Church Of St John The Baptist

Church of St John the Baptist

A parish church with a medieval tower largely rebuilt in the 17th century and a main body constructed in 1860 by T Nicholson of Hereford. The tower is built of coursed limestone rubble with ashlar dressings and a pyramidal slate cap. The rest of the church is constructed of squared and coursed limestone with ashlar dressings and a slate roof with ridge cresting. The building is designed in Decorated Gothic style.

The tower is squat and square, with two stages, a plinth, string courses, a coped battlemented parapet, weathervane and flag pole. It has 2-light bell chamber openings to the north and south, the northern opening featuring trefoil-headed lights with a returned square hoodmould. A stair projection to the south-east contains 4 rectangular lights. The western face has a chamfered 4-centred arched bell chamber opening. The first stage displays a 4-centred 3-light diamond-leaded west window, with an early 18th-century door below featuring 6 raised and fielded panels and a bracketed, moulded flat hood with 2-panelled soffit. An octagonal clock dated 1847 and a red line for a fives game are marked on the first stage to the north.

The 1860 church incorporates a plinth, cill string, trefoil-gabled angle buttresses and parapeted gable-ends, with an octagonal stone stack to the south transeptal chapel. The structure comprises a 5-bay nave with lean-to aisles, a lower pentagonal-apsed chancel, transeptal chapels, a north porch, and north and south vestries. The nave and aisles feature cinquefoiled circular windows and 2-light aisle windows with decorated tracery and hoodmoulds with carved stops.

The gabled north porch is positioned in the second bay from the west. Its entrance has half-octagonal shafts with moulded capitals and a moulded arch with ballflower ornament. A trefoil-arched niche sits in the gable above, and the cill string is carried over as a hoodmould. The side windows contain 4 cinquefoil-headed lights. The north doorway has one order of shafts with bell capitals and a moulded arch with hoodmould and carved stops, leading to 2 boarded doors with elaborate ironwork. Side benches occupy the interior of the porch.

The transeptal chapels feature large windows in their gable-ends with 4 ogee-headed lights and intersecting tracery, with hoodmoulds and carved stops. A cinquefoil-headed boarded west door opens from the south transeptal chapel. The chancel displays tall 2-light windows with hoodmoulds and carved stops, and a ballflower-ornamented corbel table. Lean-to vestries to the north and south have diagonal buttresses and 2 cinquefoil-headed windows flanking central moulded-arched boarded doors.

The interior features single framed roofs throughout. The nave has 4 bay arcades with a fifth arch to the transeptal chapels at the east, with clustered columns bearing bell capitals and double chamfered arches. Chamfered arches at the east end of the aisles carry carved-head corbels. The transeptal chapels feature chamfered arches opening into the vestry and organ chamber. The chancel has 2-bay arcades to the north and south with clustered central columns, double chamfered arches and hoodmoulds with carved stops. A cill string runs around the apse with carved end stops. The sanctuary contains triple sedilia with marble columns and trefoiled ogee arches with hoodmould and carved stops, a chamfered arched piscina, and a chamfered-arched tomb recess to the north of the altar.

The church contains notable fittings including a 12th-century tub font with a 17th-century octagonal wooden cover, and a circa 1860 octagonal stone font with moulded base, step, ballflower-ornamented bowl with foiled sides and carved heads around the rim. A circa 1860 octagonal pulpit features a moulded base, 2-light pierced ogee-panelled sides, ballflower ornament and steps to the north with wrought iron rail. A probably 18th-century parish chest is also present.

The stained glass includes circa 1860 work in the apse, circa 1850 glass in the north aisle north window, and two south aisle windows of 1863 and one of 1887 by Swain and Bourne or Birmingham. A series of late 18th-century and early 19th-century wall tablets are displayed in the north and south transeptal chapels. A decayed demi-figure of an Elizabethan divine appears on the west wall of the south transept with an associated brass plaque on the south wall.

A wall and gateway to the south of the church and The Vicarage are associated structures.