Church Of St Michael And All Angels

Church of St Michael and All Angels

This church comprises a 16th-century tower with earlier fabric almost entirely rebuilt during alterations in 1853, 1857, 1867 and 1895. The building is constructed in brick, flint rubble and knapped flint with ashlar dressings and a plain tile roof. It consists of a western tower, nave, chancel, south-eastern vestry and south-western chapel.

The western tower features diagonal buttresses on its west face which die back into the angles via three offsets. A slightly projecting plinth runs around the base with an offset of moulded brick. The west face contains a two-light 19th-century Perpendicular window at its centre with cinquefoil heads to the lights. A string course separates the ground and first floor stages. The first floor has a lancet opening with chamfered ashlar surround. The belfry contains a two-light louvred opening with Y-tracery of brick. A brick band runs below the battlemented parapet, which has ashlar coping. The south face has a projecting buttress at its right side, partially embedded in the western nave wall. The lower body is blank, but the belfry opening matches that on the western front. The north face is similar, though its belfry opening is partially blocked with a smaller 19th-century opening with ashlar surround, which has two cinquefoil-headed lights and quatrefoils to the apex. The east face abuts the nave to its lower body and has a similar belfry opening to those on the other fronts.

The nave and chancel are undifferentiated externally. The north face has walling almost entirely rebuilt in the 19th century. At the far right is a single Perpendicular light with quatrefoil head. To its left is a reset Decorated doorway with a wave-moulded and chamfered ashlar surround and hood mould. Further left is a Y-tracery window, perhaps mirroring an earlier window form. A buttress to the left dies back into the wall by two offsets. To its left again is a two-light Decorated window of curvilinear form with ogee heads to cusped lights and a quatrefoil to the apex. A dentilled band of three bricks depth runs along the top of the wall.

The eastern face has diagonal buttresses at left and right, dying back to the corners by two offsets. A stone band runs at the level of the lower buttress offset across the wall, raised at the centre to form the sill to a window of three Perpendicular lights of 19th-century date, perhaps following an earlier model, with plate tracery to the apex.

The south face features a projecting gabled vestry at the right with diagonal buttresses and a priest's door at its centre. Above this is a rose window to the gable, with ashlar coping and a central chimney-stack. To the left is a three-light Perpendicular 19th-century window with ogee heads and mouchettes above. Further left is the projecting gabled chapel with knapped flint walling and diagonal buttresses. This has a doorway at the right with ashlar surround and a three-light window with reticulated tracery at the centre.

Interior

The wagon roof has chamfered ribs, with the chancel roof having square floral bosses at the intersections. A single tie beam divides the nave and chancel, with ovolo-moulds to the lower corners and brattishing to the top. This supports a 19th-century crown post with moulded base and capital from which spring arched braces to the ceiling ribs. 19th-century arched braces support the tie beam and terminate in angel bosses holding shields.

The chapel contains three 19th-century Gothic monuments to the Fitzgerald family, featuring white marble tablets with ashlar surrounds. One records the "restoration and enlargement of the church in 1857 in memory of Mary Frances Fitzgerald". Beneath the tower is a Tournai font of circa 1150 with a square base decorated with waterleaf mouldings at the upper corners. A stout circular central shaft has a cushion capital and base. The square bowl above has roughly finished sides with ornament that has been hacked off, and a circular basin.