Holy Trinity Parish Church

Holy Trinity Parish Church

This is a parish church of late 15th-century date, heavily damaged during the Second World War and substantially reconstructed in the 1950s. The building comprises a nave with north and south aisles, a south porch, and a chancel added around 1866 in Early English style. An inscription on the plain spandrels of the north door records that the church was destroyed by bombing during the Battle of Britain in 1940, with the chancel restored in 1952 and the church completed and consecrated by the Bishop of Chelmsford on 21 July 1956.

The tower and part of the north aisle are original, as are the roofs to the nave, aisles and porch. The former embattled parapets were capped with copper sheets around 1955. The walls are constructed of flint rubble with limestone and clunch dressings, incorporating reused material, with 20th-century dark red brick repairs. Roof coverings are lead and copper, except the chancel which has 19th-century plain tiles.

The south elevation displays a square-planned red brick tower, coursed in English bond, with a wooden belfry louvred on each side and topped with a copper-clad pyramidal roof with an ovolo finial and weather vane. The nave, aisle and south porch all have capped parapets and moulded cornices. Four large grotesque gargoyles project from the walls. The nave has three clerestory windows of two cinquefoil lights with spandrels and quatrefoils set in flat chamfered arches; similar windows flank the porch. Three aisle windows, now restored, have two cinquefoil lights with vertical tracery set in moulded four-centred arches with moulded labels. A chamfered plinth runs continuously around the porch, with two-stage buttresses with offsets. The south porch is unbuttressed with a two-centred archway restored with semi-octagonal responds, moulded caps and bases. The original south door is of 15th-century date, featuring an integral moulded rib pattern to feathered boards studded to the rear frame.

The chancel comprises two unequal bays with three cusped lancet lights with labels and head stops. A roll-moulded string runs below the cill and is continuous around two-stage buttresses and above a two-centred arched priest's doorway. The chancel has a parapet gable with cross finial.

Internally, the nave has arcades of four bays—the north arcade was rebuilt following war damage—with two-centred arches of two moulded chamfered orders with moulded labels and foliate stops to the nave. The piers have four semi-octagonal shafts each with moulded caps and bases. The tower arch is of plain painted brick, as are the interior walls. The chancel arch is of 15th-century date, two-centred with two chamfered orders, moulded label and semi-octagonal moulded bases. The east window has three lancet lights divided by marble columns with roll-moulded inner arches. A two-centred arch leads to the north vestry, now used as an organ chamber. A 19th-century reredos of coloured marble forms a blind arcade with gilded mosaic vine and cross designs in panels.

The font is 14th-century and restored, with a plain octagonal bowl and pedestal with moulded plinth. Fragments of 15th-century glass survive in the south aisle windows. The east window is by Kempe, as are the south windows of the chancel by Kempe and Tower. There is a wrought iron corona lucis and a brass lectern with twisted pedestal and three supports capped with fleur-de-lys, donated by Magdalene College Cambridge in 1909.

The north vestry contains several monuments: a white marble tablet to M.S. Horseman (died 1881), a white marble tablet to James Vaughan Esq (died 1788), a marble cartouche with floral swags, angel head at base and mask and cartouche of arms at head supported by two cherubs (inscription indistinct, 18th-century), a black marble floor slab to Sir Peter Soame (died 1798), and two black marble slabs to Anne Dame Buckworth Herne (died 1806) with details of her four children.

The tower was struck by a bomb in 1940 and collapsed onto the nave and north aisle. Drawings by William Cole from the 18th century and one dated 1939 show the former embattled parapets and tower, which apparently dated from the 15th century. The Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England made an incomplete report in 1949.