Description

ST7219
10/76

HENSTRIDGE CP,
CHURCH STREET (South side),
Church of St Nicholas

24.3.61

GV II*

Parish Church. C12 origins, mostly rebuilt 1872-3 by James Mountford Allen; Tower rebuilt 1900 by E Buckle. Local stone cut and squared, with Ham stone dressing: stone slate roofs between stepped coped gables with finials. 6-cell plan consisting of 3-bay chancel, 4-bay nave, North and South aisles, 2-bay North East chantry chamel and 2-bay South East organ chamber and vestry, with West tower and South Porch. In C14/C15 style mostly. Chancel has plinth, cill course, and double offset corner buttresses; 3 light geometric traceried East window and similar South window, both under pointed labels with headstops. Organ chamber has diagonal corner buttress, a simpler 2-light traceried window and pointed arched doorway on South side, and another 2-light window to the East. The South aisle has bay buttresses and 3-light geometric traceried windows in the South wall, with a blank West wall: South porch on second bay from West has C13 style pointed arch doorways, the inner with ball flower decoration, The North East Chantry chapel has a diagonal corner buttress, a late C15 style 3-light East window and rather wide catching North window. The North aisle was not rebuilt; it has bay buttresses with offsets, 3-light late C15 style pointed arched windows without labels, and in second bay from East a blocked moulded C15 doorway; West wall blank. Tower in 3 stages with plinth, string courses, battlemented parapet with corner pinnacles, and angled corner buttresses with offsets to full height; square plan stair turret with pitched roof, 2 stages high, on South East corner; unusual ship weathervane; 4-light C15 style traceried West window with transome and subarcuation, the label forming a step up in the string course: 2nd stage has a 2-light window to the North, and small cusped lancets to South and West, with curvilinear tracery to the 2-light window at head of stair turret. 3 has tall 2 light C15 style traceried windows with labels and pierced wood baffles to all faces. Inside, the chancel has a ribbed and boarded 4-plane ceiling; late C19 furniture including brass communion rail in early Art Nouveau manner: the double arch into the chantry chapel almost certainly C13, with octagonal piers, broached base, moulded capitals and double chamfer arches; in Easternmost arch an elaborate canopied tomb, richly carved with considerable traces of colour, with 2 recumbent effigies on slab with panelled sides, with 4-centre finely cusped canopy arches and quatrefoil and rose coffering,commemorating William Cavent, High Sheriff of Somerset and Dorset, died c1463. In the Chantry chapel a North East corner canopy, probably early C16: narrow arch into North Aisle could be C13. Nave arcade in C13 style, but photograph in church shows it to be a complete rebuild, and remaining work all C19: the font in the under tower space has a plain octagonal bowl on tall octagonal shaft with moulded base and collar, probably C13. Several lesser C18 memorial tablets on West wall of North aisle. First known rector 1175, otherwise few details known. (Wakeford, A History of Henstridge, 1953).

Listing NGR: ST7227919763

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Church of St Nicholas at Wikipedia
• Wikidata Q17554916

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

• 
  Old House Handbook: A Practical Guide to Care and Repair
• 
  Dorset (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Listed Buildings: The Law and Practice of History Buildings, Ancient Monuments and Conservation Areas
• 
  Yorkshire West Riding: Sheffield and the South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  A Buying and Owning a Listed Building: A Brief Guide
• 
  Historic Environment Law: Planning, Listed Buildings, Monuments, Conservation Areas and Objects by Harwood, Richard (2012) Paperback