Church Of St Helen

The Church of St Helen is a parish church dating from 1860, designed by R J Withers. It is built of red brick with decorative burnt headers, limestone ashlar dressings, some green sandstone rubble blocks, and some marble. The roofs are slate, with decorative red ridge tiles, overhanging eaves, wrought iron finials, and a tall vestry chimney to the north. A square, slate-hung bellcote is located towards the west end, featuring a narrow wooden bell stage with star-shaped openings and a broached spirelet with weathervane.

The church comprises a nave with bellcote, a south porch, and a chancel with a north vestry. A plinth incorporates bands of sandstone and burnt headers. The west end features a large pointed window with two pointed ashlar-dressed lights, cusping, and a quatrefoil. The north side of the nave has a pair of cusped ashlar-dressed lancets to the east. A lean-to vestry projects, with a north doorway featuring a short straight head flanked by broad re-entrant curves, and a plank door. A small pointed window is located to the right, with ashlar dressing and cusping. The east end of the vestry has a pointed window with two pointed, ashlar-dressed lights and a plate quatrefoil. The large pointed east window has three pointed lights and complex ashlar tracery; a foundation stone dated 1860 sits below. The south side of the chancel has a single pointed window with two ashlar-dressed, cusped lights and a cusped oculus above. The south side of the nave has a pair of ashlar-dressed lancets with cusping. A gabled porch to the west has a pointed doorway with two low wooden gates, and an inner pointed doorway with plank doors. All windows and doors feature pointed heads articulated by burnt header decoration.

Inside, the church features a tall, broad, pointed chancel arch with a head of two orders, ashlar decoration, and red diamond-shaped tiles inset. The responds incorporate single, free-standing marble shafts with ornate capitals and shaft rings. There are three sharply pointed openings in the north wall of the chancel, the easternmost extending to the floor for access to the vestry. A plain, broad sedilia is located in the south wall with a segmental head. An ashlar string course runs round the east end. The church contains an ornate reredos of encaustic tiles, a C19 altar rail, choir stalls, pews, an octagonal font, a polygonal pulpit, and wagon roofs. A monument under the west window commemorates Eysimachus Parker, who died in 1860. It includes flanking squat marble shafts with ornate capitals and shaft rings, deep-set bands of ball flower, dentillations, and flower heads.