Fogo Parish Church

Fogo Parish Church

This T-plan galleried church was predominantly rebuilt in 1755 while incorporating earlier fabric. The building itself had been repaired and extended in 1683, when a burial aisle (now serving as vestry) was added to the east and a gabled aisle to the south, creating the T-shaped plan. A laird's loft was installed to the east at this time. Further exterior and interior repairs and alterations followed in 1817, and a western loft was added in 1854.

The church is an eight-bay galleried structure with a gabled south aisle projecting at the centre. It features exterior stairs to the outer left and right, a lower vestry adjoined to the east, and a bellcote to the west. The walls are constructed of harl pointed sandstone rubble with sandstone ashlar dressings, droved rubble quoins, raised margins, and flush cills. Openings are either round-arched or square-headed.

The south elevation, which serves as the entrance, has a projecting central aisle with a round-arched window at its centre, surrounded by a round arched surround with raised keystone. Below this is a carved figurative panel, possibly set within an infilled doorway, with a sandstone finial (possibly a sundial) surmounting the gablehead. A three-bay wing recesses to the left, featuring a boarded timber door in a gabled porch at the centre, with a gabled window breaking the eaves offset to the left above, and round-arched windows at ground level in the flanking bays. Remains of a sandstone sundial clasp the corner to the left. A ball-finalled, corniced bellcote surmounts the gablehead, with a bell in place. An exterior stair with sandstone treads and coped sandstone wall accesses a boarded timber loft door recessed to the outer left. A four-bay wing recesses to the right of centre, with a boarded timber door in a lean-to addition adjoining the central aisle and a part-obscured bull's-eye opening behind. A round-arched window appears in the subsequent bay to the right, a small square-headed window in the penultimate bay to the outer right, and an exterior stair to a boarded timber loft door in the outer right bay. A lower, single-storey vestry adjoins to the right with a pointed-arch window offset to the left of its centre.

The west elevation is a narrow single bay with a gabled projection at the centre containing a single window at upper floor (loft porch), and a coped sandstone wall enclosing a stair to the right. A stone birdcage bellcote surmounts the gablehead behind.

The north (rear) elevation comprises a four-bay nave with two single windows flanking the centre; smaller single windows appear in the bays to the outer left and right. A square-headed opening is positioned in a two-storey bay recessed to the outer right (with a store beneath an exterior stair). The single-storey vestry recessed to the outer left has a plain elevation.

The east elevation features a projecting single-storey gabled vestry with a single window at its centre and an oval-shaped opening aligned above. A taller nave is set behind with a single window centred beneath the apex and a plain sandstone finial. A small window exists in a lean-to porch recessed to the left; the projecting south aisle to the outer left has a plain elevation.

The roofs are covered in grey slate with raised stone skews and plain skewputts. Replacement rainwater goods are in place. Windows are small-pane glazing in timber sash and case and casement windows.

The interior was re-plastered and re-seated in 1817. The floor is laid in stone slabs with timber panelled dado. Walls are plain whitewashed with a coombed ceiling. Timber pews are in place, including some box pews with timber panelled doors and private communion tables. A timber panelled hexagonal pulpit is centred in the north wall, topped with an ogee-capped timber sounding board and surmounting urn-shaped finial. Columnar supports beneath laird's lofts to the east (Harcarse) and west (Charterhall) display timber pews; a painted Trotter family coat-of-arms dated 1671 adorns the west loft, and a painted Hog family coat-of-arms appears on the front of the east balcony, dated 1677. A timber-framed organ adjoins the south wall (1901). The vestry to the east, the former Harcarse burial aisle, features a pointed-arched vaulted ceiling with part whitewashed and part harl pointed rubble walls. Two separate carved stones are embedded in the north wall: the upper stone carries a carved skull and crossbones with "Momento Mori" inscribed below; the lower stone features foliate, cruciform carving.

The churchyard comprises an inner graveyard with a later outer graveyard to the south, surrounded by rubble-coped rubble walls. Various symbolic gravestones from the 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th centuries are present, including wall-mounted and table-top monuments carved with memento mori and classical detailing. An early 20th-century lych gate, serving as a World War I memorial and accessing the outer graveyard, has rubble plinths, a timber frame, a timber pedestrian gate, an engraved plaque, and a pyramidal pantiled roof.