Description

TEIGNGRACE TEIGNGRACE SX 87 SW

7/231 Church of St Peter and St Paul - 23.8.55 - II*

Parish church. Dedicated 1787 by James and George Templer Esq and Rev John Templer Esq, vicar of Teigngrace, who demolished earlier church and rebuilt on site reusing some granite as quoins. Restored in 1872. Roughly dressed lime-stone and rubble with brick. Slate roofs with black glazed ridge tiles. West tower now without spire, west door, symmetrical nave and chancel with equal north and south transept and apse. Gothick 2 stage tower with angle buttresses and pronounced batter, set- offs each surmounted with attached oblisks on cyma recta bases. Original 6 flush panelled west door, (2 panels now glazed) in original surround of 3 clustered shafts with moulded cornice all breaking forward with C20 softwood repairs. Dedication stone on rendered panel above doorway. North and south C18 lunettes to vestible with crown glass leaded lights to north. Above Gothick C19 chamnfered frames with diamond leaded glazing to first floor under C18 dressed voussoirs, except west window unchamfered C18 gothick frame with slated infill. 3 large matching Gothick arched belfry louvres. C18 local brick crenellated parapet oversailing on brick block modilions. 3 large 3 light Gothick timber windows with intersecting tracery light the church on north and south sides, with C18 6 paned bottom sliding sash, timber glazing bars and diamond leaded crown glass in each pane under ashlar voussoirs. Stone sills. Gabled transcepts with round leaded light in ashlar surround with original rose petal design. Apse with curved sides and straightend has smaller oculus in dressed surround: above a brick crenellated parapet. Small West door in north transcept C18 roll moulded architrave and C19 door. Interior: Entrance vestibule in base of tower retains some C18 joinery, panelling, door and coat pegs. Original access to floor above probably by ladder, replaced by C19 staircase when also 4 octagonal elm posts with runout stops were introduced to support load of repositioned organ (see below). Church of single cruciform space with chaste Gothick ornament comprising nave and chancel with narrower south and north transepts (the latter'probably the squires' pews, having a separate entrance from the West. Sanctuary up 2 limestone steps (now obscured by C19 work) is in a shallow flat-ended apse with, high up, a tiny round window in front of which is fixed a large early C19 copy by James Barry R.A. of a Vandyke Pieta. Answering this, at the west end of the nave, a deep gallery set back into the tower over the vestibule. The ceilings are plaster vaults, ovoid in section over nave and chancel (with ridge rib) but much steepened by narrower transepts. At the crossing, groin ribs run up to a thick ring cornice with tiny outward-facing cherubim at the cardinal points around a diminutive dome of 4 centred section. This is divided into segments by 12 ribs meeting at an acanthus chandelier boss. C18 Tudor-arched door from vestibule to nave has flush-panelled reveals and double doors with panels inset on east face and covered with C19 studded red baise. Interesting C18 and C19 door furniture. To either side clustered and banded slender columns with polychrome marbling and from these small plaster demi-fan vaults spring to support a balcony, the ballustrade of which is C19. West and east walls answer each other in their decorative treatment : plain triple 4-centred arcading of 2 blind arches and a central longer one over gallery and apse. There is a continuous cornice, which ramps over the eastern oculus. Important C18 organ by Davis of London : presumably it was set further forward originally, allowing a ringing chamber behind. Gothick case grained to simulate mahogany, cross-banded and picked out in gold, as are the show pipes : several stages of blind archading and a ramped cornice. The central canted pipe group is carried on a plume corbel and rises above the rest. On the north side 'E.S.B.' incised in serif letters. Although the manuals have been replaced much early pipework remains. C18 or early C19 ladder to belfry where there is a construction of 3 oak timbers braced down to sill level by grown curved brackets and also 2 complete bells from earlier church, one with inscription 'John Gifford Warden 1701' are hung in a C20 steel frame. At roof level, some evidence of a vanished octagonal steeple. The floors have limestone paviours including re-set C17 ledger slabs. C18 fittings include a hexagonal limestone font with gadrooned bowl on hexagonal limestone balluster stem and the box pew of the south transcept. A fine series of mural tablets, noteably those to Charles Templer (d.1786) in polychrome marble with dolphins and a shipwreck scene; to James Templer of Stover (q.v.) (d.1782) in polychrome marble with a veiled urn; to his wife Mary (d.1784); and two by Coade and Sealy to James Templer (dated 1813) and Capt. W Templer (dated 1805). One the south side of the west wall on Cenotaph in marble and Coade stone with tiny gilt brass relief commemorating Nelson. Re- ordering of 1872 includes pews, communion rail and gallery ballustrade. Also of the late C19 are the pulpit, reader's desk and lecturn. There is a second font by Caffin of Regent Street: octagonal bowl with relief panels of plants and heraldry (inscription on step has a date 1892). Lancet windows to apse have unmatched stained glass, that to the north c.1875 (inscription). Interesting C18 fenestration elsewhere with both timber glazing bars and original leading patterns and much old clear glass. Despite late C19 alterations a well-preserved and evocative C18 country church and a regionally early use of Gothick style. References: W G Hoskins "Devon", 1954 (Pieta and date of C19 re-ordering). A J Key "Stover, the storey of a school", 1982 (organ builder).

Listing NGR: SX8497673924

External Links

• Wikidata Q17535296

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Recommended Books

• 
  Cumbria: Cumberland, Westmorland and Furness (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Berkshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Herefordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  [(Cumberland and Westmorland)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1967)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Buildings of England)
• 
  Somerset: North and Bristol: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)