Church Of St James

Church of St James the Great

This is a parish church of Grade I listed significance located in Winscombe. Originally built in the 13th century, it was substantially rebuilt in the 15th century in Perpendicular style. The chancel was reconstructed in Early English style during a major restoration in 1863, with additional 20th-century restoration work undertaken subsequently.

The church is nearly complete in its Perpendicular form and comprises a west tower, nave, north and south aisles, north porch, chancel, and north and south chapels. The structure is built of coursed ashlar with some rubble (mainly visible in the south aisle and chancel), with freestone dressings and leaded roofs throughout.

The four-stage west tower features set-back buttresses connected diagonally and a full-height half-hexagon stair turret. The first stage contains a heavily moulded pointed west door with a string course and restored west window. The second stage has part-closed two-light windows on moulded cills with lozenge stops. To the west, one light features carved lily and vase carved as crocketed niches (now empty), a residual Annunciation. To the east, one niche contains a statue of St James. The third stage displays two-light blank windows, with buttresses becoming diagonal and more slender, culminating in crocketed corner pinnacles. At the fourth stage, three two-light windows per side are divided by plain shafts rising to subsidiary pinnacles, with the outer lights remaining blank and the centred pair louvred. A quatrefoil pierced parapet crowns the tower. The stair turret rises higher, capped and crocketed at the north-east corner.

The two-storey north porch features a three-light cusped window beneath a dripmould, with a spiral stair in an eastern polygonal turret leading to the first floor (timbers were being replaced in 1983). The north aisle and chapel have a pierced parapet with quatrefoils in lozenges, which rises at each end to accommodate the pitched roof. The south aisle and chapel feature a parapet pierced by trefoils in triangles. A rood stair occupies a polygonal turret with a panelled and crocketed pyramidal cap. The chancel is plain with a three-light lancet window.

Interior: The nave is arcaded over five bays with quatrefoil shafts featuring hollow waves and plain circular capitals, except for stiff-leaf capitals at the north of the chancel arch and south of the north chapel arch. A lierne vault spans the tower. The nave retains a Victorian timber roof with mock hammerbeams and pairs of angels. The chapels and north aisle have original panelled timber roofs, while the south aisle retains angel corbels. The chancel is plain and dates from 1863.

The stained glass is significant. The east window of the north chapel contains a good 15th-century crucifixion group (restored in 1850). Similar glass in the chapel's north window includes made-up figures, as does a contemporary group in the easternmost window of the south aisle. The chancel north window was given by Peter Carslegh and dates to the early 16th century with Renaissance detail, putti, and fleur-de-lys, featuring three representations of St Peter. The south window contains 19th-century pictorial glass. The chancel east lancets contain glass of pre-Raphaelite appearance by W G Saunders, dated 1863.

Fittings include good straight benches with traceried ends and a 13th-century font of heavy circular plinth and capital form in the south aisle. A grand Victorian two-tier brass chandelier hangs in the nave.

Monuments include a plain tablet to M Taylor (1701) on the chancel south wall; two tablets with weeping women on darker grounds (1791 and 1823) in the south aisle; and eight tablets in the tower dating to the late 18th and 19th centuries, featuring draped urns on darker grounds, several commemorating the Knollis family.