Church Of St Peter

The Church of St Peter began as a nonconformist chapel, called Eldad, built in 1830. It was licensed as an Anglican church in 1848, and a small chancel was added in 1849-50 by G.E. Street. The main body of the church was substantially rebuilt between 1880 and 1882 by G. Fellowes Prynne, whose father was the vicar. In 1906, a tower was added. Severely damaged in the Blitz, the church was restored in the 1950s by F. Etchells, who lowered the walls leading to the apexes of the roofs and raised the surrounding walls to create level parapets around replacement flat roofs.

The church is constructed of Plymouth limestone, with yellow stone dressings, and has roofs concealed behind moulded parapets. The tower is capped with a steep, octagonal copper roof. The architectural style is Early and Mid-Gothic. The plan includes a nave with clearstorey, a lower chancel, north and south aisles, north and south transepts, a west tower, a southeast chapel with an apsidal east end, a northeast vestry, and a south porch.

The exterior features two-light pointed-arched windows with tracery and hoodmoulds on the north and south walls of the aisles, and three-light windows at the west end. The chancel has a large five-light window with geometric tracery. Buttressed transepts have two bays of triple lancet windows. The vestry has three-light mullioned windows. The west tower has an angle-buttressed design, a balustraded parapet, and crocketed corner pinnacles. The bell stage features a modillion cornice, a parapet cornice, three tall louvred lancet windows with turned shafts and quatrefoil aprons, four narrow slit windows within lancets with turned shafts, and a two-light traceried window above a large pointed-arched doorway with four orders of nook shafts and 20th-century doors. The gabled south porch has corner buttresses surmounted by octagonal turrets with blind lantern arcades and spires; a niche with a statue sits above a moulded pointed-arched doorway with squat nook shafts.

Inside, the columns have been replaced with steel columns encased in pre-cast concrete blocks, which support the ceiling of oak beams. There are Stations of the Cross by Charles Stapleton and stained glass by James Paterson. The Reverend George Rundle Prynne served as Vicar from 1848 until his death in 1903, and played a crucial role in the Catholic Revival within the Church of England. The rebuilding, designed by his son, G. Fellowes Prynne, was completed with the construction of the tower in 1906. The church occupies a prominent position in the city, at the center of a square designed by Foulston.