's Church nearby.
