Church Of St Katharine

Church of St Katharine

A parish church of the 12th and 13th centuries, substantially refenestrated and refitted around 1684. The building is constructed of coursed and squared rubble with lead and slate lean-to and gabled roofs, ashlar dressings, coved eaves, and coped gables with kneelers and crosses.

The church comprises a west tower, nave with clerestorey, north and south aisles, chancel, vestry, and south porch incorporated within the south aisle.

The west tower dates to the 13th century but was raised in the late 17th century. It is three storeys tall with chamfered and plain string courses, a stepped crenellated parapet with small pinnacles, and an elaborate weathercock. The first stage has a round-headed double lancet to the west with coved reveal and cross in head. The third stage has double round-headed lancets on each side in pointed reveals with hood moulds. A clock is set in a square panel to the west.

The nave clerestorey has three plain double lancets to the south and two to the north, all with square-headed reveals. The north aisle dates to the 13th century and comprises three bays. It has an off-centre blocked shouldered door flanked to the left by two and to the right by a single cross-mullioned leaded casement. The south aisle has a set-back bay to the west with a cusped round-headed double lancet with hood mould, above which is a plaque with leaves and scroll. To its right is a chamfered doorway, and beyond that are two triple lancets with hood moulds. The east end has a 14th-century triple lancet with intersecting tracery, hood mould and mask stops to the left, and to its right a cross-mullioned casement with hood mould. Above it is a datestone inscribed 'P.M. 1684'.

The vestry dates to the 19th century and has a lancet to the east. The chancel comprises three bays. To the north is a single blocked 13th-century lancet. The east end has a plain triple lancet with square-headed reveal flanked by single late 18th-century memorial tablets on brackets. The south side has an off-centre shouldered doorway flanked to the left by a round-headed lancet with square reveal. To the right is a late 17th-century traceried double lancet. Above, to the right, is an 18th-century sundial.

The south doorway is 12th-century with a moulded round-headed surround bearing allegorical figures, and a battened door of the 13th century.

The south arcade is early 13th-century, comprising four bays with two round and two square piers with filleted demi-shafts, moulded bases and capitals, and double chamfered and rebated round arches. The north arcade is mid-13th-century with four bays, round piers with moulded and water-holding bases, moulded capitals with dogtooth and nailhead, octagonal responds, and double chamfered and rebated round arches with hood moulds, finials and mask stops. The west end has a panelled gallery of 1684 on shaped wooden posts, with an oak winder stair to the north featuring turned vase and stem balusters.

The nave roof is 17th-century with low pitch, moulded rafter construction, canted span beams with bosses, arch braces, wall shafts, and king posts with cusped struts. The north aisle has a figure on a 13th-century bracket at its east end. The south aisle has a chamfered arch to the south doorway and a 19th-century boarded roof. The chancel arch is 14th-century, double chamfered and rebated with hood mould, foliate and mask stops, octagonal responds and nailhead capitals. The east end and south side have stained glass memorial windows of 1877. The chancel has a 19th-century double purlin roof with arch braces.

The interior fittings are mainly of around 1684 and include an altar table and side table with turned legs, two 18th-century carved side chairs, and an altar rail with bulbous balusters. Desks and bookstands date to 1908. There are fielded panel box pews, an octagonal panelled pulpit with balustraded steps, and a panelled Squire's pew with carved crests and a canted moulded canopy carrying the Molyneux Arms on three barley sugar columns. An eggcup font with rolled rim sits on a plain stem. An 18th-century framed benefactions board and Royal Arms are present, along with two 19th-century Gothic commandment boards.

The church contains numerous memorials. A Renaissance Revival alabaster wall tablet commemorates Sir Francis Molyneux (1674) with a Latin inscription on the apron and a crested aedicule with broken ogee pediment on Corinthian columns, surmounted by a portrait bust. A painted marble monument to Sir John and Lady Lucy Molyneux (1691) features a scrolled apron with arms, scrolled brackets carrying Ionic columns to an aedicule with crested scroll pediment containing a double round-headed niche with two portrait busts. A marble wall monument to Sir Francis and Lady Diana Molyneux (1741) has a scroll-bracketed shelf carrying a recessed pedestal with crest, above which are two portrait busts on turned feet, with a bracketed back panel with moulded scallop-crested segmental pediment. There are seven hatchments of the 17th and 18th centuries, a portrait medallion to Sir Francis Molyneux (1812) by J. Kendrick, two reset alabaster floor slabs of 1538 and 1563, three 19th and early 20th-century marble and slate tablets, a pedimented tablet with high relief portrait bust to Gwendolen Herbert (1915), a classical marble and slate war memorial tablet of around 1920, and two brasses of 1876 and 1929.