Church of St Ishmael

Church of St Ishmael

This is a medieval church that was restored in 19th-century Gothic style. The building has a complex plan combining a nave and chancel under a single roof, a north aisle with chapel, a south transept, and a south porch with a tower above it. The walls are built of rubble stone with freestone dressings, and the roofs are finished with concrete tiles behind coped gables.

The nave is battered at its base and has battered angle buttresses at the west end. It features a 2-light window in the west wall. In the south wall is another 2-light window positioned next to the tower, where the tower wall partially obscures the relieving arch above the window. The 2-stage tower has a saddleback roof. A pointed south doorway has double wooden gates, and above it is a slate sundial with gnomon, dated 1725 and inscribed with the initials HI and IB, recording the churchwardens. Above the doorway are tall narrow windows in the west, south and east walls of the tower. The bell stage also has similar narrow openings. In the west wall, a pointed opening with dressings suggesting it was or was intended to be a window arch was inserted into the gable in 1859.

The south transept is also slightly battered at its base and has a segmental-headed recess in its west wall. The south wall contains a 3-light window under a dripstone, to the left of which is a slate memorial tablet to Richard Bonnell (died 1776) and his family. The east wall has a projecting tall stone stack that dates from the conversion of the transept to a vestry in 1859.

The chancel has a 2-light south window and a 3-light east window. The north aisle, set slightly back, has a 2-light east window and four 2-light north windows. A blocked segmental-headed opening at the centre-right of the aisle was probably a former north doorway. The west wall has a 2-light window.

Windows throughout the church have geometric or simple Gothic tracery. The porch has a segmental tunnel vault, and its south doorway was rebuilt in 1859. This doorway is reached by steps and has a continuous chamfer with a boarded door fitted with strap hinges. To its right is a small corbelled stoup.

Interior

The nave and chancel have a pointed arched-brace roof of 4+2 bays. The 3-bay north nave arcade features plastered pointed arches. A similar but wider arch opens to the south transept, which also has a squint, and another connects the chancel to the north chapel. The north aisle and chapel have a similar arched-brace roof to the nave and chancel, while the transept has a roof of closely-spaced scissor braces. Seven-bay wooden screens with boarded dados and cusped lights separate the nave from the chancel and the aisle from the chapel. A panelled screen divides the nave from the vestry. In the chapel, the altar has been removed and 18th-century and 19th-century grave slabs have been set up around the east and north walls. The chancel features an ornate tiled reredos with a stone bench around the sanctuary walls.

The square Norman-style font has a scalloped underside, a squat round stem and square base, apparently reproducing an earlier font that once stood in the church. Plain panelled pews and pulpit date from 1860. The communion rail has cusped arches infilled with iron bars.

The most significant monument is a wall tablet in the north wall of the chancel commemorating Catherine Mansel (died 1631). It is in classical style and comprises a slate inscription panel within a freestone surround of double Ionic pilasters, an entablature, and an achievement displaying a coat of arms. In the north wall of the aisle is a monument erected around 1809 by D Mainwaring of Carmarthen, commemorating Thomas Humphries and his family. It features an alabaster panel surmounted by a partly broken urn on a lozenge-shaped slate background. Further left is a simple wooden tablet commemorating Private D Davies (died 1917).

Several windows contain stained glass. The east window depicts Christ flanked by angels, with the Mansel family monogram in the tracery lights. In the north aisle, beginning at the west end, are windows showing Christ as the Good Shepherd, by Charles Gibbs senior of London, dated after 1864, and the Good Samaritan, dated around 1869. The chapel's east window contains coloured glass with 1844 inscribed in the tracery light.