Church of Holy Trinity

Church of Holy Trinity

An Anglican church built in 1719, possibly to designs of William Etty, in the Baroque style. The sanctuary was extended in 1735 by the addition of an apse, and later alterations were made to the church.

The building is constructed of red brick laid in Flemish bond with some original tuck pointing, ashlar dressings, and a dark grey slate roof. It follows a simple rectangular plan with a six-bay nave with clasping aisles and a west tower, lobbies and a vestry forming a seventh bay at the west end. A shallow east chancel with an apse completes the plan.

The exterior features all openings with keyed stone surrounds, the principal ones with triple keys, mostly round-arched with impost mouldings. The three-bay west elevation comprises a central tower with a pent-roofed aisle to either side. Original tuck pointing is clearly visible, and stonework to the west door and corners is rusticated. A cornice breaks forward across the aisles on giant angle and tower Tuscan pilasters. The four-stage tower has a central entrance formed by a high rusticated arch with a triple keystone over original double six-panelled oak doors, with a semi-circular over light of radiating glazing bars. Small round-headed niches flank a tall window above, with small-paned sashes containing the only pre-war glass, which has a triple key breaking the entablature above. The upper stages have quoins and cornices, and a clock face is set in tall blind arches on the third stage of the west, south and north sides. The top stage has louvred belfry openings and corner spirelets on square plinths flanked by cyma-moulded brackets. The side bays under pent roofs have keyed arches to original oak panelled doors below windows in keyed elliptical arches, the key rising through the cornice to shallow pilasters, with further angle pilasters above the cornice rising to pent gable coping. A pair of sundials are affixed to the upper south-west corner. The seven-bay north and south elevations have a moulded plinth and pilasters at the angles defining the west bay. The early 18th-century keystone centres of each window rise through a cornice to the pilasters of the corniced parapet. The most westerly windows on each elevation light the vestry and library above. A pair of former gravestones, now illegible, are set beneath a window on the south elevation. The east elevation has blind roundels over arched windows flanking a shallow, gabled sanctuary projection with a low-pitched roof, prominent stone angle pilasters and a circular former eight-foil window, now blocked. The semi-circular apse has a pyramidal roof and a large Venetian window.

The interior has stone flagged flooring throughout the ground floor, except for some terrazzo flooring to the dais and the timber floor of the vestry. The north-west side entrance opens into a porch with inserted early 21st-century oak-panelled WC pods, and an original large timber staircase with tread ends projecting over the open string, turned balusters and a ramped and wreathed handrail, rising to the first-floor gallery landing. A full-width vestibule is entered through an original panelled door with a wicket gate. This has half-panelled walls and a panelled and glazed screen with round-arched entrances dating to 1724, separating it from the body of the church; the central entrance has painted text on the lintel and inner lintel. A pair of collection boxes, dated 1721, are fixed to the bases of the pillars on the west side. A centrally-placed font by Etty and Mansfield of York has a fluted marble bowl on a turned limestone pedestal and sandstone base. The counter-balanced and ornately carved wooden cover with scroll brackets supporting cherubs and a dove finial is raised by a pulley into a domed ceiling recess, painted with cherubs and an inscription. At the south end of the vestibule, a second stair to the gallery has a closed string, turned balusters and ramped handrail.

From the vestibule, double panelled doors within an internal round-arched recess with imposts lead into the main porch, which contains a memorial to the rector Robert Gray (1819-1838). It is a life-size standing figure in a long gown, cravat and bands, with a sheaf of papers in one hand, standing upon a high pedestal carved with a lengthy eulogy. Low flanking Greek aedicules contain low-relief figures of Faith and Charity, portrayed as young women with children to either side. The vestry room is also entered from the vestibule through six-panel doors in a moulded architrave, pedimented to the interior. This has panelled walls, a corner fireplace with hob grate, and a parish safe dated 1854. A large fixed oak table is said to be original and dates from the time the vestry was used for local government meetings. The room also has an external door set in a round-arched architrave.

The Classical aisled nave has giant Corinthian colonnades on corniced plinths with undersized capitals supporting a modillioned entablature and a flat plaster roof. The colonnade plinths are enclosed in 20th and early 21st-century panels. Along the north wall is an inserted early 21st-century servery counter with an oak-panelled front. The outer bays of the Venetian chancel arch break forward and are enriched with two pairs of fluted Corinthian columns with carved plinths and gilded bases and capitals, with elaborate decoration above a modillioned cornice with three broken pediments and cherubs, the inner segmental and framing an open bible and the outer framing bishops' mitres. The chancel is distinguished from the nave by a dais with two steps to a central semi-circular projection, and three Frosterley marble steps lead to the apse, which has a panelled door in the left return. The original communion rail with semi-circular gate is in the same style as the stair balustrades. A south chapel has panelled south and east walls and panelled round-arched arcaded partitions to the other sides, thought to have been fashioned from the box pews. A wooden First World War memorial recording the names of 192 Fallen is fixed to the south wall. The west gallery is carried on pilasters, with scroll brackets set against the columns. It has an ornate panelled front adorned with slender columns carrying the original, moulded and painted George I Royal Arms in the centre, flanked by the Arms of the Bishop of Durham and London. A breakout space has been created on the gallery as part of 21st-century renovations by removing some of the pews and levelling off the rake; this has an oak floor and glass screens to three sides. The west screen of 1724 has slender columns supporting round arches over churchwardens' and other dignitaries' pews, with the names of their offices painted above.

The first-floor library is entered through a six-panel door and retains an ornate hob grate with simple surround. The north wall retains its original, full-length and full-height oak bookcase with reading and writing desks and ladders. The main staircase extends up to the original choir vestry, from which wooden steps lead up to the bell ringers' chamber, clock chamber and belfry. The complex Queen-post roof structure accessed via a hatch from the tower has original trusses with scarfed tie-beams and raised later purlins.