Church of St Oswald

Church of St Oswald

Parish church. Medieval fabric largely remodelled after extensive Civil War damage in two phases in the late 17th century, repaired around 1807 and around 1830, and thoroughly restored and slightly extended by G.E. Street in 1872–74. Coursed sandstone with ashlar to Street's additions, slate roofs with ornamental cresting and coped verges.

The church has a large complicated plan consisting of nave, chancel, south-west tower, wide north aisle, double south aisle, transepts, north and south chancel chapels, south porch and south-east vestry. A prominent brown brick and concrete parish room, attached to the west side of the north transept, was added in the late 20th century.

The tower dates to the late 12th and early 13th centuries in its bottom three stages, which have prominent stepped angle buttresses and an integral stair turret to the south-west corner. It has scattered lancet and narrow round-headed openings either original or 17th century, with a rectangular opening to the first stage on the south side. Below this is a slightly cambered doorway with a nail-studded plank and muntin door and lintel recording the names of the churchwardens in 1692, probably the date of the rebuilding of the top stage when the balustrade, crocketed corner pinnacles and two-light belfry windows were added. The large window with intersecting tracery on the north face of the third stage is also of this period. A blocked doorway beneath (obscured by ivy at the time of resurvey in 1985) probably dates to around 1662.

The nave is largely hidden by aisles except for a late 19th-century west window and pointed doorway considerably restored by Street. In the angle with the tower and actually belonging to the south aisle is a late 17th-century window. The south aisle has a gable to the south with a late 19th-century Decorated-style window and has a lean-to roof abutting the east face of the tower. A gabled ashlar porch by Street has a good moulded arch resting on columns with natural leaf capitals. The south transept also has a late 19th-century Decorated-style window, although the stonework like that of the south aisle is of medieval or 17th-century appearance. A late 19th-century vestry projects to the east.

The chancel and flanking chapels probably date to the late 17th century and present three gables to Church Street. The windows are all 19th century, although the east window with its curious mixture of reticulated and panel tracery is said to be an 1861 copy of an earlier window. The south chancel chapel was much rebuilt and an embattled parapet added around 1830. The north transept is entirely by Street on the east and west sides, but the north wall is earlier and has a blocked doorway bearing the names of four churchwardens in 1715. The buttressed north aisle has three late 19th-century windows with panel tracery on the north side and one on the west, probably copies of late 17th-century windows. The west bay on the north is left blind.

Interior

The interior is almost entirely of late 19th-century appearance and dominated by Street's restoration. The most curious feature is the two octagonal piers set very close together at the east end of four-bay nave arcades. The south aisle and transept arches are also by Street, but the pointed three-bay arcades with octagonal pillars to the chancel are either late 14th or 17th century. Arch-braced collar-beam roofs to the nave and aisles and panelled wagon roofs to the chancel and flanking chapels are all by Street, as are the transept roofs. A round-headed doorway to the north side of the tower has a late 12th-century appearance but is probably 17th century.

Most of the fittings and furnishings, including the font by the south door, stone pulpit, marble reredos (1880) and wooden parclose screens to the chancel, are by Street. However, an octagonal font with spread-eagle carving to one of the sides in the north aisle is dated 1662. A long oak chest with iron hinges in the north transept and a chest with traceried decoration in the south transept are probably both partly medieval. Some 16th and 17th-century panelling is reused in one of the chancel benches, and there is a small panel fixed to the east wall of the tower. The stained glass is all mid to late 19th century, and the south transept war memorial and reredos are by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott.

Monuments

In the north aisle is a large wall monument to Hugh Yale (died 1616) and his wife against the north wall, with two large kneeling figures in a round-arched recess facing each other over a mutilated prayer desk. The monument has columns with crude acanthus decoration to the capitals, the whole surmounted by a strapwork achievement with flanking obelisks and coat-of-arms and skull-and-cross-bones to the centre. There is a good collection of 17th to 19th-century commemorative brass plates and wall tablets fixed to the north and east sides of the tower. Further 18th-century wall memorials are in the north chancel chapel, which also contains a possibly 17th-century chest.

Historical Context

A church is recorded at Oswestry in Domesday Book (although it was possibly not on this site), and it is likely to have originated as a minster foundation.