Roman Catholic Church of St Paul and Presbytery

Roman Catholic Church of St Paul and Presbytery

A Roman Catholic church and presbytery built in 1853–4 by the architects Weightman, Hadfield & Goldie, with a chancel and Lady Chapel added in 1899 by Edmund Kirby. The Lady Chapel altar dates to around 1954 and was designed by Adrian Gilbert Scott. The building is executed in the Decorated Gothic style, constructed from sandstone with Welsh slate roofs.

The church plan comprises a four-and-a-half-bay nave with a west gallery, a lean-to south aisle, a gabled south porch, a pitched-roof north aisle, a chancel, and a gabled north Lady Chapel. A sacristy at the east end of the south aisle links the church to the presbytery, creating an L-shaped group.

The church exterior is built of coursed, rock-faced stone with a plinth, ashlar dressings, and a steep slate roof. The Lady Chapel and chancel feature red sandstone window tracery. The west end, facing the road, has a bellcote with coped verges. A central buttress contains a statue niche with a late 20th-century fibreglass statue of St Paul and is flanked by lancet windows with Decorated tracery. Above sits a large trefoil window. The pitch-roofed north aisle and lean-to south aisle both have angle buttresses and arched windows with Decorated tracery. The south aisle features a projecting gabled porch with side buttresses and a central arched doorway with a shallow blind niche above; the doorway has stone steps, a moulded surround, and timber and glazed double doors. To the left of the porch is a single lancet, and to the right are three pairs of lancets separated by buttresses. The nave clerestorey is lit by trefoil windows. The north aisle contains an arched three-light window at the left-hand end (separated by a buttress from two two-light arched windows), all with Decorated tracery, and a pointed-headed doorway with a plain plank door at the right-hand end. The small gabled Lady Chapel, attached at the left-hand end of the north side, has a plinth, sill band, and triple-lancet window. Behind it, the chancel has slightly projecting window bays on each side wall with paired lancet windows rising through the eaves and capped by sloping pyramidal roofs; the south elevation includes a tall stone stack. The east end has a large trefoil window.

The presbytery and sacristy are constructed of coursed, rock-faced stone with a plinth, ashlar dressings, and slate roofs. The presbytery has a slightly projecting two-storey gable at the right-hand end with central square-headed windows on both floors divided by a moulded string band. To the left is a projecting single-storey porch with a flat roof and corner buttresses whose shaped ashlar coping stones feature relief-carved shields depicting the symbols of St Paul (a sword) and St Peter (crossed keys). The porch front elevation has a central round-headed lancet with leaded coloured glass; the porch doorway is in the side elevation with a relief-carved panel above, now fitted with a metal grille gate. Above and to the left of the porch is a shallow canted bay window with a three-light mullion window. The ground-floor sacristy is lit by a three-light mullion window with shouldered heads, and a three-light mullion window above lights a first-floor bedroom. Most windows now have modern uPVC frames.

The church interior has a nave with pointed arcades supported by cylindrical piers and an open roof with arch-braced collar trusses. The walls and arcades are plastered and painted white. The marble high altar and Gothic timber reredos date to 1925–6 and were designed by Edmund Kirby; the sanctuary was reorganised in 1979 with the altar repositioned forward. The east trefoil window contains stained glass by Hardman from 1899. Other windows feature small panes of leaded glass with coloured borders and simple decorative motifs; the two west lancet windows display the symbols of St Paul and St Peter. The stone Lady Chapel altar (c1954) by Adrian Gilbert Scott incorporates a central timber statue of the Madonna and Child flanked by high-relief timber-carved scenes of the Annunciation and Assumption. The pine-fronted west gallery and screen likely date to the 1850s; the pipe organ has a pine case with stencilled pipes, probably from the late 19th century. Confessionals are arranged in a row beneath the gallery. The arched inner door of the south porch features decorative ironwork strap hinges. An octagonal stone font stands adjacent to the doorway at the west end of the south aisle. The south-west corner contains 1930s oak panelling by the parishioner D Renwick, which incorporates a copper war memorial plaque recording the fallen of both World Wars. A corner plinth holds a crucifix with a plaster Christ, Mary his Mother, and Mary Magdalene. The aisle walls display timber relief-carved and coloured Stations of the Cross, similar to examples dated 1906 by Mayer & Co at St Mary's Roman Catholic church, Dukinfield.

In the presbytery and sacristy, oak panelling and vestment wardrobes in the sacristy date to 1935 and were made by D Renwick. The presbytery also features panelling on the walls and doors in the adjoining entrance hall. The two reception rooms have original stone mantelpieces and simple cornices. The staircase at the rear of the entrance hall rises and divides, with one short flight leading to the plainer rear wing (where the housekeeper lived) and another short flight opening onto a long first-floor corridor in the main house, from which the priests' bedrooms open. The staircase and corridor are panelled to dado height, though currently partially papered over. The priests' bedrooms are panelled to picture-rail height and feature built-in panelled wardrobes.