Roman Catholic Church Of St Peter

Roman Catholic Church of St Peter

Roman Catholic church, 1860–1868, by Robert Gilbert Blount, built on the site of an earlier chapel for the parish priest, Canon Calderbank. The building is constructed in dressed stone laid in courses with ashlar details and a slate roof, designed in the Decorated Gothic Style.

The church is not conventionally orientated; the ritual east end faces north. The plan comprises a nave with aisles, a chancel with side chapels, and a tall tower with spire positioned at the south-east corner, with an entrance lobby passing through the base of the tower.

The exterior features a plinth with moulded offsets applied throughout. The five-stage tower at the west end is buttressed at the angles with offsets at each stage. A richly moulded doorway to the lobby opens on the west side of the bottom stage. The second stage displays a pair of lancet windows on both the west and north faces, each with a trefoil tracery in the head. Between the windows on both faces stands an elaborately carved corbel supporting a shaft with a foliated capital, which in the third stage forms the base of a niche with a nodding ogee-arched head beneath a crocketed gablet. A clock face occupies the fourth stage on the west side, set in a moulded stone frame. The upper stage is an open arcaded belfry with paired arched openings on each side; the moulded arches rest on circular columns with foliated capitals. Above a crowning corbel table rises a broach spire with two-light lucarnes in each cardinal face.

The nave front is gabled with a buttress set with offsets at the south-west corner. Three lancet windows with hoodmoulds are set above two canopied niches containing statues of saints, supported on corbels carved with busts of angels. Above a string course, the gable displays a large rose window with foiled geometrical tracery and a vesica light in the apex. The south aisle has a gabled end with a two-light traceried window. The chancel is topped with gablets above the clerestory windows.

The interior contains a four-bay nave arcade with clerestory windows positioned above the piers. The roof structure is timber arch-braced. A gallery at the west end is supported on a three-bay arcade with marble columns on stone bases and a parapet pierced with quatrefoils. The chancel arch is supported on short marble shafts set on carved corbels. The three-bay chancel features arcades with marble columns and boldly carved and gilded foliage capitals. A panelled timber vault spans the chancel with cross vaults extending to the three-light clerestory windows. The south chapel has a timber double-pitched panelled ceiling, whilst the north chapel has a similar segmental ceiling.

The fittings include an elaborately carved and arcaded pulpit and a richly carved and painted reredos at the east end of the chancel. The Lady Chapel and Sanctuary feature painting by Clayton and Bell, later modified by Linthont of Bruges in 1979. The stained glass is by Clayton and Bell.

The church was funded by parishioner subscriptions with a gift of £1,000 from Frances Canning. It represents a distinctive composition in the Gothic Revival style and is among the most notable of Blount's commissions, dating from the middle of his architectural career.