Church Locks & Warding

At Lockkeys Locksmiths we are lucky to be able to combine our love of locksmithing with our love of history and the above pictured Church Box Lock which is over 140 years old and stil working is one such case.

The key was lost to the lock and so we were asked to remove the lock so that a door could be opened and remain open which is what we did. However the lock is now back on its righful door as the key has been found.

These locks with the ornate patterned keys are protected by the shap of what is call warding inside of the lock itself. A warded lock (also called a ward lock) is a type of lock that uses a set of obstructions, or wards, to prevent the lock from opening unless the correct key is inserted. The correct key has notches or slots corresponding to the obstructions in the lock, allowing it to rotate freely inside the lock.

But the locks which are not very secure were subject to a bypass method using what we now call skeleton keys and so went out of use but can stil be found on some church doors.

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