Church Of Saint Leonard

Church of Saint Leonard

Parish church built in 1830–1 by George Ernest Hamilton of Stone. The interior was restored and the chancel was added or rebuilt in 1887. A tower was added in 1910 by Chapman and Snape of Newcastle. The building is constructed of rendered brick with a slate roof.

The church consists of a 5-bay nave, a small one-bay chancel, and a west tower. The nave features a plinth, cill band, impost band, and panelled pilaster strips with bases and moulded capitals supporting a continuous frieze and moulded eaves cornice. It has a triangular-pedimented gable with deep eaves and a cross at the apex to the east. An integral brick stack rises from the south-west corner. The nave windows are small-paned round-arched openings. The chancel has a plinth, cill string, panelled pilasters, frieze, and moulded eaves cornice, with a triangular-pedimented gable end featuring a circular grille in the tympanum and a cross at the apex. The east window is tripartite with a continuous cill and round-arched centre light. A 20th-century flat-roofed vestry stands to the north.

The tower comprises three stages. The first stage to the west has three bays with a plinth, cill string, and panelled pilasters supporting a frieze and cornice. The outer bays are topped by attics with small-paned lights set in round-arched panels, cornices, and coped parapets, with a balustraded recess between them. The second stage is set back with a moulded cornice to the belfry, moulded eaves cornice, and a pyramidal slate cap with a cross at the apex. The belfry openings are louvred round-arched with moulded architraves and keystones, each set in a recessed panel. A round clock with moulded architrave appears on the second stage to the west, and circular windows with four panes and moulded architraves are on the other three faces. The entrance comprises a central pair of three-panelled west doors with panelled reveals, moulded architrave, and a moulded cornice to a triangular pediment, approached by three steps flanked by bootscrapers. One-bay returns to the front stage have round-arched small-paned windows and small-paned attic lights.

The interior features dog-leg stairs to the tower and galleries at each side of the entrance lobby, with a closed string, stick balusters, and square newel posts. A moulded cornice runs around the nave and chancel. A small boarded bracketed gallery stands to the west. The chancel arch is moulded and elliptical with a panelled soffit and moulded capitals, bearing the inscription "HOLY. HOLY. HOLY. LORD. GOD. ALMIGHTY". The centre east window has a moulded architrave with flanking windows with beaded corners.

Furnishings include chancel panelling with moulded cornice, probably dating to 1929. Communion rails to left and right have wrought-iron supports. Plain 19th-century choir stalls are present. The organ stands to the right of the chancel arch. An octagonal oak pulpit of 1929 features a stem, paired panels, Corinthian colonnettes at the corners, and a frieze and moulded cornice. A brass lectern is also present. An oak chancel screen of 1917 comprises seven alternating wide and narrow bays with Corinthian columns on pedestals, frieze, cornice, and a central triangular pediment. It is inscribed in memory of Second Lieutenant Percy Mellor "who fell in action in France in the attack on the Hohenzollern redoubt". Plain pine pews fill the nave. An octagonal stone font dated 1848 has a step, stem with trefoil-headed panels, a bowl with quatrefoil panels, and a wooden cover with crockets and finial. Stained glass in the north window, dating to around 1905, was made by Kempe and Tower.

The present building stands near the site of an earlier chapel-of-ease first recorded in 1552. George Ernest Hamilton published a book of "Designs for Rural Churches" in 1836. The builders employed for the erection of the tower in 1910 were Wilton and Son of Newcastle.