Church of St Benedict

Church of St Benedict

A simple Gothic church of grey rubble stone with light-brown freestone dressings and a slate roof behind coped gables. The building comprises a nave, a lower chancel with north and south chapels, and a north vestry. The unusual plan forms a T-shape, with the east walls of both chapels aligned with the chancel's east wall.

The west bellcote contains a single bell within a pointed opening beneath a stepped gable. The south porch is partly open on its east side with diamond wooden mullions and has a timber-framed arched entrance with a collar beam and iron gates. Inside the porch are slate benches. A buttress marks the east end of the nave.

The nave's south side has two 3-light square-headed windows to the right of the porch and a single-light window to its left. A decorated 3-light west window has a hood mould with head stops. The north side of the nave contains a central near full-height vertical joint indicating a break in the building's construction. Here stands a 3-light square-headed window incorporating decorated tracery. A full-height vertical joint on the north side of the nave marks a distinct structural break.

The south chapel has tooled quoins and a west segmental-headed doorway in the angle with the chancel, fitted with a boarded door and strap hinges. Its south window is 3-light decorated style, and the east wall has a 3-light square-headed window with decorated tracery. The north chapel has a 3-light square-headed east window with ogee lights. The chancel features a 3-light window with reticulated tracery and hood mould with head stops. The lean-to north vestry has a reduced stone stack and a north window in a dressed surround.

Interior features are primarily contained in the chancel. The chancel possesses a late medieval boarded wagon roof with painted figures of Evangelists and saints set upon a cornice incorporating large male heads—two surviving on the south side and one on the north. A late medieval parclose screen to the south chapel comprises a reed-moulded post-and-panel dado beneath open lights with delicate tracery and a 2-tier cornice. A doorway with a gabled head and delicate tracery patterns is set back from the west end. The opening to the north chapel has a post-Reformation screen of three bays, narrower in the centre, with simple brackets supporting the chancel roof and plywood arches inserted.

The south doorway features a continuous chamfer with a late medieval ribbed door and strap hinges, strengthened on the inner side with diamond lattice braces. The chancel arch rests on foliage corbels and has a single order of chamfer. The nave is roofed with closely spaced arched braces. Both chapels have 2-bay arched-brace roofs. The interior is plastered and painted white.

The font, probably of the 13th or 14th century, has a round bowl with low-relief foliage frieze and is lead-lined. It stands on a later pedestal of four clustered shafts with a square base and plinth. The simple pews have moulded ends. The pulpit and choir stalls both have fielded panels. A 17th-century communion rail has turned balusters.

Against the east wall of the chancel are re-set grave slabs commemorating David Lloyd (died 1691) and Katherine Lloyd (died 1710). A slate tablet with pilasters in the chancel's south wall commemorates Brigadier-General F.M. Edwards (died 1929). In the north wall of the nave is a brass plaque to Thomas Ellis (died 1898) and a slate tablet to John Prichard (died 1756).

The east window depicts Christ as the Good Shepherd flanked by figures of Saints Peter and Paul, dating after 1858. One south nave window by Jones & Willis, showing the Crucifixion and Resurrection, dates to 1922.