Church Of St Andrew

The Church of St Andrew in Preston is a parish church built in 1836. It was enlarged and altered between 1873 and 1874 by Ewan Christian, with a vestry added in 1902. The church is constructed of coursed squared sandstone with slate roofs, and comprises a nave, chancel, a small west tower, and a wide north aisle. An organ house is located to the north and is dated 1874.

The tower is Romanesque in style, with three stages, clasping buttresses to the first stage, a set-back belfry stage, and a short broach spire. It features round-headed lancet windows; two to the first stage, one larger window to the second stage with a hoodmould, and triple round-headed, louvred lancets to the belfry. The nave, with four bays, incorporates buttresses (except at the corners) and has two-centred arched windows with hoodmoulds and simple plate tracery, with two lights to each bay except for the wider east bay, which has three lights. The north aisle, built in a matching style, features a gabled porch to the west bay.

Inside, the nave and aisle have arch-braced king-post roofs with curved struts. The tower arch is round-headed. The four-bay aisle arcade consists of stout cylindrical piers of polished pink granite carrying low two-centred double-chamfered arches. The chancel arch is similar but larger, with semi-columns of polished granite. The chancel contains sedilia and an arch leading to the organ house. It has a wagon roof.

The church contains several good wall monuments to members of the Pedder family of Ashton Lodge, including that of Jane Pedder (d.1838), featuring a draped urn; James Pedder (d.1846), with a white tablet in a sarcophagus form surmounted by a woman grieving over a broken Corinthian column; Captain Thomas Pedder (d.1858), a marble relief depicting a sarcophagus flanked by military figures and commemorating his death from sunstroke during the Relief of Lucknow; Richard Newsham Pedder (d.Calcutta 1863), with trophies and helmets as decoration; and Herbert Davies M.B.,CH.B. (d.1900), who died of dysentery while serving as a civil surgeon in the Transvaal War, with a profile in relief.