Description

5191
SY 4692 1/262

EAST STREET
(South Side)
United Reformed and
Methodist Church

GV
II

1859. Architects Poulton and Woodman of Reading. Hammer dressed stone with
ashlar dressings. Pitched roof. Nave and 2 aisles. "W" front expresses this
by buttresses with setbacks crowned by octagonal spirelets with steep gablets
on each side. Coped gable end, crow-stepped at very top and crowned by tall
finial. Large 5-light grouped lancets, centre 3 lights grouped together under
1 arch and divided from remainder by colonnettes: reticulated tracery hood
mould. Pointed arch in gable end with Geometrical tracery. Porch to each
aisle with very steep roof, coped gable ends and finials, diagonally planked
double doors with ornamental iron hinges, in cusped pointed arches with hood
moulds. Star-shaped windows above each porch. Side elevations have 6 lancets
with shaped arches, separated by buttresses.
Interior. Open hammerbeam timber roof on foliate corbels. Galleries round
3 sides on twisted iron columns. Rib-vaulted apse approached through arch
on shafts with elaborate foliate capitals, corbelled out from wall; "O Worship
the Lord in the Beauty of Holiness" painted round extrados. Gabled and crocketed
organ in apse. Panelled pulpit. Early C17 polygonal pulpit with 2 tiers
of arcading, originally in the church at Charmouth. It was from this pulpit
that the Vicar of Charmouth (John Wesley's great-grandfather) was preaching
while the fugitive Charles II was waiting for the ship which failed to take
him into exile in 1651.

Nos 8 to 36 (even) form a group with the United Reformed and Methodist Church.

Listing NGR: SY4675792863

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26412362

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Bristol (Pevsner Architectural Guides: City Guides)
• 
  Pioneers of Modern Design: From William Morris to Walter Gropius (Penguin Art & Architecture)
• 
  For the Record
• 
  Churches: An Architectural Guide (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Introductions)
• 
  Hampshire: South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Essex: Buildings of England Series (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)