Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady of the Annunciation, boundary walls and railings

Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady of the Annunciation, Boundary Walls and Railings

A Roman Catholic parish church built between 1846 and 1849 to designs by Charles Hansom, originally constructed as a Dominican priory church and endowed by William Leigh. The building is accompanied by associated boundary walls and railings.

The church is constructed of local limestone with Cotswold limestone slate roofing. It is oriented northeast to southwest, though the description uses liturgical compass points. The plan comprises a nave with north and south aisles, north and south porches, a chancel with a south chapel, a crypt, and part of the east range of the former priory cloister to the north, which houses a vestry, sacristy, and meeting room.

The church is executed in Decorated Gothic style and sits on steeply sloping ground to the east, which accommodates a crypt beneath the eastern end. The south entrance is via a moulded pointed doorway with a porch arch featuring attached octagonal column shafts in the parapet gabled end and quatrefoil side openings. The buttressed aisles are lit by two-light windows with Decorated tracery, as are the smaller two-light clerestorey windows of the nave. The offset buttressed west end has a heavily moulded pointed doorway and a four-light west window with Decorated tracery. The chancel and chapel windows are each of three lights. The large five-light east window features elaborate tracery including a rose containing three spherical triangles. Part of the former priory range to the north has trefoil-headed casements with narrow trefoil lancets to the lower floor. The tower is positioned in the angle with the priory range and has clasping buttresses, an octagonal belfry with broaching to the short spire brought down below the belfry openings, resulting in spherical triangle openings to each face and trefoil-headed openings with pierced screens below those on the cardinal faces only. The striking design is emphasised by the positioning of the octagonal stair turret in the northwest corner. The small cross-gabled north porch was formerly linked with the west range of the priory buildings.

The interior has nave arcades of six bays with octagonal columns possessing moulded feet and capitals, and pointed arches. Wall shafts are positioned between these, with carved head stops and foliage capitals—each one different—supporting scissor-braced-trussed nave roof beams. The pews date from the twentieth century. At the west end of the nave is an elaborate chest tomb with the robed effigy of Francis Nicholson, Archbishop of Corfu (died 1855). A large octagonal stone pulpit with stone steps displays carved symbols of the Evangelists in painted and gilded quatrefoils matching those on the screens. The high-relief Stations of the Cross are set in panels built into the walls of the aisles and west end of the nave. Tall canopied statue niches with ornate decoration flank the east end of the nave; the north niche houses a statue of Saint Dominic and the south niche a statue of the Virgin.

The high moulded chancel arch is surmounted by a wall painting by Henry Doyle (1827–92) depicting the Last Judgement. The five-bay stone rood screen, designed by Charles Hansom, has cusped and crocketed tracery with carved angel enrichment to the string moulding and trefoil piercing above. The lower panels contain sculpted demi-angels in quatrefoils, painted and gilded, holding shields and symbols of the Passion. Above stands the rood—a large painted and gilded Crucifixion flanked by statues of the Virgin Mary and Saint John. The chancel has a six-sided painted panelled ceiling incorporating religious symbols. The floor is laid with richly coloured Minton tiles in various geometric designs; marble steps ascend towards the high altar, which remains in situ. The altar and reredos are painted and extensively gilded; the reredos features sculpted angels in crocketed niches on either side, and the altar front displays figurative scenes including the Crucifixion at the centre in quatrefoil panels matching those on the screens. Triple-arched sedilia on the south side step down towards the west. A shouldered-arched piscina sits at its east side. Nineteenth-century choir stalls have carved head ends. A pointed-arched doorway to the north, with head stops, provides access to the remaining part of the former monastic buildings, which include the sacristy and a first-floor meeting room.

In the south aisle, the west end is screened off with a low Gothic timber balustrade creating a baptistery; the stone font is octagonal with panels bearing symbols of the Evangelists similar to those on the screen, and the floor displays polychrome Minton tiles. The east end of the aisle forms the Chapel of the Forty Martyrs of Saint Sebaste, divided from the aisle by a three-bay stone screen matching that in the nave. Set under the arch between the chapel and the choir is the elaborate alabaster tomb of William Leigh (died 1873) by Richard Boulton, his effigy attended by an angel with a lion at his feet; he holds a model of the church. The north aisle features an altar at its west end against the west wall—a relatively simple stone table with stencilled decoration. Against the north wall stands the altar of the Rosary, added circa 1894, in stone with a high canopied niche at the centre of its reredos.

The original stained glass windows are by William Wailes of Newcastle. Three in the aisles are by Hardman, installed in the late 1890s. The north aisle contains a rare signed work by WG Saunders and a continental window of circa 1884. The south aisle holds a reset window of 1936 by Edward Payne (Arts and Crafts designers), brought from the former chapel at Hampton Green near Box.

The crypt is accessed from outside the church on the south side and runs beneath the east end of the nave and chancel and the remaining part of the east range of the monastic buildings. The crypt is vaulted with the ceiling carried on robust square-section stone piers with chamfers. At the east end, directly under the high altar, is a simple altar table carried on three slender piers with foliate carving to their capitals. Beneath the south aisle chapel lies the Leigh family vault, with burials in a stone matrix behind closing stones bearing carved inscriptions. The crypt extends under the stub of the monastic range, which contains vaulted storage.

The churchyard is accessed from the south through a gateway in the boundary wall. The path to the south porch is flanked by wrought iron railings of unusual design: widely spaced barley-twist uprights support a continuous top rail with scrolled ends, from which rise tapering finials with ball tops.

The boundary walls of the present churchyard are a mixture of original boundary walls and remains of monastic buildings demolished in 1970. They surround the space on two sides and are irregular in their height, layout, and construction. The original boundary walls have angled coping stones. A stretch of high retaining wall stands to the west.