Church Of St Patrick

Church of St Patrick, Patrick Brompton

This is a church of late 12th-century origin with significant additions and alterations dating from around 1320, the 14th century, the 19th century, and the early 20th century. The building was restored in 1864. It is constructed of sandstone with Westmorland slate roofs.

The church comprises a late 12th-century nave with 14th-century aisles, a 14th-century chancel and vestry, a 19th-century west tower and south porch, and an early 20th-century organ chamber.

The west tower is built of rusticated stone in three stages with a plinth and stepped diagonal buttresses. On the south side of the second stage is a lancet window and clock set in a gablet with crockets and finial, while the third stage contains a two-light pointed belfry opening. The west side of the tower has a matching arrangement with a first-stage window of two trefoiled lights with hoodmould featuring head stops.

The south porch is constructed of ashlar in Early-English style with a doorway and gable. The inner doorway is of 12th-century date, comprising three pointed orders decorated with roll, chevron and zigzag motifs, with water-leaf capitals to the shafts.

The south aisle is of coursed stone divided into four bays by stepped buttresses, with the porch positioned in the second bay. It contains three windows of two trefoiled lights each, a parapet with corner finials, a 19th-century lancet window with tracery at the west end, and an east window of three lights with reticulated tracery.

The nave retains its coping to the right with a gable cross.

The north aisle, also of four bays divided by stepped buttresses, contains from east to west: a window of two trefoiled lights with quatrefoil above; a two-light window with Y-tracery; a triangular window with three-circle tracery and a round-arched roll-moulded blocked doorway; and a window of two trefoiled lights with trefoil above and hoodmould. A trefoil-headed lancet appears on the west side.

The chancel is of ashlar, divided into three bays by stepped buttresses with pinnacles. Its windows are of two ogee-headed lights. The first bay contains a low ogee-headed single-light window and a priest's door with roll flanked by deep hollows on continuously-moulded arris, with hoodmould featuring head stops. To the right of this door is a blind trefoil-headed image niche. The east window of the chancel contains five lights with reticulated tracery.

The vestry has a segmental-pointed east window of three segmental-pointed cinquefoiled lights with matching transoms and hoodmould with head stops. A north vestry window of two trefoiled lights with circle above has a hoodmould with head stops. The organ chamber contains a triangular window with three quatrefoils.

Interior

The interior contains a 12th-century four-bay north arcade with shafted columns bearing water-leaf capitals and rolled pointed arches decorated with chevrons. The easternmost arch is lower and of slightly earlier date. The 14th-century south arcade comprises four bays with filleted quadrilobate columns and octagonal capitals, the arches being of two stepped chamfered orders. The easternmost arch is earlier, decorated with chevron and roll motifs.

A tall chancel arch with filleted rolls and hoodmould with head stops spans the chancel opening. Above it are three stepped lancet openings. North of the 19th-century tower arch is a chamfered doorway with an image corbel above, and steps formerly led up to the rood loft.

The north aisle contains a blocked single-light east window with trefoiled head and shouldered head with ball flowers. In the south aisle at its east end are image corbels to the left and right of the window, a trefoiled piscina with shelf above set in a gabled canopy, and a water-leaf capital that was formerly the western respond of the easternmost arch of the south arcade.

The chancel is of ashlar with scrolled string stepping up around openings and hoodmoulds featuring large head stops to the windows. The south wall contains three-seat sedilia with trefoiled canopies divided by columns below heads of a bishop and priest, with crocketed gables and finials, all set within panelled buttresses with finials. A piscina with trefoiled head sits within a hoodmould with head stops. On the east wall, on each side of the window, is a niche with nodding ogee crocketed canopy, the bases supported on a grotesque head to the left and a king to the right, with devilish head stops below the side shafts.

A tomb recess with richly moulded trefoiled pointed arch, flanked by panelled buttresses with finials, appears in the north wall. Also in the north wall are a vestry doorway with continuously hollow-moulded pointed arch and a former window of two trefoiled lights with circle above.

The chancel contains a small brass below the piscina to Thomas Lowden, d.1666, and wall monuments to Gregory Elsley, Gent, c.1716, with elaborate cartouche above a skull; Rev Heneage Elsley d.1833 with Greek inscription by Skelton of York; and Gregory Elsley Esq d.1823 by Webster of Kendal. A turned baluster altar rail is positioned in the south aisle, and 19th-century benefaction boards appear on the south wall. Fragments of medieval glass survive in the west window of the north aisle. Near the north respond of the chancel arch is part of a wheeled cross head.