Church Of St Andrew

The Church of St Andrew is a church with elements dating back to the 12th century, significantly altered and extended through the 14th, 16th, and 19th centuries. It is situated on Church Road in Lower Bebington.

The church’s architectural design reflects its long history. The nave originally had two bays of a 12th-century south arcade. Around 1300, a south aisle was added. The south-west tower was constructed between the early and mid 14th century, followed by the chancel, north and south chapels, crossing, and transeptal bays in the early 16th century. A new north aisle was built in 1847, incorporating windows and an entrance from the earlier 14th-century north wall of the original nave.

The north aisle features a parapet and a gabled porch with a pointed entrance featuring doors with vertical strips, studs, and strap hinges. It contains a three-light window, a two-light window, and a straight-headed two-light window at its west end. The tower has deep buttresses, with the western two being diagonal, and a rectangular stair turret to the north side. Its west window has two lights; the second stage exhibits a lancet with a shouldered lintel, and there are two-light louvred bell openings above. A splay spire sits atop the tower, pierced with lucarnes. The south aisle incorporates two windows with Y-tracery and a gabled porch similar to the north porch, with 19th-century masonry in the eastern bay. The chancel and gabled chapels are characterized by a moulded base, sill course, weathered buttresses with panelled pinnacles, a cornice, and a parapet. The windows are four-light, featuring hollow-chamfered reveals, hood moulds, transoms, and Perpendicular tracery. North-chapel windows have cusping, while those in the south chapel are cusped below the transom; the windows in the transceptal bays lack cusping. The east end has a five-light window, and entrances to the eastern bays, the north being a 19th-century addition.

Inside, the church showcases a three-bay Norman style arcade, dating from the 19th century, and an arch-braced collar roof. The south aisle contains a blocked window and a high door at its eastern end. A round font with simple panels, likely medieval, is also present. The crossing and transeptal bays feature panelled piers and corbelled chancel and chapel arches. The chancel has a three-bay arcade and wall shafts supporting the tie-beam roof. Screens within the chancel, chapels, and parcloses were designed by C.E. Deacon. Windows have cusped panelled recesses located below. Reredoses and altars are from the 19th century, with pierced panels to the altars. There are 16th-century misericords and bench ends. A timber pulpit with tracery panels is also present. A window in the north transept was created by Wailes in 1855 and a south transept window by Holiday in 1881.