Church Heritage Record 620628

West tower of three stages, wide nave with south porch and no aisles (although it evidently embraces the width of the original nave and a later south aisle) ; chancel with south vestry.

The church is mentioned in Domesday Book, and later became collegiate with four priests under Haughmond Abbey (to which it was given in 1155 by William FitzAlan). The great antiquity of the church is also shown in its fabric. Many Roman stones are re-used, but the earliest ecclesiastical remains consist of Saxon masonry in the north wall. In the late twelfth century a new chancel was built, wider than the old nave, and several windows survive from this period. The masonry of the lower stage of the tower is also Norman, although its upper parts are now Perpendicular, probably post dating the Dissolution of the Monasteries since stonework from Haughmond was used in its construction. The nave has both Early English lancets and Decorated lights in the north wall and a south arcade has been removed at some time, probably in c.1763 when the south side of the church was rebuilt (a brief for £1254.19.10 having been issued in April 1759). The church was restored in 1887, and the south door re-opened and the south porch built in 1890 at the expense of the Duke of Cleveland, the patron of the living.

The building history of Wroxeter church is extremely complicated and D.H.S. Cranage found in its fabric evidence of each of the eight periods, from Saxon to "Modern", into which he divided the progress of English ecclesiastical architecture. In outline, it seems that there was originally a Saxon church on the site to which a large, well-proportioned chancel was added in the late Norman period (c. 1190) which displays features of the Transitional Style which led to Early English and a tower was built. In the next century the nave was extended westward by one bay (evidence. of the Early English style is at the west end of the north wall ) to reach the tower and at some stage a south aisle was added. During the Decorated and Perpendicular periods various new windows were inserted to provide more adequate light for the interior and at the very end of the latter period the tower was rebuilt, using many stones, both ashlar and carved, from Haughmond Abbey, following the Dissolution of the Monasteries. In c.1763 the southern part of the nave was rebuilt, and the south arcade was removed, the whole area of the nave and aisle being roofed under one span, and about this time also the classical vestry was added on the south side of the chancel. Finally, in 1890 the south porch was added.

The great west tower is square on plan with diagonal buttresses at the angles and a boldly moulded plinth. That at the north-east becomes two set at right-angles near the eaves of the nave roof, set on a stone projection possibly dating from 1763. The three stages are divided externally by moulded stringcourses and at the north-east corner the spiral staircase is housed within a semi-octagonal projection which terminates above the parapet in a stone octagonal cap (probably renewed in the 1887 restoration). There are various carved stones inserted in the walls, which are reputed to have come from Haughmond Abbey, and these add considerably to the interest and the picturesque appearanceof the tower.

The lowest stage is lit by a large three-light Perpendicular window with cinquefoil-headed main lights and panel tracery above, and this is set within a Decorated moulded recess outlined by a later moulded hood which returns at the ends. A doorway was opened under the window in 1858 and blocked in 1890. The north and south walls here are blind. In the middle stage there is no opening in the west face except a small aperture through which the clock mechanism passes to a circular clock face painted with Roman numerals set just above the stringcourse. The latter is composed of various lengths of moulding intercepted by square fleurons with, at irregular intervals, parts of three carved bosses and capitals placed with a rough idea of symmetry. Three courses higher in the wall to the left of the clock face are the heads of three blind arches with cusps and recessed spandrels which seem to have come from blind arcading, and to the right of the clock face is a row of five small blind arches of half the size but similar form. In the south wall is set the head of a niche below a small rectangular opening and in the centre of the north wall is a square opening with a quatrefoil set within a deep recess round which a stringcourse turns to form a hood. On each side of this are set further carved stones which were probably bosses.

The uppermost stage, which houses six bells, has paired openings in each face of late Perpendicular form evidently much renewed in 1887 or later. The band of recessed quatrefoil ornament is more likely to have been carved in situ rather than to a transferal from Haughmond in view of its comparative crudeness and uniformity. There are however, in the south side at least, some stones evidently reset from elsewhere. In the west front are reset two small statues, much too high to discern without fieldglasses. Each is set within an ogee-headed niche, that on the left more elaborate than that on the south. In the south wall there is another single figure with a crozier in a niche and in the north wall a figure of St. Peter and a panel carved with several figures. The parapet is embattled and appears to have been entirely renewed in 1887; there are prominent stone spouts with carved heads at the angles and the pyramidal tiled roof is capped with a pretty weathercock on an iron support.

On plan the body of the church is unusual, being abnormally long and narrow in both nave and chancel. The earliest surviving masonry, as has already been stated, is to be found in the north wall of the nave where there are several courses of Saxon work built of roughly squared stones of considerable size. There is one blocked window opening but since this is rectangular it is probably of a very much later date. Otherwise there is a window of three lancet lights near the junction with the chancel and further west a large three-light window similar to that in the ground stage of the tower. At the wall head is a projecting strip of masonry of Saxon character. Further west again is the thirteenth-century extension to the nave which joins it to the tower; this is separated from the Saxon work by a straight joint running the whole height of the wall and is pierced by a pair of lancets inserted since 1812. The line of the old ridge of the nave roof can be seen against the east face of the tower, indicating by its slightly lower height but sharper pitch that the south aisle was originally under its own roof.

The south wall of the nave was much rebuilt in c.1763, but evidently considerable quantities of the old materials were re-used (as might be expected in a relatively cheap restoration) and some stones are carved with mass-dials. The outlines of the Georgian windows can still be seen in the stonework, and further evidence of the building history appears on the west wall of the aisle where there is a thick, rather clumsily built buttress against the tower and then, above some slate weathering, a triangular brick wall to bring the aisle up to the height of the present wide roof which embraces it with the nave. The east nave gable is also of brick.

