Church Of St Michael And All Angels

A parish church at Eaton Bishop with origins in the 11th century, substantially developed through the 12th, 13th and 14th centuries, and comprehensively restored in 1885 and 1927. The building is constructed of roughly coursed sandstone rubble with sandstone dressings, with tile and shingle roofs. It comprises a west tower, a four-bay nave with north and south aisles, a south porch, and a two-bay chancel.

Tower

The tower dates to the 11th and 12th centuries and underwent restoration in 1927. It rises in three stages above a battered plinth, topped with a shingled broach spire and a gabled dormer to each face. The ground stage contains a single low-set round-headed chamfered light set roughly centrally in the west and south faces, with a similar but off-centre light in the north face. Above each small light in the south and west faces is a larger round-headed window. The second stage has one round-headed window of the larger type on the north, south and west faces. The top stage features twin round-headed openings to each face, each divided by a shaft with cushion capital. The north-east and south-east corners are slightly recessed behind the main line of the north and south walls.

Aisles and Nave

The north aisle has a chamfered lancet in its west wall and two lancets to the north wall, one flanking a north doorway with a flat two-centred head. Between two buttresses is a three-light window with a label and trefoil-headed lights beneath a gable with a cross. A 19th-century stack with an octagonal shaft stands centrally. The east end of the aisle bears scars indicating a lower, earlier and steeper chancel roof. The nave has three recessed clerestory lancets to north and south. At its eastern verge is a gable cross below which sits a small gable light with a two-centred head and a large five-light window with stepped trefoil-headed lights beneath a two-centred arch with label.

The south aisle has a lancet at each east and west end, and a two-light window similar to those of the chancel's south wall, beneath a gable and flanked by two weathered buttresses. One lancet stands to each side of the late 19th- or early 20th-century south porch. The porch has two bays with trusses carried on curved angle braces; the collars carry V-struts. A chamfered south doorway features a two-centred head.

Chancel

The chancel has a pair of traceried two-light windows to each north and south side, each light trefoil-headed with a two-centred head and label. The window on the south side is notably earlier and has a higher cill than the others. A moulded cornice runs above the windows. The east window has a wide two-centred head with label and five restored lights, all trefoil-headed. Diagonal eastern corner buttresses are capped by pinnacles with crocket and dog-tooth ornament.

Interior

The interior roofs are of late 19th-century date or later. The nave roof is an open wagon roof with scissor-struts. The chancel roof has angle braces to the rafters and brattished wall-plates. The aisle roofs resemble half of the nave roof but at each east end have diagonal pine ribs rising from 19th-century corbel heads to form a wooden quadripartite vault beneath the north and south gables.

The chancel contains a three-seat 14th-century sedilia with chamfered ogeed and trefoiled heads separated by octagonal shafts on moulded bases, with a ballflower frieze above. A piscina features a similar but smaller head to the sedilia, with an octagonal drain. A pair of aumbries, one on each north and south wall, have 15th-century traceried panels on late 19th- or early 20th-century doors.

A 19th-century oak altar rail is supported by twisted brass posts with foliated brass decoration. The east window, re-leaded in 1978, contains celebrated 14th-century stained glass featuring a central Crucifixion flanked by tabernacles beneath which are angels and donors, with a Virgin and Child panel to the left. The east window of the south wall displays more contemporary stained glass showing Christ in Majesty in the tracery lights. The north-east window contains a small Crucifixion in the tracery. A 19th-century south-west window for Samuel Clark displays Saints Michael and Ethelbert in the left light and Saints Gabriel and Cantelupe in the right. The opposite window shows The Annunciation, a memorial for Ellen Strong, wife of the then rector, who died in 1891.

The north wall bears a monument to Richard Sneade (died 1678) of painted stone with a segmental broken pediment containing achievement and flanking putti, with twisted columns and Ionic capitals. The south wall has a monument to Thomas Phillips (died 1784) with an arch above a cornice and apron in the form of a swag. Also on the south wall is a monument to his daughter Isabella, burnt to death in 1836, of white marble with pediment and simplified acroteria, inscribed with the words: "AN AWFUL EXAMPLE OF THIS IMPORTANT TRUTH / 'IN THE MIDST OF LIFE WE ARE IN DEATH' / BE YE THEREFORE READY ALSO: FOR THE SON OF MAN COMETH AT AN HOUR WHEN YE THINK NOT".

A large organ, inscribed "EUSTACE INGRAM HEREFORD 1888", stands to the north side.

The chancel arch features double chamfers, with the inner order on half-columns with fillets and half-octagonal capitals, the outer order dying into the responds. The chancel screen is largely of circa 1900 date but includes 14th-century elements; it consists of three panelled bays to each side of the entry with pairs of ogee and cinquefoiled heads.

The nave contains a 13th-century arcade with circular piers and abaci set on the diagonal, supporting two-centred and double-chamfered arches. The south-east pier exhibits stiff-leaf foliage. The south-west respond has cusping to each face of its abacus. Two carved heads are positioned above two of the westernmost abaci of the south arcade. The west wall of the nave shows weathering from an older lower nave roof, with a cushion capital on a shaft between the twin openings of the tower's top stage. A low unmoulded tower arch of two orders features chamfered jambs and moulded imposts.

The font is partly 13th-century, with eight clustered shafts with foliated capitals on a circular base; it is topped with a 19th-century cylindrical bowl. The lectern, probably mid-19th century, has a twisted wrought iron shaft rising to an oak book wedge. The pulpit is late 19th-century, part-octagonal with cresting to the top rail and resembling the cinquefoil style of the chancel screen. Twisted brass newel post and hand rails rise to the stairs.

Stained glass above the chancel arch in the east window, of late 19th-century date, illustrates The Resurrection. The north aisle contains a 17th-century communion table with turned legs and moulded rails. At the east end, beneath a 14th-century ogeed and cinquefoil-headed recessed panel, is a bas-relief in crystalline stone of "Suffer the Little Children", a memorial for Lady Irva Keenan Pulley and Sir Charles Thornton Pulley DL, JP (died 1942 and 1947 respectively). A north-east window for Mary Pulley (died 1876) contains stained glass depicting Charity flanked by Faith and Hope.

The south aisle contains a 14th-century piscina with a cinquefoiled head and circular drain. Above, in the easternmost window of the south wall, is stained glass for Sir Joseph Pulley, Bart of Lower Eaton (died 1901), with the inscription: "This and the window over chancel arch erected 1904".

A brass plaque commemorates nine men who fell in "the War with Germany 1914-19", with names arranged hierarchically for ranks above private and alphabetically for privates. A painted stone plaque to the west of the south door commemorates William Gulliford (died 1770) with incised lettering and raised parts in black.

The tower's north wall displays two framed drawings: one entitled "Plan of Sittings" and another "General Restoration", both inscribed "T Nicholson FRIBA Architect Hereford July 1885 JAT Nicholson Delt".