Aubourn

Location




Nestling close to the glorious late Elizabethan Aubourn Hall, Aubourn 'Old Church' is just a fragment of a much larger medieval building.  In 1862 a new parish church was built to the west of the village and most of the medieval church was demolished, leaving the chancel standing as a mortuary chapel.  The shape of the lost portions of he church are marked out in the grass.  In a strange quirk of fate St Peter's was made redundant in 1973 and all but the chancel demolished and the medieval chancel of the 'Old Church' became the parish church once more. 



There is much of interest crammed into this tiny thirteenth century chancel.  On the north wall are the remains of an alabaster monument to Sir Anthony Meres who died in 1587, his damaged kneeling figure propped on top of his coat of arms.  The monument was found in pieces in the demolished tower.  In the same north east corner are monuments to Sir Anthony's descendants, the Nevilles, who still live in the hall.  Elizabeth Neville, who died in 1745, has a lovely marble monument incorporating a medallion with her head in profile.  Next to it is a tablet in memory of Sir Christopher Neville, who died 1692, with cherubs and all the usual baroque flummeries.  



The floor is made up of Neville ledger slabs, there are Neville hatchments, a royal arms of George II (1733), a balustered Georgian altar rails, a Perpendicular font and a west gallery with delightful little chamber organ.  All combine to make a very memorable little building.  



Access:  The church is open during daylight hours.  Acess is on foot, via a footpath approximately 100 yards west of the entrance gates of Aubourn Hall.  The path takes you directly in front of the hall. Park with caution by the roadside. 

If you want to see some more photos of Aubourn look in my Flickr set.

Lusby

Location

St Peter's Lusby is a fascinating little church, its rust-coloured greenstone walls probably date back to the eleventh century.  The north east angle of the nave has long-and-short work and in the north wall of the chancel has a lovely little keyhole window; both late Saxon.  Inside the church the chancel arch is of a similar date and there are remains of contemporary capitals and shafts to either side of it.  There has been much rebuilding since.  Into the Saxon walls of the nave were inserted two Norman doors, now both blocked.  The north door is decorated with zigzag, the south surmounted with a carved cross. 



The chancel has thirteenth and fifteenth century windows. There was once a west tower, but this disappeared long ago, and its place is now taken by a timber framed porch and vestry designed by Ewan Christian, who restored the church in 1891-3.



The church has evidently been touched by the Catholic movement in the recent past. The sacrament is reserved and statues of St Joseph holding the child Jesus and the Sacred Heart occupy the sill of the south window, next to a fine fourteenth century corbel head of a king. 



The east wall above the chancel arch is painted a bright ochre and the chancel arch itself is filled with a fifteenth century rood screen. In the chancel there is a niche built into the south wall and a touching brass memorial inscription, recording the grief of a husband at the loss of his wife. It was formerly part of the memorial to Katherine Palfreyman, wife of a wool merchant Anthony Palfreyman; she died in 1555.



Access: The church is kept open during the day.  There is plenty of roadside parking outside the church. 

If you want to see some more photos of Lusby look in my Flickr set.

Blyborough

Location

St Alkmund's Blyborough was restored in 1877-78 by the ubiquitous James Fowler of Louth.  Although Fowler is not generally known for being a conservative restorer, his work at Blyborough was relatively sensitive.  In his rebuilding of the west end of the nave he retained the curious slender Georgian west tower, with its reused medieval gargoyles.



Inside Fowler also retained much of the medieval fabric, including the Early English north arcade with stiff-leaf capitals, the chancel arched with keeled responds and the arch to the north chapel.  In the chancel he retained an ogee headed niche in the north wall.  The triplet of lancets in the east wall of the chancel is characteristically Fowler, the mouldings rather too elaborate for Lincolnshire rural Early English.  The muscular Butterfieldian pulpit is also fairly representative of Fowler's work. 



The north chapel has many features of interest.  Both north and south walls have ogee-headed burial niches of the fourteenth century.  Among the architectural fragments is a late 10th or early 11th century grave cover with elaborate interlace decoration and the remains of a number of later medieval cross slabs. 





The chapel is dominated by monument of a former rector Robert Conyng, who died in 1434.  His effigy, in full mass vestments is on top of a tomb chest decorated with shields of arms.  One of the shields is decorated with waterbougets and this charge also appears on the orphrey of his chasuble.  His head is supported on a cushion held by angels and there is a dog at his feet.  Lord Monson, writing in 1828 noticed the monument in its current position and suggested that it was formerly placed under the between chapel and chancel. 



