Presbytery Adjoining Roman Catholic Church Of The Holy Ghost

Presbytery to Roman Catholic Church of the Holy Ghost, 1895, designed by Father (later Canon) AJC Scoles.

MATERIALS: constructed of red brick with Hamstone dressings under a red clay double-Roman tiled roof with stone-coped gable ends and brick axial and gable-end stacks.

PLAN: it is rectangular on plan with a projecting central bay.

EXTERIOR: the house which is built in the Gothic style, faces S onto Higher Kingston and has two storeys and an attic. The front elevation is of three bays with a continuous cill stringcourse. The central gabled bay breaks forwards and has a large five-light stone mullioned and transomed ground-floor window with cusped lights and hoodmould. To the first floor are two two-light Gothic windows with plate tracery and two-centred arches with hoodmoulds, and a cusped lancet in the gable above. The return walls of the central bay each has a flat-headed, transomed single window at first floor. The flanking bays are set back. The right-hand one has a pointed-arched entrance with recessed doorway with marginal lights and a flat-arched mullioned and transomed window of two lights under a continuous hoodmould to the ground floor and a matching first-floor window. The left-hand bay has a pair of French doors under a segmental head, and a two-light stone mullioned and transomed first-floor window. The rear (N) elevation is plainer and also has a central, projecting gabled bay. The windows are mostly four-pane, timber sashes, except for a dormer to the roof and a modern casement under a concrete lintel to the ground floor left.

INTERIOR: partially inspected (2015). Although relatively plain, some of the rooms have carved fireplaces, several displaying Canon Scoles’ initials and coat of arms, and stone corbels support the ceiling beams.