Church Of St Michael And All Angels

The Church of St Michael and All Angels is an Anglican parish church built in stages between circa 1160 and 1190, with parts rebuilt in the early 14th century and 17th century. The tower was added around 1700 by James Hill of Cheltenham, and the church was restored around 1900 by Henry Prothero. It is constructed of ashlar with a stone slate roof, comprising a nave with south porch and transepts, a south chapel abutting the porch and transept, a north aisle, a tower over the crossing, and a chancel.

West End and Entrances

The 12th-century west end features a single large 15th-century raking buttress. Central 20th-century fielded-panelled doors are set within a 12th-century roll-moulded arch supported on engaged columns. Two further arches with chevron decoration on columns (two restored) sit above, with a hood featuring fleur-de-lys decoration and fine dragon head and gripping beast stops. The imposts continue as a string course on either side. Above the entrance stands a Decorated three-light west window with reticulated tracery, interrupting a further string course, with a small rectangular window in the gable and an eaves cornice with nailhead decoration. Square 12th-century stair turrets, formerly leading to a western gallery, feature chevroned arcading and pyramidal tops with finials.

South Side

At the south-west corner of the 12th-century aisle is an offset pilaster buttress, with a small round-headed window with rebated surround and small rectangular window at the west end. The battlemented parapet and gargoyle date from the 14th-century heightening, and a rectangular 19th-century two-light window appears on the return.

The projecting gabled south porch is 12th century with a 13th-century upper storey and clasping pilaster buttresses. Double 20th-century doors with fielded panels sit within a roll-moulded arch, with a further arch featuring two bands of chevron decoration running at right angles around a keeled moulding. The outer arch has triple roll moulding supported on engaged columns with eroded capitals displaying stylized foliate decoration. A sundial with metal gnomon sits above, cutting an earlier sundial. A 19th-century two-light window with engaged columns appears above, with a trefoil-headed lancet in the gable.

The Decorated south chapel has buttresses with offsets and three late Perpendicular three-light windows with casement-moulded surrounds—one with a segmental head, the others with rectangular surrounds. The battlemented parapet features three gargoyles, two now eroded. The 12th-century south transept was largely rebuilt in the 14th century but retains offset 12th-century pilaster buttresses at the south-west corner and the remains of two string courses, now interrupted by a pointed three-light 14th-century window with cusped intersecting tracery. A diagonal buttress stands at the south-east corner.

Chancel

The chancel has side and angle buttresses with offsets and three pointed two-light windows with scroll-moulded hoods featuring carved head stops including a sheep. A plank priest's door sits within a pointed arched surround decorated with ball flower and a deep ogee hood with carved head stops and ball flower decoration. The pointed 19th-century five-light east window retains its original early 14th-century surround enriched with ball flower. The chancel north wall features three 14th-century two-light pointed windows with scroll-moulded hoods with beast's head stops, and a moulded cornice with ball decoration.

North Side

The 12th-century north transept has offset pilaster buttresses at each corner and a string course halfway up the wall, now interrupted by a 14th-century pointed window with cusped intersecting tracery and a hood with carved head stops. A corbel table with varying decoration and a blocked 12th-century doorway with plain tympanum (now partly obscured by the north wall of the chancel) are visible. A rebated 19th-century round-headed window sits above the level of the string course on the same side.

The early 14th-century north aisle has side buttresses with offsets and three three-light pointed windows with cusped intersecting tracery. The battlemented parapet features a moulded string and four gargoyles, two now without heads.

Tower

The tower features two-light belfry windows with trefoil heads and stone louvres within round-headed surrounds, with clock faces on the south and west sides. The battlemented parapet has a moulded cornice with gargoyles and crocketed pyramidal pinnacles on heavy pedestals. Flat coping and cross finials top the gable ends.

Interior

The porch interior has a quadripartite stone vault with roll-moulded ribs flanked by projecting chevron. The upper chamber conceals a well-preserved section of the 12th-century corbel table. A 19th-century double fielded-panelled door sits within a fine 12th-century archway of two orders with crenellated and chevroned arches and a hood decorated with dragons with intertwined tails and beak head stops. The aisle side of the inner doorway features 12th-century facetted ball flower decoration and dragon head stops in shallow relief. A Perpendicular stone ceiling with a traceried roundel with ribs radiating from it covers the aisle above the door.

