Church Of St. Andrew

Church of St. Andrew

Parish church with origins in the 11th century, extensively developed through the 12th to 16th centuries, and substantially restored in 1864. Built of coursed limestone and ironstone rubble with limestone ashlar detailing. Slate roofs with stone coped gables and cross finials. The church comprises a west tower, nave with north and south aisles, south porch, chancel, and north vestry.

The 15th-century west tower features a moulded plinth and string course with multi-stage angle buttresses. A polygonal stair turret projects from the south east, lit by slit lights and a quatrefoil panel. The west doorway has a flattened triangular head with continuous moulded surround, hood mould and plank doors. Above is a moulded string course and a large west window with flattened triangular head, four cusped pointed lights and hood mould. A string course above frames a small rectangular light to the left with a shield panel to the right. The east side contains a rectangular doorway accessing the roof and another rectangular opening, both with chamfered surrounds. Bell openings on all four sides each have a round head, two pointed cusped lights, hood mould and ornate label stops. Moulded eaves with projecting gargoyles on each face surmount the tower, though the battlements and corner pinnacle pedestals no longer survive. A clock sits below the south bell opening.

The north aisle was rebuilt in the 19th century with a moulded plinth and three rectangular windows, each with two cusped ogee-headed lights. A 19th-century clerestory above contains three rectangular windows of two cusped pointed lights each. A pointed window serves the vestry to the east. The north side of the chancel retains a 16th-century rectangular window with three cusped pointed lights. The east end features a two-stage flanking angle buttress and a 19th-century pointed window with three cusped ogee-headed lights, panel tracery and hood mould. The south side of the chancel has a 19th-century rectangular window with three pointed cusped lights and a pointed doorway to the left with continuous chamfered surround, hood mould and plank door.

The east end of the south aisle, rebuilt in the 19th century, embeds four fragments of Anglo-Saxon sculpture with interlace decoration of various designs. These fragments surround a blocked rectangular window with an inner pointed cusped light. The south side of the south aisle has a plinth, two-stage buttresses and two rectangular windows: the eastern window is late 14th century with three richly moulded ogee-headed lights, while the western is 19th century with three simple pointed lights. A gabled south porch with plinth and single-stage buttresses has a pointed south doorway with continuous moulded surround. The porch interior is flanked by stone benches and contains a 14th-century pointed doorway with continuous moulded surround, two whorls on the jambs and double plank doors. The west end of the south aisle displays a pointed window with Y tracery and above it a slate monument to John Westmoreland, died 1814.

Internally, the tower arch has a moulded pointed head, semi-circular responds with broad fillets, polygonal abaci with castellated details. A stair turret doorway in the south wall has a moulded triangular head, broad chamfered jambs and plank door. The mid-13th-century north arcade comprises three bays with triple rolled responds with fillets, quatrefoil piers with fillets, pointed moulded heads and hood moulds with foliate stops in spandrels. The later 13th-century south arcade has polygonal responds, octagonal piers and double-chamfered pointed heads with hood moulds. A 19th-century pointed chancel arch with moulded head features corbelled responds with half shafts. The north vestry doorway has a pointed head with continuous chamfered surround and plank door. A 19th-century pointed piscina appears in the south wall. A blocked doorway in the south chancel wall has a segmental head.

Furnishings include 19th-century roofs, pews, pulpit and lectern, and a 19th-century font with octagonal pedestal and 20th-century hood. A notable 19th-century tomb recess contains a 14th-century effigy, possibly of Ethelreda Rigdon, beneath a nodding ogee canopy flanked by angels with angle shafts, angle buttress shafts and finials. The effigy was later converted to Elizabethan dress.

Monuments include a grey and white monument with triangular head and apron to Humphrey and Mary Hyde (died 1807 and 1811); two black and white marble monuments to Kingsman Baskett St. Barbe (died 1837) and George Foster (died 1856); a grey and white marble monument to the Burrell family (undated); a white and grey marble monument to the Reverend Kingsman Foster (died 1867); a brass plaque on grey marble with red and green detailing to Kingsman Baskett Foster (died 1896); and a white and black marble monument to Sarah Parker (died 1840).