Church of St Mary

Church of St Mary

An early Decorated church with an exterior predominantly of early 19th-century character, comprising an aisled nave and chancel built of coursed dressed stone beneath a slate roof. The chancel retains some earlier 19th-century graded slates, though most of the roof has been replaced with later slates.

The south aisle is divided into 5 main bays framed by stepped buttresses rising to broad pinnacles, with porches at the end bays and a further half bay at the east end. The late 19th-century gabled porches have parapets. The chamfered 2-centred doorways are fitted with studded doors and wood-mullioned overlights. Between the porches the south aisle contains 3 windows with Y-tracery. The parapet displays Gothic arched panels. At the east end are 2-light aisle windows with blind trefoils set in each gable, a string course at the base of the parapet, and a 3-light chancel window with Y-tracery beneath an embattled coping.

The north aisle and west front are integrated with the Town Wall, against which abuts a tower at the northwest angle of the church. The north aisle is otherwise similar to the south aisle, containing three 2-light windows. The nave features a 3-light west window with Decorated tracery (formerly the east window) positioned above a blocked arched west doorway, possibly a postern gate in the original town wall.

Interior

The nave contains 4-bay arcades on both north and south sides with square piers set diagonally and 2-centred arches with 2 orders of chamfer. The arches carry hood moulds, some retaining head stops. The nave has a plastered keeled wagon roof of flat pitch; the aisles have plainer plaster ceilings. The chancel arch displays 2 orders of chamfer matching the nave arcades, while similar arches on the north and south sides lead to chapels, with segmental arches at the ends of the aisles. The chancel has a plastered wagon roof comparable to the nave, springing from a simple cornice. A stone reredos incorporates a shelf behind the altar and features foliage cornices and round relief panels decorated with foliage and quatrefoils. The south wall contains an ogee-headed piscina. In the north wall of the north chapel is a Tudor-arched recess with a crocketed ogee hood.

The octagonal font exhibits plain 19th-century tooling. The pulpit, donated in 1911, is polygonal with open Gothic-traceried panels. The altar is of stone. Choir stalls in the south chapel have simple moulded ends with rear panels in late medieval style displaying blind arcading and vine trails to the cornice. The pews feature moulded ends. The south wall of the south aisle contains 2 memorial tablets: one commemorating the fallen of the parish, and a separate memorial to Lieutenant Morys Wynne-Jones of the Royal Engineers.

The east window, dating to circa 1910, displays figures of Saints George, Mary and Alban, with regimental badges in the tracery lights. The south aisle east window of 1910 portrays the Tree of Jesse. The northeast window, dated 1933 and made by C.E. Kempe & Co, depicts the Annunciation, Nativity and Crucifixion, with a fourth panel probably showing the death of the Virgin. The west window has a missing panel but probably represents the Adoration of the Magi.

At the west end of the north aisle is a panelled screen with a door leading to the vestry at the base of the tower. On its left side a panelled door with strap hinges opens to a mural stair ascending to the upper stage of the bell tower. At the top of the stair is a window seat, partly removed. A doorway with shouldered lintel leads into the upper chamber, which contains a chimneypiece with a tripartite lintel projecting on brackets and a raked hood. A blocked window on the southeast side has a segmental rere-arch and seat; to its right is a lintelled doorway with steps and a lintelled doorway above it. Another lintelled doorway on the left side of the southeast window opens to a former garderobe. Both the vestry and upper chamber have high joist-beam ceilings with corbelled brackets.