Facetted roofs, probably dating from around 1900, cover the nave, chancel, north and south aisles. A compartmented lean-to roof dated 1671, supported on reused 12th-century corbels, covers the north aisle. The floors are wood block.

The 12th-century nave arcade comprises three bays with massive circular piers featuring renewed circular scalloped capitals and 17th-century arches, inserted when every second pier of the original six-bay arcade was removed. Pointed transept and chancel arches were rebuilt in 1700. The 12th-century arches with crenellated and chevroned decoration either side of the chancel arch lead into the transepts. The south transept arch is partly blocked by an ashlar-built wall containing a pointed 19th-century door. The north transept arch is blocked with 20th-century fielded panelling and double doors; the upper part of both archways is glazed. The north transept is subdivided with plasterboard to form a vestry.

A three-bay arcade with thin octagonal piers featuring small ball flower ornament on the capitals leads to the south chapel. A Decorated tomb recess with two orders of ball flower and a trefoil-headed double piscina appears in the south wall of the chapel. The cresting of a Perpendicular altar comprising a band of quatrefoils and a brattished cornice survives at the east end of the north aisle. Two reused possibly 12th-century pieces of stone—one with an incised Anglican cross, one with bands of foliate decoration and the inscription 'ME: JESU/'—are reset in the north wall.

An altar recess appears in the east wall of the north transept, to the north of which is a spiral stone stair formerly leading to a gallery. Stone steps change to a 15th-century ladder stair with wooden block treads and panelled wooden balustrade from the opposite corner. A 14th-century cinquefoil tomb recess with triple cusps and an ogee arch with ball flower and crocketing stands in the south wall of the south transept, with a restored pillar piscina to the east of the tomb.

Furnishings and Fittings

At the west end of the nave stands a plain octagonal stone font dating from 1570 to 1580, together with some Tudor pews and an ancient log chest, beneath a fine 17th-century Jacobean musician's gallery supported on turned wooden columns matching the balustrading. The frieze features paired dragon, lunette and 'S' scroll motifs. A 17th-century pulpit has plain moulded wooden panelling. The high altar comprises a marble slab of 1794 with a triptych painted by J. Eadie Reid around 1900.

Wall Paintings

Twelfth-century foliate scrollwork painting in red appears in the splay of the window in the west wall of the south transept. The north transept east wall has the remains of a 13th-century Crucifixion painting in black and red. Traces of a 14th-century painting with part of an inscription in late black-letter include traces of a St Christopher at the west end of the painting. Paintings by Sperry dating from 1818 appear in the chamber over the south porch.

Glass

Fragments of 14th- and 15th-century glass survive in the 12th-century west window of the south aisle. The south-east window is by Powell (1911), the south-west window by Burlington and Grylls, and the central window on the south aisle by J. Eadie Reid (circa 1890).

Monuments

A recumbent knight of circa 1270 lies within a later tomb recess in the south transept. A classical marble monument to Mary Smith (died 1787) by Bryan of Gloucester with palm leaf decoration also stands in the south transept. A recumbent lady of circa 1500 lies at the east end of the chapel within the railed enclosure belonging to a richly carved and gilded alabaster monument to Richard de la Bere (died 1636) and his wife (see also The De la Bere Hotel, Southam). This monument comprises two recumbent effigies in front of two pairs of black columns between which is a segmental arch decorated with heraldic shields and garlands, with an upper display of smaller black columns featuring statuettes of Justice and Strength and heraldry.

On the chancel south wall: a Baroque stone tablet to Edmund Bedingfield (died 1695); a simple slate and stone monument; a similar but smaller monument to Catherine Norwood (died 1711); and a small pedimented slate and stone monument to Jane Reed (died 1716) with skull and hourglass at top. A 19th-century white marble monument to Mary Ramus (died 1809) by Bowd of Cheltenham also appears here. On the chancel north wall is a monument to R.L. Townsend (died 1830) with draped urn by Gardner of Cheltenham. Various relatively plain ledgers, mostly 18th century in date, are scattered throughout the church.