Inveresk Parish Church And Graveyard, Musselburgh

Inveresk Parish Church and Graveyard, Musselburgh

This rectangular-plan classical Georgian church was designed by Robert Nisbet and built between 1803 and 1805. William Sibbald added the steeple in 1805, and J MacIntyre Henry undertook substantial additions and interior reconstruction in 1893.

The church is constructed of squared and coursed grey stone with ashlar dressings, featuring base and band courses, banded quoins, and a moulded cornice. The steeple is distinguished by banded droving, whilst the 1893 additions employ yellow sandstone coursed rubble with ashlar detailing. Segmentally arched windows punctuate the body of the church.

The steeple projects from the centre of the south elevation and was designed by William Sibbald. At ground level, it contains a vestry and upper vestry set within a pilastered temple front. Above this rise four set-off stages terminating in a stone spire with three tiers of lucarnes. A round-arched doorway with decorative fanlight provides access, with a round-arched window on the west return flanked by classical wall monuments in tripartite form. Further round-arched windows sit in recessed panels above and on the east and west elevations. An oval panel in the tympanum is inscribed "AD 1805". A dentil cornice crowns the semi-circular windows at the second stage, each with three lights, the outer lights blocked. The third stage features raised, pedimented panels bearing an octagonal fourth stage; keystoned blinded round-arched windows to all four sides are flanked by pilasters beneath a triglyphed and metoped frieze and cornice. The octagonal fifth stage displays detached Ionic columns bearing a cornice, with blinded round-arched openings to each face. A cockerel weathervane crowns the spire.

The south elevation presents five bays with the steeple at centre. Tall round-arched windows with loop tracery rise to the second stage on either side of the steeple, flanked by outer bays containing windows at each stage, those on the third stage being smaller and set in clerestory form.

The north elevation, the original entrance elevation, comprises three bays. A Tuscan-columned doorpiece marks the centre, though the doorway was blocked as a window in 1893. Windows to each stage occupy each bay above and on either side.

The west elevation has three bays with a corniced stairblock projecting at centre and rising full height, with a blocking course, ashlar staging at ground level, and rounded angles. Gibbsian doorways flank the north and south returns, whilst paired round-arched windows with Gibbsian surrounds at the second stage are pilaster-flanked. Single windows to each floor occupy the flanking bays, positioned against re-entrant angles.

The east elevation comprises three bays with a corniced rectangular projection at centre, featuring a blocking course and housing the organ. A blinded window occupies the ground stage. Simply corniced doorways flank both sides against re-entrant angles, with tall windows rising from the second to third stage above.

The windows are multi-pane sash and case with timber glazing bars and leaded glazing patterns to each pane. The roof is pitched with grey slates and lead flashings.

A Burgerhuys bell dated 1624 hangs within the steeple. Two wall-mounted sundials flank the vestry entrance; that on the left was created by Archibald Handyside in 1785 and was brought from the earlier church on this site.

The interior was reconstructed by J MacIntyre Henry in 1892 and restored in 1988. It is galleried with three aisles. A panelled gallery on fluted Ionic cast-iron columns extends along the north, south, and west elevations, with a Fishermen's Loft above to the west. An Adamesque plaster ceiling crowns the space.

The Communion Table, positioned at the east during the 1893 reconstruction, incorporates an early 18th-century communion rail from a church in Antwerp, adapted by William Adams of Edinburgh and ornately carved. The pulpit, which replaced an earlier pulpit formerly sited at the centre of the south wall, is a classical oak design with staircase by Taylor and Son of Edinburgh. The organ case is also by Taylor and Son, with the organ itself supplied by Lewis and Company of Brixton in 1897. A brass eagle lectern stands within the church, alongside an octagonal stone font and two classical oak secondary lecterns. Bench ends feature segmental pediments.

Double interwoven stone scale and splatt staircases with wrought-iron balustrades occupy the west stairblock. A winding timber stair ascends to the steeple vestries. A gravestone, probably 18th century, is embedded in the wall of the stairblock.

Coloured glass features in the majority of windows. Stained glass windows include one to the right of the Communion Table depicting St Michael, created by Douglas Strachan in 1923. Two windows on the south wall were made by Ballantine of Edinburgh; the western window commemorates David Macbeth Moir. A small window in the west vestibule is by Margaret Chilton.

The graveyard occupies the site of a Roman fort. It is enclosed by rubble walls with semi-circular and ashlar coping, with a later western section. Oliver's Mound within the graveyard marks Cromwell's use of the former church as a cavalry station. Wrought- and cast-iron railings divide paths from the graveyard proper, set on ashlar-coped rubble bases, with wrought-iron gates providing access. A pair of square ashlar gatepiers flanks the southern entrance by Inveresk Village Road, corniced and capped.

The graveyard contains a large number of fine wall monuments, predominantly 19th century in date. Several earlier gravestones display decorative classical forms with memento mori imagery and inscriptions. Eighteenth-century table slab gravestones are also present. A rectangular burial enclosure in ashlar dates to the 19th century.