On the wall of the chapel are a number of later monuments, a fine tablet of 1794 to John and Elizabeth Broadley and a number commemorating the Luard family of Blyborough Hall.  There is also a hatchment commemorating Peter Luard, who died in 1830.

Access: The church is kept locked, but there are contact numbers on the noticeboard.  There is ample parking around the church. 

 If you want to see some more photos of Blyborough have a look at my Flickr set.

Ashby Puerorum

Location

Ashby Puerorum, Ashby 'of the boys', is so called because in the late thirteenth century the living was appropriated to provide an endowment for the boy choristers of Lincoln Cathedral.  Ashby is a remote hamlet and its medieval church of St Andrew is approached across a farmyard.  The churchyard affords fabulous views across the Wolds.   




St Andrew's is a fairly straightforward building, constructed of greenstone with limestone dressings.  The Perpendicular tower, shorn of its bell-stage in the early nineteenth century, is patched with brick and has sugar-loaf pinnacles.  Inside the tower are two medieval bells; the earliest of these, dating from c.1150, is the oldest bell in the county.  The church was restored in 1850 and again in 1878 by Ewan Christian and all the windows date from that time.



Inside you will find a sturdy Transitional arcade, also built of greenstone, a plain fifteenth century font and seventeenth century balustered altar rails.  Mounted on the south wall are a number of sixteenth century brasses to members of the Littlebury family of Stainsby, the figures a product of a London brass workshop.  Under the altar, covered by a carpet is an early fourteenth century incised slab of a priest, his head, hands and feet were formerly of brass. 



 Access: The church is kept open during the day.  The church is in a farm yard and parking is extremely limited. 

 If you want to see some more photos of Ashby Puerorum look in my Flickr set.

Harrington

Location

The path leading to St Mary's passes between the old rectory and the great seventeenth century hall and its glorious gardens, the inspiration for Tennyson's 'Come into the Garden Maud'. The first thing you see as you enter the churchyard is the rock-faced west tower, then the similarly rock-faced nave and chancel with Decorated style windows.  All you see dates from S S Teulon's very thorough rebuilding of 1854-5.  You enter the building not expecting much, and in fact all that remains internally of the medieval church is the tower arch.  However, be prepared to be surprised, for what Teulon did reuse and what makes this church so very special. are the monuments to sucessive lord's of the Manor, the de Harringtons, Copledikes and Amcotts.

 



Taking them chronologically, the earliest is a cross-legged military effigy of the early fourteenth century, said to be John de Harrington.  Carved from honey-coloured stone, his shield is covered with graffiti.



Then a brass to Margaret Copledike c.1480, she portrayed in widow's weeds with her hands raised in adoration.  This over-polished brass formed part of a monument that also commemorated her husband John, they were both similarly posed below a lost image in brass.  Apparently the matrix remains under the carpet.  She needs putting back.  The next in date is a brass commemorating John Copledyke who died in 1552, part of a rather battered tomb chest in the tower now used as a surface for storing flower vases and ecclesiastical detritis.  



His two sons Sir John died 1585 and Francis, died 1599 are commemorated by monuments in the chancel.  Sir John and his wife as shown kneeling in brass against the back of a reused late medieval canopied tomb chest. 



Francis and his wife Elizabeth, opposite, are imortalised in a classical alabaster tablet with kneeling effigies.  The last of the Copledike line, Thomas Copledike who died in 1658, has a pedimented marble tablet with an inscription extolling his virtue - 'the last and best' of 'ancient stock'. 



The Copledike's patronage of the church is shown by the Perp. font, which is decorated with their arms and those of their associates and relatives, each shield hung around the neck of a little figure. 



The Amcotts monuments continue this fascinating collection.  Vincent Amcotts who purchased the estate and hall after the death of Thomas Copledike, has a fine heraldic ledger slab in the chancel and there are further monuments to his descendants in the chancel and tower. 



Access: The church is kept open as are all the churches in the South Ormsby group of parishes.  There is limited parking on the roadside opposite the church gate.

 If you want to see some more photos of Harrington look in my Flickr set

Market Stainton

Location

In 1989 Henry Thorold described St Michael's, Market Stainton as a 'most endearing little medieval church of greenstone patched with brick'.  Twenty years on St Michael's has lost a lot of its charm.  This textured Decorated church appears to be unused and is decaying fast.  

The pointing of the fourteenth century tower has mostly gone, leaving the spongy greenstone exposed to decay.  The nineteenth century brick angle butrresses are moving away from the tower.  The lead coverings of the nave and chancel look thin. There have clearly been some attempts to redress the decay, the eastern part of the nave has been repointed, but these attempts don't seem to be keeping up with the tide of deterioration.   