The chancel has been less drastically altered than the nave and still retains its Transitional proportions. In its original form it appears to have had three round-headed windows of good size in each side wall and a pair in the east wall of greater size with a smaller light above. At present the eastern and the centre windows remain in the north wall and the western and centre light remain in the south wall, although now obscured by the later vestry. In the east wall the original lights have been replaced by a late Perpendicular window of five lights with a transom and five smaller lights above. It is quite possible that this in its present form is in fact of c.1850, the date of the glass with which it is filled. On each side of it may be seen half the outlines of the original Norman windows, now blocked. Its further misfortune is that it cuts into the semi-hexagonal stringcourse which formed a sill for the original windows and which returns along the north and south walls, binding the Norman parts of the church together. The north wall also has a battered plinth. The western window on the north side has been replaced by three equal lancets with chamfered reveals and the chancel is a little wider than the nave. On the south side a later vestry has been built which covers about half the south wall of the chancel but leaves exposed most of the arch of the Norman south doorway which has been blocked for a considerable length of time, possibly as early as 1570 when the monument against it inside the church was erected. It has a double row of zig- zag round the arch meeting at a bowtell moulding (i.e. partly Norman and partly Early English in form) and the visible capital of the eastern shaft similarly has Norman square abacus but rudimentary leaves which show the beginnings of stiff-leaf carving. The other capital and part of the arch are hidden by the vestry wall. The eastern Norman window of the south wall was replaced by a two-light Decorated window with a pointed quatrefoil in the head, now all blocked by a monument.

The vestry, though a minor part of the church, is in itself of some interest as the only recognisable Georgian work to survive externally at Wroxeter. It is a simple rectangle, rather narrow, with a symmetrically designed south wall having a doorway in the centre which shares the form of the windows put in the south nave wall in 1763 and since obliterated- that is, a plain raised course of stonework framing the arch with plainblocks as imposts and keystone. On each side are single square windows without surrounds but again with a simple block projecting a little from the wall surface as keystone. Beyond the west window, the wall bonds with the wall of the nave suggesting that the vestry belongs to the 1763 rebuilding, but above that is a straight joint which further suggests that the vestry originally was quite low with a lean-to roof against the chancel; from the appearance of the stonework the raising of its roof must have happened quite soon after its erection.

Since only the porch and the tower appear to have been rebuilt or restored in the 1887 restoration, the interior of the church still derives much of its character from the Georgian rebuilding of 1763 which threw the original south aisle into the nave, removing all trace of the south arcade and covering the whole are with a flat plaster ceiling with coving along the side walls and a cut-out section to take the uppermost point of the chancel arch.

The walls of the nave are plastered, and the chronological puzzles posed by the exterior thus do not much exercise the mind inside the church. The only features worth special mention are the tower arch and chancel arch. Both are Transitional in character, setting out the dimensions of the church as it was after the chancel had been erected. The tower arch has a roll and very broad fillets eastwards, the outer fillet being rounded off to fit the west wall of the nave. The middle order is a semi-octagon and the inner order has a bold roll, not of the same curvature as the middle one. The whole thing is a conflation, as may also be seen in the capitals. These display a mixture of coarse late Perpendicular moulding and refined Norman Transitional details such as shell-like foliage and grapes. The bases are more or less Transitional in character. The responds are polygonal.

The chancel arch is a much finer piece, and shows both Norman and Early English features blended in a way typical of the Transitional style. To begin with, it is pointed (its four-centred present shape is surely the result of settlement, not intent) and has good mouldings with two pointed bowtells each side and other plainer mouldings. The abaci are square at the sides and semi-octagonal for the inner order. They stand above capitals carved with excellent stiff leaf foliage, some of which is nineteenth-century but well finished. The middle section on the south side is old, with some good stiff leaf and a carved head. More on the north side is old, with some simple leaves ending in small Norman volutes and others being more like scallops ending in shell-like leaves. The bases are square cut with chamfered corners, and mouldings round the feet of the shafts. On the south side is built in a stone of pre-Conquest character depicting what appear to be birds pecking at large worms. The nave is floored with a mixture of stone flags, bricks and ledger slabs.

The width of the chancel arch is of great benefit to the church, allowing a clear view from almost all the nave into the chancel in spite of the great length of both parts of the building. It also allows some of the light from the nave to reach the chancel which otherwise, with its relatively small north windows, obscured south windows and east window filled with dark stained glass, would be rather dark. It is, however, the richest part of the building both architecturally and in its contents. In architecture there is little to add to what has gone before save to emphasise inside as well as outside the excellent proportions, made perhaps even more marked by the two high steps which raise the chancel well above the level of the nave. The windows are set within plain reveals. On the north side are two original Norman lights and the three lancets of later date towards the west end, which on the south two of the Norman lights remain, opening now only in the vestry. A stringcourse runs round much of the wall and on the south are two doorways; one, that blocked probably c.1570, is now partly obscured by a monument but shows a hoodmould (partly renewed) with enriched dog-tooth ornament, and the other is probably of Georgian date, with a plain round head, and leads into the vestry. There is also an arch in the west wall of the vestry communicating with the southern part of the nave, also of rounded form and probably of the same date.

In the east and north walls are rectangular aumbries with rebates for doors and a shelf, and near that in the north wall is a delicate trefoiled arch with a row of ball-flowers along its outer moulding, now partly obscured by a later tomb. This is probably, from its position, an Easter sepulchre, and there are remiins of painting within it which were seen, on their discovery in c.1865 to represent The Resurrection; they are now unrecognisable. The chancel was re-roofed in the sixteenth-century with a good late Perpendicular roof with collars and four slightly cambered tie-beams.