Church Heritage Record 623069

Nave of three and a half bays with galleries on three sides; north and south aisles, small appendages at the west end and elsewhere housing staircases; several small porches; broad transepts, tower and spire outside north aisle; short chancel with later additions, cross-gabled like transepts, to north and south, the latter being a vestry with organ chamber above. The War Memorial Chapel stends to the north or the northern projection and abuts the east wall of the tower.

The church was designed by Thomas Cundy the younger (1790-1867) and was built in 1844-46; the Earl Grosvenor laid the foundation stone on 20 May in the former year, and his father The Marquis of Westminster had given the site and a contribution of £5,000 towards the estimated cost of £8,900. The church was consecrated on 2 April 1846. The church was enlarged by the addition of transeptal spaces north and south of the chancel in 1874, and other improvements were effected. In 1920-21 a War Memorial Chapel was added on the north side from designs by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott (1880-1960), the architect of Liverpool Cathedral.

The style of the church was Cundy's usual florid late Decorated, with flowing tracery in the broad windows and a plethora of rather aimless gables (about fifteen in all) intended, no doubt, to appear picturesque. It is difficult to imagine the original texture of the walls, when the Kentish ragstone was new, since it is now so decayed and blackened. Towards the square, the church presents a broad front consisting of the gable of the chancel in the middle flanked to north and south by two-bay transepts (added in 1874) with three-light windows in each bay and gablets above each window. These transepts of course also have gables to north and south, paralell with the gables of the original transepts which they abut. The chancel now projects only a few inches beyond the later transepts. Since there are rooms below the galleries in these later transepts, those are lit by triplets of windows below the larger windows. To the north there is a awkward gap betwen the body of the church and the Memorial Chapel added in 1921, and the lower part of this is filled by a later kitchen.

The south side of the church has the two big transept gables near the east end, both with four-light windows and with porches below, and the junction of the transepts is covered by a turret housing a staircase to the gallery. There are angle buttresses at all the principal corners of the building. Moving westwards again, the nave wall is seen, with two bays each having a tall three-light window uninterrupted by the gallery within. There is also a window high in the west gable, and below it a two storeyed porch housing another staircase is set under a cross-gable. In the south wall of this there is a doorway with a two-light window above. The north wall of the nave is similar but without a porch at the west end. The big west gable of the nave is pierced by a large seven-light window with complicated flowing tracery.

This leaves only the steeple and Memorial Chapel to be described. Both lie on the north side of the church, and the tower is placed at roughly the midpoint. Early descriptions of it refer scathingly to its open arch in the west face of the ground stage, which still survives, and seems to have been intended as the main entrance to the church. This is the lowest of three stages. The middle stage is very lofty, and in the north wall a tall window of two lights has blind panels below a transom. There is a tiny lancet in the west wall, and above this is a square clockface set lozenge-wise. Finally, the bell-chamber has two-light openings with ogee heads and a painted quatrefoil above, a typical Cundy motif. There are paired angle buttresses at each corner of the tower, rising to the parapet which originally had pinnacles at each corner. Within the parapet rises a short stone broach spire with two tiers of lucarnes, the lower in the cardinal faces and the upper in the intermediate faces. This is said to rise to a height of about 150 feet. Like every gable in the building, the spire is capped with an iron cross. Those on the gables are complicated pieces of design of considerable decorative quality.

Abutting the east wall of the tower is the War Memorial Chapel added to designs by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott in 1920-1. This is tall and narrow, of two bays with a three-sided apse, the walls rising above a moulded plinth and divided into bays by slender buttresses which are scarcely more than pilaster strips having gabletted niches at the top. There is a shallow parapet above a moulded course. The two bays of the north wall and the east bay of the apse have tall two-light windows with a small gablet at the head of the central mullion and a decafoil cusped light in the head.

The interior of the church has plastered walls and all the plaster and stonework is painted cream in the nave and pale blue in the chancel. The atmosphere is pleasant because the many windows admit a good light and the galleries give a comfortable feeling of enclosure. The nave is of three bays, the western two opening into the galleried aisles and the broader eastern one into transepts north and south; the distinction is marked by piers rather than pillars. The free standing pair of pillars have four attached shafts with foliate capitals, and similar shafts abut the piers. The roof has tie-beams on brackets and every pair of principals is supported on a stone corbel carved with a head. There are a remarkably large number of these carved heads throughout the building. The transept arches are carried on polished granite shafts with foliate capitals and corbels. The alleys are paved with York stone and the pews stand on timber platforms. The galleries have panelled fronts pierced with quatrefoils and the west gallery is carried on two iron pillars in addition to being built into the walls. Both the ground floor of the church and the galleries are filled to capacity with pews. At the east end, the later transepts abutting the chancel open through arches supported on polished marble pillars with foliate capitals.

The addition of the chapel in 1920 is introduced by a broad nearly semi-circular arch under the north transept gallery which leads into a narrow rectangular ante-chamber housing the contemporary font. An identical arch, also on semi-circular responds, leads into the chapel beyond. This is a dignified space quite foreign in style to the rest of the church. Its tall proportions, moreover, give it a resonance which is entirely absent elsewhere. The walls and vault are plastered and whitewashed and the windows are filled with various heraldic emblems or figures of saints against clear grounds. The plaster groin vault is carried on slender shafts with primitive volute capitals, and the chancel arch is in similar style. On the south side of the eastern bay there is an arch like that by which the chapel is entered.