Although locked, I was able to take a number of photos of the interior of the church through the nave windows.  The interior is filthy and neglected, piles of pews lie in the chancel and under the tower.  The early nineteenth century plaster ceiling in the nave has been breached in some places and plaster is coming off the wall.  How long is it before the delicate plaster vault in the chancel collapses?  





I'm sure this building is loved by those who have responsibility for, but this is a isolated Wolds community and I suspect support for the church is rather limited.  Like so many in Lincolnshire, the building probably presents an insuperable challenge for its guardians. 

Access: The church is locked and there is no named keyholder. There is ample parking around the church. 

If you want to see some more photos of Market Stainton have a look at my Flickr set

Harpswell

Location

St Chad's serves the tiny hamlet of Harpswell with a population of 65.  The first thing you see is the Saxo-Norman west tower and then the fine Decorated tracery of the south aisle.   Inside there is a late Norman south arcade extended in the early fourteenth century and a rather dark and dreary chancel of 1891.  In truth the whole interior feels a bit dreary, for it is dirty and neglected. 



It is the monuments that really matter at Harpswell.  In the south aisle are two notable medieval monuments to rectors of Harpswell.  The most prominent is an effigy of William de Harrington set back in a niche in the south wall  He is dressed in cassock and hood with a pileus or skull cap on his head.  His feet are supported on a bracket decorated with a green man and his head on a pillow supported on two angels.  He died around 1350.  To the west is a rather battered incised slab to one of his predecessors, John de Gere who died around 1300. He is shown dressed in full Eucharistic vestments.  Under the Harmonium is a further slab to a rector a late fourteenth century slab to Richard de Beauchamp.



There are other monuments too.  On the north wall of the chancel is a fine fifteenth century brass of a man in armour and his wife in butterfly headress. They are believed to be John Whichcot and his wife Elizabeth Tyrwhit.  She was an heiress and her marriage to John, a Shropshire gentleman, brought the manor of Harpswell into the Whichcot family.  The manor remained in their hands until the nineteenth century and opposite the brass is a marble tablet to their descendant Thomas Whichcot, who died in 1776.





Thomas Whichcot was evidently an ardent supporter of the Protestant settlement.  There is a prominent royal arms of Queen Anne, one of the finest sets of royal arms in the county.  On the face of the tower is an inscription recording that he paid for a clock to commemorate the Duke of Cumberland's defeat of the 'rebels' i.e. Bonnie Prince Charlie, the Stuart pretender to the throne, at the battle of Culloden in 1745.


  
Medieval benchends (one decorated with the five wounds), fragments of medieval glass and a Norman arcaded font also contribute to a building of great interest.     
Access: The church is kept open during the day and there is ample parking by the roadside.

If you want to see some more photos of Harpswell have look in my Flickr set

Haugh

Location

There is nothing much at Haugh (pronounced Huff), except the tiny church of St Leonard and a sixteenth century manor house beside it.   In the Middle Ages the manor of Haugh was owned by the de Hagh family, until they died out and it passed to their descendants the Bolle family sometime in the late fifteenth century.  The church, a simple two cell building, with an early Norman chancel arch and mostly 14th and 15th century masonry, is for the most part a mausoleum to these two local families. 



The floor of the chancel is paved with numerous incised slabs to generations of the de Hagh family, from Richard de Hagh who died in the thirteenth century, to John de Hagh who died in 1458.



On the walls are two alabaster monuments to the Bolles.  To the south an alabaster tablet to Charles Bolle who died in 1591 and on the north the grander monument with kneeling effigies of his son Sir John Bolle, and his family. Sir John Bolle, who died in 1606, was something of an adventurer in his life.  He was an army commander in Ireland under the Earl of Essex and was for a time governor of Kinsale. In 1596 he went with Essex to raid the town of Cadiz in Spain and fell in love with a Spanish lady.  For more about his fascinating story see my article over at the other blog.



On one of my most recent visit to the church I was pleased to meet an American member of the Bolle family, a descendant of Sir John, drawn to the blog entry I had written at Vitrearum's Church Art.  It was great to stand there with him among the graves and monuments of his ancestors. 



There are other things of interest beside the Hagh and Bolle monuments.  Among the incised slabs in the chancel is one to a vicar, Robert de Winceby who died in 1426, it is engraved with a chalice and host.  The fifteenth century font is also worth a close examination, as Pevsner notes, its eight sides are decorated with a veritable pattern book of window tracery.  All together this is a very enjoyable building. 



Access: The church is kept open as are all the churches in the South Ormsby group of parishes.  There is ample parking beside the church.

 If you want to see some more photos of Haugh look on the Flickr page