Church Of St Stephen

The Church of St Stephen is a parish church dating to circa 1857, designed by J.A. Cory, with additions made in 1868 (likely by C.H. Fowler) and 1873. Constructed of regularly-coursed squared sandstone with ashlar dressings, it features a Welsh slate roof with stone gable copings. The church comprises a west tower, a four-bay nave with a north aisle and south porch, and a lower chancel with a north vestry.

The south porch has a double-boarded door with studs and elaborate wrought-iron hinges, set beneath a drip string, incorporating a sun-dial in the gable peak. The three-stage west tower features a three-light west window with traceried 2-centred head, a small cusped lancet window on the second stage, and two-light belfry openings with Perpendicular tracery, supported by flower-bracketed friezes and a battlemented parapet, topped with a weather-cock finial. Nave windows consist of two lights under depressed 2-centred heads with Decorated tracery; the chancel features an elliptical-headed door with a moulded alternate-block surround and drip string, and square-headed two-light windows with Perpendicular tracery. Diagonal buttresses are present on the tower and porch, with larger buttresses on the chancel, each having moulded plinths; the nave bays are also buttressed.

Inside, the area above the boarded dado is plastered, and an ashlar arcade is visible. The nave features an arch-braced hammer-beam roof with a brattished frieze and stone-corbelled wall posts, while the chancel roof is panelled with Tudor-flower friezes and bosses. Patterned tiles are laid on the chancel floor. Double-chamfered arches rise on octagonal piers within the nave and on attached columns leading to the chancel, springing from the wall to the tower. The south chancel door has been blocked; its crested wood surround is now used for a priest's seat. The vestry door has a low elliptical head. A rood screen and traceried choir-stalls with poppy-heads are present, along with pews decorated with Tudor flower motifs. The tower arch has been filled with a glazed screen. The east window commemorates Major-General Mills of Willington Hall, who died in 1851. Other 19th-century stained glass is found in the chancel and in one south nave window. A brass war memorial (World War I) is mounted on the wall to the left of the chancel arch. An octagonal stone font is also present.