Church Of St Andrew

The Church of St Andrew is a church dating from the late 11th century, with significant additions and alterations in the 13th and 19th centuries. It was restored and enlarged in the 19th century, with work by J. Derick and others. The church is constructed of limestone rubble with ashlar dressings, and has a plain-tile roof. It comprises a two-bay nave with a north aisle, a chancel, a west tower, a south porch, and a vestry to the north of the chancel.

The chancel has a round-headed lancet to the north, pointed-trefoil lancets to the east and at the end of the south wall, and a Romanesque window at the west end of the south wall featuring exterior shafts with cushion capitals. The eastern part of the chancel may be a 13th-century extension. The south wall of the nave is partly 11th-century but contains 19th-century windows, including a two-light window with plate tracery to the east of the porch, and a trefoil-headed lancet to the west. The south doorway has an early Romanesque round arch with a plain tympanum and an old double-boarded ribbed door. The ashlar porch is dated 1652 and has a cuter doorway with an ovolo-moulded surround and a four-centre arched head with shields in the spandrels. The north vestry, dated 1893, was designed by H.W.G. Drinkwater, and the north aisle, dating from 1865, is by J. Brooks, who also rebuilt the chancel arch and the nave roof. Small lancet windows are present on the north, except for the west window, which is a 15th-century square-headed window of two traceried lights. A blocked 11th-century north doorway, similar to the south door but very narrow, is incorporated into the north wall. The two-stage tower, built around 1840 by Derick, is in a late Romanesque style and features flat buttresses, round-headed lights at the lower stage, and belfry openings of two lights under a single outer arch. The tower’s shafts to the jambs and mullions have capitals with volutes. A carved corbel-table supports a plain parapet.

Inside, there is stained glass from the mid-19th century, with the north chancel window of 1856 likely the work of Willement. A small, early 15th-century alabaster relief of the Assumption, measuring approximately 1.5 by 0.6 metres and retaining traces of paint and gilding, is set into the south wall of the chancel. Beneath the tower, which extends the nave, are several white marble ledger stones dated from 1683 to 1841, and five late 18th- and early 19th-century wall monuments of a simple Classical form; one monument to John Clarke (died 1764) and family features a broken triangular pediment and flanking fluted pilasters set against palm leaves. Another monument, dating from around 1661, is dedicated to Sir William Powell and includes a Latin inscription on a black tablet with a Baroque surround of Ionic colonettes supporting a swan-necked pediment holding armorials and flanked by small obelisks. The church is designated Grade II* primarily due to the 15th-century alabaster carving.