Church Of St Mary The Virgin

Church of St Mary the Virgin, Higher Brixham

This is a parish church, primarily of the 15th century, refurbished by major works in the 19th and 20th centuries. The building was re-roofed by Ashworth in 1867, and underwent restoration by Tait & Harvey in 1905.

The walls are solid roughcast with details in exposed, squared and coursed red sandstone, and other details in limestone, probably from Beer. The roof is slated with 19th-century crested ridge-tiles.

The church plan comprises a nave with north and south aisles, north and south transepts, a chancel, north and south chancel chapels, a west tower, and a south porch. Stair turrets are located at the west end of each aisle.

The windows display Perpendicular tracery, nearly all restored in the 19th century, though the east window of the north aisle retains original Beer stone head-tracery. The north window of the north transept has wooden intersecting tracery. The aisles, transepts and chancel chapels are battlemented. A string course beneath the north aisle battlements carries 4 large gargoyles, one on the east possibly medieval. The north aisle has an old Beer stone doorway with a 4-centred arch and hoodmould. The west wall of the north transept (Churston family pew) has a 19th-century stone doorway with pointed arch.

The aisle stair-turrets are polygonal, apparently post-dating the tower and differing slightly from each other in design. Both have corbelled, battlemented tops and 2 weathered limestone windows each—a slit below and a quatrefoil above. Fixed to the south wall of the south transept is a stone sundial with rounded top, its face gilded with sun rays instead of hair.

The tower rises in 3 tapering stages with set-back buttresses and battlements. The south side of the west face has a series of 9 limestone slit stair windows with varying heads—square, pointed or quatrefoil-shaped. The west doorway is of medieval Beer stone, heavily moulded with a pointed arch. Above it stands a large pointed-arched window with 19th-century tracery. The second stage has a 2-light window with quatrefoil in the head (restored), and above this is a single-light opening with red sandstone jambs and cinquefoiled limestone arch, now containing a statue of the Virgin Mary. At the base of the third stage is a small old limestone window with 2 pointed-arched lights. Immediately above is a large clock face, apparently of 1740 with names of wardens W Clarke and L Edwards. At the top is a belfry opening with 4 cinquefoiled lights under a square hoodmould. The north and south faces each have a large blocked window in the lowest stage. The south face has additional second and third-stage windows matching those on the west, except with cinquefoiled arches in the upper one. The north, south and east sides each have a belfry opening like that on the west, together with a clock face added in 1931.

The south porch is single-storeyed with diagonal buttresses and battlements. Its restored pointed-arched limestone doorway has a heavily-weathered holy water stoup to its right. The interior contains stone seats and a Beer stone lierne star vault springing from corner shafts. The central boss is carved with the Virgin Mary flanked by angels. Further bosses at intersections are carved with animals or flowers. An original pointed-arched Beer stone doorway leads into the church; above it is an inserted niche containing a 20th-century statue of the Virgin Mary.

Interior

The nave and west end of the chancel are flanked by Beer stone arcades of 5 depressed arches springing from ogee-moulded pillars with attached shafts. A similar tower-arch is present. Small pointed-arched, chamfered red sandstone doorways lead to each aisle stair turret; the north one is now blocked.

Ogee-headed Beer stone piscinas in the chancel and north transept both have carved basins and stone shelves. The chancel piscina has a cusped arch carved with the arms of Bishop Courtenay of Exeter (1478-87). The north transept (later converted to the Churston family pew) has a screen of fluted wooden columns removed from a former south gallery of 1792; behind it is a low panelled, inlaid partition.

Fittings include an early 14th-century Beer stone font with an octagonal base buttressed by 3 grotesque animals, its bowl carved with trefoiled ogee crocketed arches, and a wooden Gothic font cover dated 1908. Under the tower is the original clock mechanism of 1740 (now out of use) with a maker's plate of William Stumbels, Totnes. There is also a framed embroidered altar frontel made from early 15th-century vestments.

Monuments include a stone coffin lid carved with a cross. At either side of the chancel, piercing the wall into each chancel chapel, is a late-medieval stone tomb. The north tomb has a quatrefoil-panelled base and a carved ogee canopy with traces of old paint; its inscribed top of grey stone is said to be for William Hille, vicar 1464-87. The south tomb also has a panelled front, with a panelled interior with vaulted canopy; no inscription, but in place of an effigy is an early-medieval stone coffin lid. The north chancel chapel contains 3 ornate 17th-century monuments to the Upton family of Lupton. In the south chancel chapel is a white marble monument of circa 1720 to Anne Stucley, in the form of a cartouche with a pair of skulls at the base; Cherry and Pevsner suggest Weston as the sculptor.

All windows except the north window of the north transept contain Victorian or early 20th-century stained glass.