Church Of St John

Church of St John

The Church of St John at Pencombe is a parish church built between 1863 and 1865 by Thomas Nicholson of Hereford. It represents an entire rebuilding of the former 12th-century and later medieval church, designed in the Transitional Norman and Early English style. The building is constructed of coursed and dressed local Lower Devonian or Old Red Sandstone with paler sandstone dressings, beneath a Welsh slate roof.

The church plan comprises a nave, chancel with buttressed apsidal east end, vestry to the north, south porch, and a tower with pyramidal roof. The tower incorporates a stair turret to the ringing floor, capped with a conical roof.

Exterior

The south front consists of six bays and incorporates the south porch, tower, and chancel. The porch features a coped gable framing an imposing round arch with bold chevron detailing set on pairs of engaged columns with stiff leaf capitals. Above a string-course is a niche with a round-headed arch decorated with chevron detail, supported on two columns with scalloped capitals. Within the niche sits a small statue, possibly the Virgin and Child from the original church.

The nave extends for two bays with Early English window tracery. The tower rises buttressed to the height of the ringing floor with two tiers of weathering. At its base, an attractive door features chevron boarding and decorative hinges, set within a door case flanked by engaged columns with stiff leaf capitals. The belfry contains pairs of round-headed louvred openings on each face, all supported on pairs of columns with stiff leaf capitals. At roof level, a corbel table is supported on columns with capitals at each corner.

The chancel comprises two bays with Early English window tracery. The west front displays a large round-arched window with bold chevron detailing set on two columns with zig-zag detailing and scalloped capitals above, flanked by two narrow windows with heavy chevron detailing within broad buttresses. An oculus appears in the apex of the nave gable.

The east end comprises a three-bay apse defined by three windows with Early English tracery and four massive buttresses with three tiers of weathering. A corbel table with dog-tooth detailing runs along the base. The north side incorporates the vestry to the north of the chancel and four bays of the nave defined by windows in a plainer Norman style.

Interior

The interior features a plain plastered finish with a timber arched braced roof over the chancel. A bold round-headed chancel arch with chevron detailing is supported on columns with stiff leaf capitals. Beyond lies a fine reredos of five round arches forming an arcade. Above are five flat ribs with chevron pattern, featuring a central boss depicting a dragon or salamander set on a bed of leaves.

A 15th-century font, simple and octagonal, sits at the base of the tower. At the west end stands a more ornate font set on a large central column with four lesser columns at the corners, all with stiff leaf capitals. At the base of the chancel arch is the pulpit, Transitional in style, mounted on a cluster of columns with stiff leaf capitals and repeating this detailing above.

Memorial stained glass appears in the south chancel windows and above the reredos at the east end.

The church represents a significant work of the mid-19th-century Gothic Revival, demonstrating considerable architectural and historic interest through its confident reinterpretation of Transitional Gothic architecture and the quality of its carved stonework and masonry craftsmanship.