Church Of Holy Trinity

FONTHILL GIFFORD FONTHILL GIFFORD VILLAGE ST 93 SW (west side)

1/100 Church of Holy Trinity

GV II*

Anglican parish church. 1866, by T.H. Wyatt for Marquess of Westminster. Limestone ashlar, tiled roof with fishscale bands and ceramic cresting. Plan; nave, north and south chapels, chancel with south east tower and north vestry. Early C13 style. Pointed south doorway to nave has gabled hood on marble shafts with foliated capitals, 2-light plate tracery window to right. South chapel has lancet to west side, two lancets and multifoil with nailhead-decorated surround over. Three-stage tower to right has fine south doorway in pointed archway with enriched nailhead ornament and crocketed aedicule on pink marble shafts, tower has angle buttresses, string courses, pair of lancets to second stage, bellstage has large 2-light plate tracery window with attached shafts and louvres to all sides, Lombardic frieze to eaves of octagonal spire with corner pinnacles and gableted shuttered windows, cylindrical stair turret to east side with conical roof. Apsed chancel has four buttresses carried up to pinnacles between five cusped lancets with hoodmoulds, corbelled eaves. Vestry on north side has pitched roof, 2-light window and shouldered doorway, ashlar stack with offsets. North chapel has two lancets and multifoil over with detail as south chapel. North side of nave has two 2-light plate tracery windows. West end has angle buttresses, two lancets with central buttress and large roll-moulded circular window with quatrefoils over. Interior: Nave has 6-bay roof with arch-braced collars on foliated corbels. North and south chapels have 2-bay arcades with pointed arches on pink marble pier and responds with leaf capitals, scissor-rafter roofs, pointed doorway with attached shafts to vestry from north chapel. Pointed chancel arch with attached marble shafts with foliated capitals and foliage carving to arch, chancel has fine quadripartite rib-vaulted roof of 3 bays with apsidal east end, polychrome tiled floor, possibly by Minton, east windows all with attached shafts to hoodmoulds and stained glass in memory of William Radcliffe died 1885. Wrought-iron and wooden communion rail, original pews and choir stalls and oil lamps on nave walls. Stone and marble font on five short columns in south chapel. Pink and grey marble pulpit has relief-carved heads of the four Apostles. Stone plaque on vestry wall has inscription; 18 MAY 1748 / WILL. BECKFORD / ESQR. FOUNDER, recording the building of a C18 church on this site by Alderman William Beckford, demolished 1860s. Fine folage carving by a Mr. Sansom. One of the best examples of Victorian estate churches in Wiltshire. (N. Pevsner, The Buildings of England, Wiltshire, 1975; The Builder, 23rd June 1866)

Listing NGR: ST9297131248