Church Of The Holy Trinity

This parish church was built in 1859 by Samuel Pountney Smith of Shrewsbury for John Arthur Lloyd. The steeple at the rear, dated 1871, was added by the same architect for Charles Spencer Lloyd. The building is constructed of tooled yellow and grey Grinshill sandstone ashlar with smooth ashlar dressings and plain tile roofs. It comprises a five-bay nave with south porch and north aisle, a two-bay chancel with a family pew to the south and a two-bay north chapel, and a north-west steeple.

Architectural Character

The church is designed in the Lancet Gothic style and features chamfered plinths and string courses, continuous hoodmoulds, gabled angle buttresses with chamfered corners and offsets, chamfered and moulded eaves, and parapeted gable ends with copings, gabled kneelers, and crosses at the apices. Dogtooth ornament is used extensively throughout.

Exterior: Nave and Porch

The nave has paired chamfered lancets with continuous hoodmoulds. The south doorway, located in the second bay from the west, has two arches: the inner with a continuous hollow chamfer and the outer moulded and springing from shafts with stiff-leaf capitals. The doorway has a hoodmould with carved stops and a pair of boarded doors. The gabled porch has flanking flush buttresses, carved stone gargoyles, and an archway of two orders—the inner moulded and springing from shafts, the outer continuously moulded—with a hoodmould and carved stops. The porch has chamfered lancets to the sides and an interior with side benches.

Exterior: West End and Bellcote

The west end features a central flying buttress running up to a diagonally-placed square bellcote at the apex of the gable. The bellcote has squinches, quatrefoil panels and semi-blind lancets to the base, trefoil-headed arched openings, buttresses at the angles, a carved frieze, and a short spire with a cross at the apex. Chamfered lancets flanking the buttresses have a continuous hoodmould. There is a chamfered Caernarvon-arched boarded doorway in the angle to the left and two chamfered rectangular staircase windows to the left.

Exterior: North Aisle

The lean-to four-bay north aisle has chamfered lancets and a moulded-arched doorway set in a gabled projection to the left, consisting of one order of shafts with stiff-leaf capitals and a hoodmould with carved stops.

Exterior: Chancel

The chancel has chamfered lancets. The east end features stepped triple lancets, each with nook shafts with stiff-leaf capitals, chamfered arches, and a continuous hoodmould with carved stops.

Exterior: Former Family Pew

The gabled former family pew has a stone ridge stack consisting of a square base, a circular shaft with four arched openings at the top, and a trefoil-headed gable above each. The gable contains a spheric-triangular window with three quatrefoils in plate tracery. At ground floor there is a chamfered lancet to the left, a boarded door to the right with chamfered reveals and hoodmould, and a central chamfered quatrefoil opening to the basement. The right-hand return front has a chamfered lancet and a chamfered segmental-arched basement door with steps down.

Exterior: North Chapel

The north chapel has chamfered lancets and a trefoiled circular window in the gable to the west.

Exterior: Steeple

The four-stage tower has a double-chamfered plinth, string courses, and a diaper band between the second and third stages with quatrefoils in lozenges. Angle buttresses have chamfered offsets and gabled tops. The tower features a corbelled parapet with cusped chamfered arches on carved foliate brackets, a moulded parapet string with a central carved gargoyle to each face, and a battlemented parapet with moulded coping. Square corner pinnacles have chamfered corners, a quatrefoil frieze, spirelets, and flying buttresses to the crocketed spire. The spire has crocketed louvred lucarnes to the cardinal faces with pierced trefoils in the spandrels and trefoil arches on shafts with stiff-leaf capitals, smaller trefoiled lucarnes above, and small blind lucarnes on shafts above buttresses to the angled faces.

The belfry stage has paired louvred lancets with moulded arches springing from nook shafts with stiff-leaf capitals and hoodmoulds. The third stage has a circular clock to the west with a moulded surround, a circular panel to the north with a cusped six-pointed star, and a cusped square panel with an uncarved shield to the north. The second stage has pairs of chamfered rectangular windows to the west and north, each with a floating hoodmould, and a central carved shield to the west with a lion. The first stage has lancets with nook shafts to the west and north. A two-storey link to the nave has two tiers of chamfered lancets.

Interior: Nave and Aisle

The interior is richly ornamented and furnished. The five-bay nave roof has chamfered arched-braced collar trusses springing from short wall shafts with dogtooth ornament, king posts with struts, and pairs of purlins with cusped windbraces. The four-bay aisle arcade consists of monolithic circular piers with fillets and moulded bases and capitals, and double-chamfered arches.

The moulded chancel arch includes one order of marble shafts with moulded bases and capitals.

Interior: Chancel

The two-bay chancel roof has moulded arched-braced collars springing from short wall shafts with stiff-leaf capitals, chamfered king posts, pairs of chamfered purlins with chamfered cusped windbraces, and a pierced screen in front of the ashlar pieces with billet ornament. The area between the rafters is decorated with painted gold stars. The east windows have marble nook shafts with stiff-leaf capitals, chamfered arches with dogtooth ornament, and a hoodmould with foliate stops.

Interior: North Chapel and Family Pew

The north chapel and former family pew to the south have double-chamfered arches springing from short wall shafts. The north chapel has a flat ceiling with moulded cross beams. A chamfered round arch between the aisle and north chapel springs from short wall shafts with stiff-leaf capitals.

Interior: Tower Link and Baptistry

Double-chamfered arches to the tower-link block spring from short wall shafts with foliate capitals. The baptistry in the link block has a wooden quadripartite rib vault springing from stone corbels in the corners. A screen to the vestry beneath the tower consists of two moulded Caernarvon arches with marble shafts and a moulded circular panel to the spandrel. Chamfered rear arches are found throughout.

Fittings

The church retains complete mid- and late 19th-century fittings. The reredos around three sides of the sanctuary consists of an arcade with marble columns, moulded trefoil arches, a hoodmould with carved stops, and a frieze above with dogtooth ornament. It features painted panels depicting the symbols of the Eucharist, the four evangelists, and the Last Supper. There are two sedilia with a piscina or aumbry to the right.

Wooden altar rails have wrought-iron supports. The choir stalls have carved heads to chamfered arm rests and frontals with blind cusped trefoil arcading. The pew in the family pew has carved poppyheads. The polygonal wooden pulpit has trefoil-arcaded sides and shafting, and there is an arcaded reader's desk. A brass eagle lectern has a wrought-iron support.

The pews have chamfered trefoiled-ogee panelled ends and moulded arm rests. Similar choir stalls are located at the west end. The organ at the west end has a Gothic case. The circular grey marble font in the baptistry has a stem formed from four red marble clustered shafts and a bowl with a carved relief of the baptism of Christ.

A six-bay trefoil-arcaded wooden screen separates the north chapel, which also contains two hatchments. The floors are laid with encaustic tiles. Stained glass is present in the east and south-west windows.

Monuments

In the north chapel is a tablet to the patron, John Arthur Lloyd (died 1864). It consists of a brass with painted inscription and a stone surround with a carved base, a shaft with moulded bases and capitals, a moulded trefoiled arch with dogtooth ornament, and a hoodmould with carved stops.

Historical Context

A drawing in the vestry of the south elevation is signed by S. Pountney Smith and dated Shrewsbury 1857. This church and the neighbouring vicarage were intended to be part of a model village alongside the Shrewsbury-Baschurch road at this point, but no more was built. Pevsner dates the tower and the north aisle to 1872.

This is a fine example of a mid-19th-century church by a good provincial architect.