Church Of All Saints

Church of All Saints

Anglican parish church with 12th-century origins, substantially rebuilt around 1300 and again in the 15th century, with an 18th-century west tower. The building was restored in 1881. It is constructed of rubble stone and ashlar with stone slate roofs and coped gables.

The church comprises a nave, north porch, chancel, south aisle, south porch and south-west tower. The nave is of rubble stone with a Perpendicular 3-light 4-centred west window and on the north side a plain 13th-century lancet and a deep-set 15th-century flat-headed 2-light window. The north porch has an ashlar front with front buttresses on each side, a moulded pointed entry and a reset small traceried pierced stone in the apex. The east side is pierced with two tiny cusped lancets.

The chancel is heavily restored, featuring a chamfered eaves cornice and sill course. Its north side contains a 16th or 17th-century two-light window with Tudor-arched heads and a 3-light 4-centred arched Perpendicular window. The east end has angle buttresses and a large 3-light plate-traceried window which appears entirely 19th-century with sexfoils and quatrefoils in the head. The south side has a 2-light window breaking the eaves under a coped gable, with plate tracery and quatrefoil head, apparently 19th-century but representing a restoration of an original around 1300. A low door in the angle leads to the south aisle.

The south aisle features a fine 14th-century three-light east window with ogee-traceried lights, sharp trefoil heads to the outer lights and a quatrefoil over the centre. It has diagonal angle buttresses, a moulded sill course and moulded eaves course, with drainpipes dated 1881. From the east, the south aisle has two Perpendicular 3-light 4-centred arched windows with a buttress between them; this buttress carries a scratch dial and two carved rosettes. There follows a window of around 1300 with two lights and ogee trefoil head, then the porch and a 3-light 4-centred Perpendicular window.

The large ashlar south porch, of 15th-century date, has diagonal buttresses, a moulded plinth and coved eaves. The front features a 4-centred arch and hood, with a small ogee-headed niche above and a sundial above that. There are small 2-light windows on each side. The interior has stone seats and an arch-braced rafter roof, formerly plastered. A fine inner doorway is ogee-headed with cinquefoil cusping and one order of shafts, hood-mould and head stops, probably of the 14th century. The door is of studded planks.

The ashlar west tower consists of three stages with a plinth, dripcourses, coved cornice battlements and angle pinnacles. Diagonal buttresses run to the lower stage angles, with raised angle piers above. The bell-openings are round-arched with Y-tracery and contain 2-lights; a clock sits on the east face. The south side has a similar 2-light to the second stage and a large 3-light below, positioned over a reused moulded pointed 14th-century doorway. A graffito date of 1721 appears on the buttress. The tower shows similarities to Kington St Michael tower of 1725.

Interior

The south aisle has a braced-collar-rafter roof with three cambered tie-beams with crown posts, one of which is a 19th-century copy. The east end has a cradle roof with 19th-century moulded longitudinal timbers. A round-arched 18th-century entry to the tower exists above a high 14th-century doorway. Windows have a sill-course stepped over a finely moulded segmental-pointed doorway. The 2-light window features fine shafting. At the east end, a chapel is screened by an exceptional 15th-century timber screen with traceried heads to single light divisions, a deep cove and richly carved leaf friezes. The east window is shafted with mutilated niches on each side and a squint to the left. A crocketed ogee-headed piscina with side pinnacles sits below, with a moulded arch to the north side.

The nave has a four-bay arcade with pointed 2-chamfer arches, hood-moulds and head stops. The piers are octagonal with moulded caps and bases, possibly of the 14th century. A broad 19th-century cradle roof, originally ceiled, features moulded longitudinal members. The north door has exposed a plain 12th-century round arch, later infilled for a Tudor-arched doorway. The chancel arch matches the arcade but appears to be 19th-century work.

A less elaborate timber screen of the early 15th century features a pointed cusped centre arch and two 4-light sections on each side with traceried heads. The chancel has a 19th-century cradle roof and a shafted east window with nailhead ornament, apparently 19th-century but possibly a copy. The south side retains fine paired cusped sedilia with original shafting and dog-tooth ornament to the 2-light window. Two small carved heads are reset on each side of the communion rail.

Fittings include a chancel east window of 1893 and some 15th-century fragments in one north window; another north window has poor glass of around 1885 by A. Savell. The nave contains a 19th-century pulpit, one window with glass of around 1912 by A.L. Moore & Son, one with some 15th-century fragments, and a large south side monument to Reverend Willes (died 1815) by T. King, depicting a female mourner and urn in a Gothic frame above. The south aisle has some small 15th-century glass fragments and a circular font of around 1200 with a scalloped base moulding, arcading with pellets and zig-zag top moulding.