Church Of St Andrew And St Bartholomew

Church of St Andrew and St Bartholomew

A parish church of medieval origin, dating from the 12th to 16th centuries, substantially restored and extended in 1869 by T. Fulljames for Reverend Attwood. The church comprises a nave, chancel, south aisle, north transept, porch, vestry, and western tower.

The tower is constructed of thin coursed stone in its lower part and coursed squared stone in its upper section, with ashlar dressings throughout, an ashlar parapet, and an octagonal spire with roll moulding to the arrises, four lucarnes in two levels with counter-changed detailing, a stone finial, and an iron spike. The four-stage tower features a plinth and angled corner buttresses on its west face, a two-light window with 19th-century Decorated tracery and hoodmould, a lancet with ogee trefoil head above, a moulded string course, another lancet, a second moulded string, and tower windows with Perpendicular tracery in a four-centre arch, fitted with wooden louvres. The parapet is battlemented with two gargoyles rising from a string course below. The north face has a square-set buttress to the left and otherwise follows the pattern of the west face above its lowest two stages.

The nave is of squarish stone with a low plinth, though the wall has been raised in later times. A semi-circular headed doorway, now blocked, had 19th-century tracery inserted into it. The porch to the left has a plinth, angle buttresses at its corners, a moulded archway with a four-centred arch and plain spandrels, a hoodmould, a parapet gable with a cross-gablet apex, and semi-circular heads to windows in its returns.

The north transept, set on the left of the nave, has a plinth, angled buttresses, a two-light Geometric tracery window with hoodmould set in its gable, a parapet gable with cross-gablet apex, and a three-light Perpendicular tracery window reset in its left return with a flat head. The old vestry projects from this area, set back on the left with a flat roof and moulded parapet; it is lit by a two-light window with three trefoils and ballflower ornament in the parapet, and similar treatment over a doorway with shouldered arch on its left return.

The chancel is of random rubble with squared dressings and features three stepped lancets over the vestry in its wall, with another lancet to the left of the vestry. It has a parapet gable with cross-gablet apex and an iron cross. Its east end is lit by a three-light window with 19th-century Decorated tracery and hoodmould. The south aisle is of coursed squared blue lias stone with ashlar dressings.

The south side of the church comprises four two-light windows with flat heads and varied tracery. A boarded priest's door to the left of the first window has keel moulding to its surround, a stone step, and a hoodmould. Quoins for an earlier east end are visible to the left of this door. The aisle has a diagonally-set corner buttress, a parapet gable with a floriate cross on its apex at the left end, and a three-light window with 19th-century Perpendicular tracery. A boarded door with hinges matching those of the porch appears on the left return, featuring a four-centred archway, with the tower on this side having a boarded door in its second stage approached by an iron ladder.

All roofing is of stone slate, with artificial stone slate to the valleys.

Interior

The porch contains stone benches on each side and a 16th-century boarded door with original hinges. It features an angle-strut truss at each end with one pair of purlins and curved windbraces. No medieval roof structure has a ridge piece.

The nave is unplastered, revealing herringbone masonry in the north wall with a semi-circular arch to an earlier opening slightly above the north door head. A wide arch to the transept sits on corbelled columns with a hoodmould, while a plain arch leads to the chancel with a squint to the right, reopened in the late 19th century. A four-bay south arcade features octagonal pillars with plain bases and capitals, and straight-sided arches rounded at the foot. The roof is a collar rafter type with straight braces and two heavy tie beams with crown posts but no collar rafter.

The chancel is plastered and features lancets set in a 19th-century recess on the left, a wide arch to the south side, a trefoil-headed piscina, and a square aumbry. Its arch-braced collar rafter roof has moulded collar rafter and wallplates, though the braces on the south side were removed when the south aisle was built in the 15th century and the chancel widened. The south chancel aisle is unplastered and contains an ogee-headed piscina decorated with two ballflower ornaments and oak-leaf carving beneath, along with the base of stairs to the rood screen.

A wooden 15th-century rood screen, partly restored in the 19th century, is reset on the south side. It has six lights on each side of a central doorway, with brackets carrying a boarded platform above. The aisle roof is arch-braced with collar rafter type, featuring moulded collar rafter and wallplates; the area to the front of the screen is boarded with ribs.

A pulpit, reportedly containing reused carved panels dated around 1635, appears largely to be of 1894 manufacture for Reverend R. Marchant. Two medieval chests are present. An octagonal stone 19th-century font features quatrefoils on its bowl and blind panelling on its stem. The pews are of the 19th century with linenfold panelling to their ends. Royal arms of Elizabeth I in the south aisle represent a very early survival. A late 18th-century benefactions board is positioned under the tower. A brass of 1615 is located in the transept, with a Creed and Decalogue on unequal metal plates at the west end of the nave. Nine brass hanging lamps with glass globes and flues for oil, since converted to electricity, are fitted throughout. The top of the spire was rebuilt in the late 19th century. Medieval glass survives in the south chancel aisle window; the east window is by A. Gibbs, dated 1865, and the east aisle window, dated 1874, commemorates T. Fulljames.