St Andrew's Church, Wroxeter

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Coordinates: 52°40′12″N 2°38′50″W / 52.6701°N 2.6472°W / 52.6701; -2.6472
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St Andrew's Church, Wroxeter
Style
Anglo-Saxon, Norman, Gothic
Closed1980
Specifications
MaterialsSandstone, tiled roofs

St Andrew's Church is a redundant Church of England parish church in the village of Wroxeter, Shropshire, England. It is recorded in the National Heritage List for England as a designated Grade I listed building,[1] and is under the care of the Churches Conservation Trust.[2] Both the village of Wroxeter and the church are in the southwest corner of the former Roman town of Viroconium.[3]

History

The earliest parts of the church are

college
of four priests.

In 1155

Saint Mary was built and the nave
was lengthened westwards. In about 1470 the lower part of the tower was built.

After the English Reformation the interior of the church was damaged, the wall paintings were covered with whitewash and wooden statues and fittings were burnt.[citation needed] The upper part of the tower was added in 1555, incorporating material from Haughmond Abbey. By the middle of the 18th century the population of the village was declining, and the church was becoming unstable because of the inadequate medieval foundations.[5] In 1763 the south aisle and chapel were demolished, and part of the chapel was converted into a vestry.[3] The church was restored in about 1863, and in 1890 a porch was added and the tower was restored.[1] By the end of the 19th century most of the local people had moved away.[5] The church was declared redundant on 1 December 1980, and was vested in the Churches Conservation Trust on 18 May 1987.[7]

Architecture

Exterior

The church's tower, with the gate piers in front re-using Roman columns.

St Andrew's is built of

weathervane. On its northeast is an octagonal stair turret, also with a pyramidal cap. In the upper stages on the north, west and east fronts are carved fragments which are said to have come from Haughmond Abbey; these include canopied niches, some containing sculpted figures, and ceiling bosses. In the bottom stage is a three-light west window, there are rectangular openings in the middle stage, and the top stage contains two-light louvred bell openings. The north wall of the nave is Anglo-Saxon and contains blocks from former Roman buildings. These blocks have Lewis holes.[1] This wall has a triple lancet window and a three-light arched window.[3] In the south wall are two-three light windows and a porch containing a doorway. The porch has a parapeted gabled double lancet window, and a carved frieze. Set into the top of the south wall is a fragment of a 7th-century Anglo-Saxon cross-shaft. On each side of this is a carved block of similar date, one depicting a beast and the other a bird. The chancel also incorporates some re-used Roman masonry in its north wall, which contains two narrow round-headed windows and a triple lancet window. In the south wall is a blocked Norman priest's doorway. The east window has five lights, and around it are portions of blocked former windows. The vestry has two square windows, one on each side of a round-arched doorway.[1]

The sandstone churchyard gate piers were made in the 19th century re-using Roman masonry.[8] The square bases came from farm buildings, the shafts of the columns from the Roman baths, and the capitals from an unknown source.[3] They have a pair of cast iron gates, and are listed Grade II.[8]

Interior

a circular sandstone font standing on an octagonal base, bearing a floral decoration
The font, carved from a Roman pillar

In the east wall of the chancel is an

First World War memorial; nearby are two brass plaques listing the parish dead of both World Wars. One of the First World War dead, Captain C W Wolseley-Jenkins, also has an individual memorial tablet on the east end's north wall.[9]

The largest memorial in the church is an

Protestant to become Lord Mayor of London. On the wall of the chancel is a marble memorial to Francis Newport, 1st Earl of Bradford, who died in 1708.[1] This has been attributed to Grinling Gibbons.[3]

The tower has a ring of six bells. The oldest is dated 1598 and was cast by Henry Oldfield II of Nottingham. Three of the bells were cast in the Clibery foundry in Wellington in the 17th century. The newest bell is by John Warner and Sons of London and is dated 1877.[11] The two-manual organ is in the west gallery and was made by Brindley of Sheffield in 1861.[12]

  • The Bromley tomb
  • Tomb of Thomas Bromley and Isabel Lyster.
    Tomb of Thomas Bromley and Isabel Lyster.
  • Effigies of Thomas Bromley and his wife, Isabel Lyster.
    Effigies of Thomas Bromley and his wife, Isabel Lyster.
  • Margaret, daughter of Thomas Bromley and his wife, Isabel Lyster, portrayed on the Bromley tomb.
    Margaret, daughter of Thomas Bromley and his wife, Isabel Lyster, portrayed on the Bromley tomb.
  • Arms of Thomas Bromley.
    Arms of Thomas Bromley.
  • Arms of Thomas Bromley impaled with those of his wife.
    Arms of Thomas Bromley impaled with those of his wife.
  • Effigy of Sir Richard Newport, St Andrew's church, Wroxeter, Shropshire.
    Effigy of Sir Richard Newport, St Andrew's church, Wroxeter, Shropshire.

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h Historic England, "Church of St Andrew, Wroxeter And Uppington (1224008)", National Heritage List for England, retrieved 14 April 2013
  2. ^ St Andrew's Church, Wroxeter, Shropshire, Churches Conservation Trust, retrieved 17 October 2016
  3. ^
    ISBN 0-300-12083-4
  4. ^ a b White, Roger; Dalwood, Hal, Archaeological assessment of Wroxeter, Shropshire, York: Department of Archaeology, University of York
  5. ^ a b c d e White, Roger (2001), St Andrew's Church, Wroxeter: Information for teachers, London: Churches Conservation Trust
  6. Marjorie M Chibnall, D C Cox, Revd D T W Price, Margaret Tomlinson, B S Trinder (1973), "Houses of Augustinian canons: Abbey of Haughmond", A History of the County of Shropshire: Volume 2, Institute of Historical Research, retrieved 12 March 2014 {{cite web}}: |author= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link
    )
  7. ^ Diocese of Lichfield: All Schemes (PDF), Church Commissioners/Statistics, Church of England, 2011, p. 7, retrieved 7 April 2011
  8. ^ a b Historic England, "Churchyard and gates, gate piers and approximately 3 metres of flanking walls approximately 10 metres to west of west tower of Church of St Andrew (1224775)", National Heritage List for England, retrieved 1 October 2013
  9. ISBN 978-1-909644-11-3
    .
  10. ^ Hyde, Patricia (1981), Hasler, P. W. (ed.), BARKER, John II (1579-1618), of Haughmond Abbey, Salop., London: History of Parliament Online, retrieved 12 August 2016 {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
  11. ^ Wroxeter, St Andrew, Shropshire Association Towers, retrieved 27 September 2010. Archived 2011-07-19 at the Wayback Machine
  12. ^ Shropshire, Wroxeter, St. Andrew (N04723), British Institute of Organ Studies, retrieved 27 September 2010

External links

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