Church Of St Thomas A Becket

Church of St Thomas A Becket

This is a parish church with a chancel dating to the 14th century and the remainder built in the 15th century with some early 16th-century fittings. The structure is built in granite rubble and ashlar with a slate roof and granite, volcanic, and freestone dressings.

The church comprises a west tower, nave, chancel, a 4-bay north aisle, a south porch, and a lean-to north-east vestry.

The chancel is constructed of rubblestone with a 3-light Decorated east window. The south side features a buttress with set-offs and a chamfered rounded priest's doorway. There is a 1-light cusped 19th-century Ham Hill window to the left and a medieval Decorated volcanic 2-light window to the right, which has a 19th-century hood mould and a rectangular ashlar granite rood stair turret beside it.

The nave is built of granite ashlar. To the right of the porch is an unusually large and grand Perpendicular window with a granite frame and freestone Perpendicular tracery and mullions with capitals. To the left of the porch is a smaller 3-light Perpendicular window with granite mullions and freestone tracery.

The 4-bay north aisle is also of granite ashlar and has 3-light Perpendicular windows with granite mullions and 19th-century freestone tracery. The east window is similar in style. The 2-light square-headed west window has decayed cusped freestone heads and replaced granite mullions.

The tower is a 3-stage battlemented structure of granite ashlar, with the belfry stage built in rubblestone and featuring corner obelisks and an internal north-west stair turret. The west doorway is double-chamfered and rounded. The 3-light Decorated west window has volcanic tracery and granite mullions. The 2-light chamfered belfry openings are located on all four faces, and there is a moulded rectangular opening at the bellringers' stage on the south face.

The south porch is gabled granite ashlar with angle buttresses featuring set-offs. The outer doorway is rounded and moulded granite with 19th-century timber gates. The inner doorway is moulded and contains a 17th-century plank and coverstrip door.

The roof is notably refined Perpendicular boarded wagon construction, boarded behind the ribs to the porch. The ribs are carved with beaded ribbons and have delicately carved bosses at the intersections.

Interior

The walls are unplastered. There is a timber chancel arch at the junction between the nave and chancel roof, and a plain tower arch. The north arcade is of conventional late 15th- and early 16th-century Perpendicular granite construction.

The nave and aisle have a probably Perpendicular ceiled wagon roof with carved bosses to the nave. The chancel has a 19th-century keeled boarded wagon roof with moulded ribs.

The church contains a remarkable early 16th-century screen and other notable fittings. The 8-bay rood screen is said to have once borne a date of 1508. The rood loft and coving are missing, but the surviving portions are richly carved and coloured with unusual lively carved (rather than painted) wainscot figures. These figures are believed to be the model for the 17th-century figures on the Lustleigh screen. A granite doorframe for the rood loft stair is rebated for a door. The pulpit is formed from similar panels to the screen. The 4-bay Perpendicular traceried parclose and the rear of the rood screen have large demi-figures, probably of 17th-century date, painted on the wainscot.

The chancel contains a piscina with an ogival chamfered arch, a 19th-century timber altar rail, and an east window probably by Drake of Exeter with a memorial date of 1872.

Fragments of 15th-century stained glass remain in the south windows. A chair has been made up from pieces of medieval carving in the early 19th century.

The nave has square-headed 19th-century bench ends and a granite octagonal font front on a volcanic stem and plinth.

A 1661 Royal Arms is painted on a board above the south door. An early 18th-century wall monument to Emanuel Hall (died 1703) with an inscription recording a charity is set in a moulded frame on the south wall.

The 15th-century glass includes remains of a scheme by the Doddiscombsleigh atelier in the east window of the Lady chapel, which includes figures and armorial bearings.