Church Of St Peter And St Paul

The Church of St Peter and St Paul is a parish church dating to 1733. It is constructed of red brick in Flemish bond, with greenstone ashlar dressings and copper roofs. The church comprises a three-stage western tower, a nave, and a facetted chancel.

The tower has a plinth, three stone bands demarcating the upper stages, and a parapet with corner pilasters ramped down to the centres. A twelve-panelled door is set within a Gibbsian surround featuring a pulvinated frieze and pediment. Above the door is a semi-circular leaded light within a rusticated ashlar surround, complete with impost and keystone. Louvred openings are present on each face of the belfry stage, and keyed, leaded oculi are on the tower’s sides. The nave’s side walls feature ashlar quoins, a brick plinth, an ashlar band, a wooden eaves cornice, and two semi-circular headed leaded lights. A keyed oculus interrupts the stone band at the west end. The facetted chancel’s east end contains a Venetian window set in a flat ashlar surround with a bracketed stone sill. A small, blank organ extension projects from the south side.

Inside, a pair of double six-panelled doors leads into the church. A western gallery with a panelled face and a 19th-century rail is present. The nave and chancel are undifferentiated, united by a continuous, deeply moulded cornice. The facetted walls of the chancel feature two moulded plaster panels each. The rear arches of the nave windows have moulded architraves. A stained-glass east window, designed by O’Connor in 1861, illuminates the chancel.

The interior also includes dado panelling throughout, raised and fielded with dentilling in the chancel, a complete set of panelled pews, and a matching pulpit with fluted Doric pilasters and a moulded cornice. A chair is constructed from two 15th-century poppy head bench ends. The octagonal font, dating from the 15th century, sits on a moulded base. A pipe organ is housed in a polished mahogany case, and is of a late 18th-century Snetzler type. Wall plaques commemorate the Dycock family of 1724 and a later member, as well as Martha Moody, who died in 1742. An obelisk monument to Charles Brackenbury, who died in 1816, is by Walsh and Dunbar of Leeds, and incorporates a fluted sarcophagus and a white marble tablet.