Church Of St James

Church of St James, Ansty

This is a church of 13th-century origin with significant later additions. The chancel dates to the 13th century, while the north arcade was built in the 14th century. The nave, aisle, tower, and a major restoration were added in 1856 by the architect George Gilbert Scott.

The chancel is constructed of coursed squared red sandstone with some ashlar patching. The nave is built of regular coursed grey sandstone, while the aisle and tower are of ashlar. The roofs are of old plain tile with pierced terracotta ridge cresting. The chancel has a 19th-century coped gable parapet with gablet kneelers and a cross finial. The nave has a moulded cornice and parapet, and a west gable parapet.

The building comprises a 2-bay chancel, 4-bay nave, north aisle, and west porch tower. Diagonal buttresses of two offsets run throughout. The chancel has a splay plinth. The 19th-century east window comprises three stepped trefoiled lancets in a chamfered arch with hood mould and foliage stops. The chamfered south doorway has a hood mould and a 19th-century plank door with decorative ironwork. Paired 19th-century trefoiled lancets open to the east, with a western lancet. The north side has a 2-light chamfered mullioned eastern window and a trefoiled western lancet.

The nave, aisle, and tower have splayed and moulded plinths. The south side of the nave has a buttress between the eastern two bays. The 2-light windows have geometrical tracery. The aisle has a north buttress. A 3-light east window has panel tracery. At the north-east corner stands an octagonal stone stack. The north side has two straight-headed windows of three trefoiled lights, with a similar 2-light west window.

The porch tower rises in two stages. The upper part of the first stage is octagonal. West diagonal buttresses rise into pedestals with seated statues. The doorway of two moulded orders has keeled nook-shafts to the outer order and double-leaf doors with decorative ironwork. The hood mould has head stops. Above stands an elaborate Decorated-style image niche with crocketed canopy and statue. The north side has a shallow stair projection, and the south side has a trefoiled lancet. An upper window of four mouchettes faces north and south. There is weathering between the stages. The second stage has elaborately moulded openings with reticulated tracery, hood moulds, and head stops to alternate sides. A moulded cornice carries gargoyles and foliage bosses. The embattled parapet is moulded with blind quatrefoils. The spire has lucarnes and a finial.

The interior is plastered. The chancel features elaborate stencil work of 1856. The south-east window has a trefoiled rere arch. The chancel and nave both have queen strut roofs with windbraces; the chancel roof includes an old moulded tie beam dated 1615. There is no chancel arch. A 3-bay north arcade of two chamfered orders has octagonal piers with moulded bases and capitals. The west doorway of three orders (the outer two segmental-pointed) has double-leaf doors. The north aisle has a queen strut roof, partly of old timbers, with simple bosses to the tie beams.

The fittings appear to date to 1856. The chancel floor is laid with encaustic tiles. An elaborate Decorated-style traceried wood chancel screen with some Gothic openwork panels above stands at the chancel entrance. There are traceried altar rails. Stalls, pews, and an octagonal pulpit feature blind tracery. An octagonal stone font has blind tracery.

A large 19th-century triptych painting above the font depicts the Baptism of Prince Peada.

The stained glass includes windows of 1851 in the east window and south-east window, 1846 in the nave north-west, 1865 in the aisle east, and other 19th and early 20th-century windows.

Wall monuments in the nave include, in the south-east, a neoclassical monument to Simon Adams, dated 1801, with a weeping woman and urn. On the south wall is a large Gothic marble monument to John Adaas, dated 1856, with an inscription recording that he was a visiting justice of the Hanwell Lunatic Asylum and "one of the first promoters of the humane system of the treatment of the insane".