A Visitor’s Guide
to
St Peter’s Church
Brimpton
St. Peter’s Church before 1868
There is no record of when the first Church was built on this site. The Doomsday
Books record that there was a Church in the Manor of Brimpton in 1086, but
does not indicate where this Saxon Church stood. It may well have been on the
site of the present St. Peter’s Church.
The Church which stood on the present site until1868 appears to have been of
Norman origins and to have had many extensions and alterations over time. It is
also said that Roman bricks and hypercaust tiles were incorporated into the
external walls . We have at least two descriptions of it as well as a sketch of
1822showing the exterior appearance. The only surviving features however, are
the inner brick tower which carries some old memorials to the Wollascott and
Fingal families and the bells, three of which date from the 17th Century. The
perimeter wall of the Churchyard was repaired in the 18th Century and the
initials J.S. and the date 1789 are carved into 2 of the bricks under the Yew tree
to the South of the Main porch. Until the nineteenth Century, there were
thatched stables in the Churchyard and a skittle ground on one side of the
Church gates and the Horseshoes Inn on the other, both very close to the
Church.
At the time of the 1822 sketch, the Church consisted of a chancel, nave with
cross aisle and chapel. The chancel arch and window were described in 1849
as ‘modern’. The western end of the church had been rebuilt in brick and we
know that a three stage brick tower was built in 1750-51. Under the Singer’s
Gallery at the west end was a plain font, probably Transition Norman. The aisle
was separated from the nave by Transition Norman arches on round pillars. In
the South wall was a perpendicular Piscina (A piscina or sacrarium is a
shallow basin placed near the altar of a Church used for washing the
communion vessels) with a recess having a pointed arch with Norman
mouldings and the north wall had a blocked up Norman doorway.
The Present Church
By the 1860’s the Norman Church had fallen into disrepair and was considered
to be too small and ‘in a ruinous condition’ but efforts to raise the necessary
money for a new Church were unsuccessful, until Mr James Blyth, the Lord of
the Manor, agree to fund the works. The building of the current Church began at
his expense in 1868 and was completed the following year. The total cost of
building, excluding the cost of timber which came from the Woolhampton estate
and the heating system was £3,700 – a considerable sum at that time. The Inn
and skittle ground were removed from their close proximity to the Church and Mr
Blyth gave the money to build a new public house.
The Church was designed by
the architect John Johnson
(1807 – 1878) and is built in
14th Century Decorated Style.
Johnson was well-known and
respected
in
mid-Victorian
times and was responsible for
some 21 Churches and 19
other major projects including
Alexandra Palace in London.
Locally, his work includes
Woolhampton Church (1861),
Midgham
Church,
Woolhampton
School
and
alterations to Woolhampton and
Midgham Houses.
The present Church consists of
a nave of three bays, a
chancel, two aisles, two shallow
transepts – one serving a s a
Lady Chapel with memorials to
the Hadden family who lived at
Stonehouse – a south Porch
and West Tower. It is built of knapped flint and internally the walls are of Bath
stone. All the internal fittings – pulpit, chancel arch and wall – are carved from
Caen stone as one unit.
The columns are made of pink Mull granite and are topped with capitals
decorated with some fine carvings by the firm of Farmer and Grindley. Among
the primroses, passion-flowers, ears of corn, grapes, hawthorn, and chestnut
leaves, a single swallow is carved on one of the capitals. Traditionally this
represents a swallow’s nest discovered during the demolition of the old church.
The wooden fittings are made from wood grown on Mr Blyth’s Woolhampton
estate. The stalls in the chancel are oak, the vicar’s deskis walnut and the other
fittings are all oak, chestnut or walnut. The hammer beam roof is constructed
from varnished Baltic timber.
The spire of Brimpton Church is a well known landmark visible from 4 miles
around. The Church is built at the highest point in the village and the spire rises
40.2m (132 feet) above ground level. This remarkable height was made possible
because the bilders of 1869 retained and reinforced the 1750 tower before
adding the spire. Outside the Church, one sees a timber framed splayfooted
spire covered in oak shingle; inside the Choir vestry one stands in the brick built
eighteenth century tower.
In the tower, there are now four bells which hang on an oak frome and are fitted
wit helm headstocks, strap gudgeons or bearings, brass bearings and traditional
wheels and fittings. All bells have inscriptions. The treble has only the date
1642, but the second bells reads, ‘ Thomas Mears founder London Rev George
B Caffin Vicar / Joseph Arundell, James Rivers, Church Wardens. 1842.’ The
third is inscribed ‘Love God 1642’, and the tenor ‘Prayers Ye The Lord 1624 /
Recast by Mears and Stainbank London 1876.’ The Treble, the Third and the
original Tenor were cast by Ellis Knight of Reading whilst the second and
present Tenor are from the Whitechapel Foundry. The bells fell into disrepair but
were restored ion the 1970’s are rededicated in April 1978.
The Church clock was supplied and installed by Cook and Sons of York in 1899.
It was paid for by public subscription, but it appears that the local inhabitants
had great trouble in raising the necessary funds, because a large balance was
eventually paid off by the Blyth Estate. The South Face of the clock was
repaired and refaced in 2007.
Most of the windows contained stained glass; the most important being the one
in the North Transept, or Lady Chapel. The glass, which was previously the east
window of the old church is by Thomas Willament in memory of the Earl of
Falmouth who died in 1852.
Other windows commemorate previous Vicars and their wives. There is one
piece of old church plate, a silver chalice with a London maker’s mark of 1667.