Church Of St Michael And All Angels

Church of St Michael and All Angels

A parish church of multiple periods, predominantly 12th to 17th century, with substantial late 19th and early 20th century restoration and reconstruction. Built in roughly squared, coursed stone with ashlar dressings; the chancel stone is better squared. The building is roofed with lead flat and stone slates. The plan comprises a nave with aisles, south porch, west tower, transepts, and chancel, with an octagonal spire.

The south facade displays a three-stage tower on the left with a diagonal corner buttress. The tower carries a boarded door with semi-circular fanlight and two-piece stone lintel, with a lancet above. A string course runs below a two-light reticulated-tracery window with stone louvres and hoodmould. Further up, another string course sits below corner gargoyles and a crenellated parapet. The octagonal spire has rolls to its arrises, a lucarne with trefoil head and louvres, a leaf finial, and weathervane.

The nave frontage shows a square-set corner buttress and a three-light Perpendicular window with two tiers of small tracery in the top and a low arch. The south porch projects forward with its front wall extended each side as buttresses. A boarded door rises one stone step with an arched head; above is an ogee-headed niche containing a statue, and a two-light window above that. The right return of the porch has a two-light window matching the aisle window to its left. A string course runs to the aisle and porch, with a crenellated parapet over and crocketed corner finials. Behind the porch sits a four-light stone-mullioned dormer to the nave with semi-circular heads to its lights and a pedimented gable.

The transept projects on the right, featuring a four-light Perpendicular window with king mullion and casement moulding. It has a parapet gable with cross-gablet apex. A lancet on the right return has a parapet gable to the nave above it and a single-arched bellcote on the ridge. The chancel has a string course at windowsill level with two small lancets, corner buttresses, a parapet gable, and cross-gablet apex with cross. The east wall carries a four-light Perpendicular window behind casement moulding.

The north facade mirrors the chancel work of the south. The north transept has a two-light window with trefoil heads on the left return, and a two-light with reticulated tracery in the gable. A boarded door descends stone steps below. The transept has a parapet gable with cross-gablet apex. The north aisle displays a two-light window with hollow chamfer, semi-circular heads to its lights, sunk spandrels, and hoodmould. A four-light Perpendicular window with king mullion and hoodmould sits above. A gabled dormer with three-light casement tops the aisle; its parapet gable merges into the tower buttress. The west side of the tower mirrors the north side.

The interior contains a stone bench in the porch with two steps down to the nave. The nave is stone-paved. The north arcade has circular pillars with scalloped capitals and water-holding bases, supporting semi-circular arches. The south arcade has octagonal pillars with moulded capitals and four-centred arches, with grotesque heads over them. A western gallery with panelled front rests on four octagonal pillars; a stair with splat balusters sits in the north aisle.

The chancel screen and rood loft, dated 1923, feature two-lights on each side of the door with Perpendicular tracery, a pelican in piety, a cross, and two statues over. The nave has a collar rafter roof with straight braces, moulded cornice, and cambered tie-beams on wallposts. The north aisle has a rafter roof with dado panelling. The south aisle has moulded beams and purlins with exposed rafters.

The north transept has plastered walls and ceiling, an aumbry, and remains of medieval wall paintings. It contains two panels from a medieval chancel screen and a passage squint to the chancel. The south transept has dado panelling, a piscina, aumbry, and squint. The chancel holds a carved reredos serving as a War Memorial.

Furnishings include a 17th century panelled octagonal pulpit on a stem with sounding board, and a semi-octagonal reading desk made up of 15th century fragments. Late 19th century poppy-head pews are present throughout. An early 16th century octagonal stone font has quatrefoils on its sides and blind arcading to the stem. Two benefactions boards and various 17th and later wall monuments are displayed. Medieval glass has been reset in the east window alongside new glass of 1918 by Sir Ninian Comper.

The chancel was rebuilt in 1874, and dormers were added; the north aisle was reconstructed in 1896. The church underwent major restoration in the late 19th century by Blomfield and in the early 20th century by Comper. One wall monument, recorded by E. Harp in 1858, remains only as a moulded cap; another monument has been entirely lost.