Church Of St Ann

Church of St Ann

An Anglican parish church located on Radipole Lane in Weymouth. The building comprises a 13th-century nave and chancel, with 14th-century north and south chapels. The west front was rebuilt in the 16th century, the porch and south chapel were rebuilt in the 18th century, and the church underwent 19th-century restoration with a 20th-century vestry added. The structure is built in Portland stone ashlar and rubble with slate roofs.

The plan consists of the original two-cell building of nave and chancel, extended by transept-like chapels on each side, with a south porch and north vestry.

The west front features diagonal stepped buttresses and a coped gable, supporting a notable two-stage square bell-turret with one-over-two vertical openings topped with five-cusped heads. The turret roof is a low lead-covered pyramid, with four gargoyles. A large stepped external buttress at the centre of the front sustains the turret.

The south front of the nave contains a 14th-century two-light window left of the porch and a small two-light 16th-century window with plain pointed lights to the right. The deep square porch has a chamfered stone eaves course and coped gable over a small tablet inscribed "WMCW 1733", below which sits a large plain war memorial slab. A round-arched chamfered opening contains a pair of 19th-century doors with chamfered framing and decorative cast-iron grilles. The south chapel displays a coped gable above a flush tablet inscribed "WM EM Churchwardens 1735" (the date of its restoration), with a three-light uncusped window featuring a plain label below.

The chancel has a small cusped ogee-headed light, a plain glazed opening (former doorway) with bold ogee lintel, and a two-light with quatrefoil. The east end features a two-light Perpendicular window in a flush surround with label to square stops and casement plus cavetto moulds. The north side of the chancel contains a two-light uncusped window with trefoil head and a small cusped ogee-headed light, blocked below.

The north chapel's east side displays a three-light 14th-century window without label, and a three-light 14th-century with label in the south wall. High churchyard levels here have prompted a drainage channel, revealing the plinth. The north side of the nave features a lofty 16th-century two-light to four-centred heads and a small lancet.

Internally, the nave spans five bays with tie-beam trusses with king posts and queen struts, largely late medieval work with chamfered members. The walls are painted on a carpeted floor. The priest's door leading to the vestry is not directly opposite the main entry, with a recessed opening to a flat lintel to its right. A deep west gallery with panelled front sits on a moulded beam with brackets. At the west end is a pointed recess, formerly the west window, with exposed rubble fill. The chapels are entered through pointed arches with plain chamfers; the north chapel has a painted barrel roof and the south has a seven-sided barrel vault, both on tiled floors. Each chapel contains a cusped piscina. The chancel arch is double-chamfered with arch-braced rafter roof.

Fittings include painted pews with floral panels, a carved oak pulpit of 1902 in memory of Richard E E---sward, and a matching reading desk. The east window is a memorial to Captain Prowse from 1885, above a late 19th-century stone reredos. The polished oak communion rail incorporates 17 turned balusters from the 16th century, formerly from a staircase at No. 4 North Quay. The 13th-century font bowl, originally square but cut to a rounded front, stands on a central shaft and four slender columns with a 1978 cover opposite the porch. Above the chancel arch are the Royal Arms of William IV. Monuments include a fine Baroque cartouche to Humphrey Hardy (died 1725) and a rectangular marble tablet with Saint George and Dragon in Art Nouveau style, to Charleton W Gordon-Steward, Major in the 5th Fusiliers, killed in action in April 1917. Above the font is a painted ceiling panel depicting Saint John the Baptist.

The Church of St Ann, now in a peripheral position in Weymouth, was the mother church for the area until replaced by St Mary, St Mary Street, in 1605. It stands immediately west of the Manor House and opposite the village school.