Church Micro 1951...Wyddial
Parish church. Nave C14, W tower early C15, chancel C15, N aisle and N chapel 1532 for George Canon. Nave restored and chancel and S porch rebuilt 1859 by Baillie & Co.. Flint rubble with stone dressings, remains of external plaster on tower butting up to quoins, thin red brick to arcade and external walls of N aisle and N chapel, and steep old red tile roofs. Lead spire with vane on tower. A Perp Church of 3-bay nave, 2-bay square ended chancel, unbuttressed 3-stage battlemented W tower, S porch, and a fine brick N aisle and N chancel chapel dedicated to St. George and dated by a recorded brass to 1532. C19 Chancel has 3-light E window with cinquefoil in head, 2 paired lancet windows on S, and arch-braced open timber roof with wallposts and corbels. C15 tall chancel arch of 2 moulded orders, the inner only on engaged shafts with moulded caps and bases. Large 2-centred brick arch opening into N chapel of 2 double hollow-chamfered orders with octagonal responds and chamfered capitals closed by an elaborate early C17 carved and pierced oak panelled screen with arched double door, arcaded top and grotesque figures interrupting a dentilled entablature with swelled frieze. The nave has C19 open timber roof, S wall features, and panelled pulpit and pews. Grouped lancet windows, one to light pulpit at E, single window to E of porch and similar window at W of 2-centred arched S door. 3½ bays arch-braced moulded roof with 2 purlins, wind-bracing, and moulded king-posts set on collars with axial bracing to ridgepiece. Moulded wallplate with collar pieces. Arch braces spring from stone corbels. 3 bay C16 N arcade of brick, probably originally plastered but now colour-washed red and tuck pointed with narrow black joints. Wide 2-centred arches of 3 chamfered orders, the middle chamfer hollow, on brick piers with semi-octagonal shafts on cardinal faces and hollow chamfered shafts on the diagonals. S side of tall C17 panelled box pews in N aisle block the middle and E arches of arcade. Tall C15 tower arch of 2 orders, only the inner carried on half-octagonal shafts with moulded caps and bases. W-tower has chamfered string courses to 3 diminishing stages, W window of 2 lights under a quatrefoil in a 2-centred head. S lit only in middle stage with clockface on S. 2-light pointed bell openings with trefoil headed lights. Gargoyle to parapet base-course. C19 gabled S porch faced in knapped flints with Early English style moulded entrance with small raised shafts and single lancet side windows. Continuous N brick range of N aisle and N chapel of 1532 has moulded external plinth offset and eaves course, diagonal corner buttresses with stone watertables, canted brick projection for full height at W end, plastered gable triangles, 2 2-light C15 traceried stone windows probably reset from nave at W and W end of N wall, 4 brick-traceried 3-light windows on N with heavy moulded hoodmoulds and lozenge shaped terminals, more elaborate 3-light brick E window with cinquefoil lights and six small lights in the head under a Tudor arch with hoodmould. Early C17 classical stone N doorway with round head, moulded square surround and full entablature. Plain impost blocks and keystone breaking up into frieze. Interior has continuous segmental plaster barrel-vault, with 2 iron tie-rods. An elaborately carved early C17 arcaded screen with entablature separates the chapel, the single door being offset to N to accomodate the former box pews, the carved panelled sides of which now form a dado at the W end of the aisle. Plainer C17 panelling as original dado along N wall. Elaborate moulding on N face of brick arch from chancel to chapel and 'front' face of screen faces into chapel. In 2 of N windows of aisle are 8 panels of mid C16 Flemish stained glass. Monuments: George Canon d.1532 (upper half missing) on W wall of N chapel; palimpsest to John Gille d.1546 with wife and children in chancel; Margaret Plumbe d.1575 a demi figure with 4 shields on stone panel with moulded surround in chancel; Margery Disney d.1621 a wooden tablet with gilt inscription in black arabesque border on grey ground, in nave; Sir William Goulston d.1687 a large wall monument in chapel with inscription on gilt tasselled drape above Baroque gadrooned base supported by deathsheads and cherubs. Barley-sugar black shafts but white marble bases and Corinthian cups, 2 white busts in black niches. Full entablature with urn of black and white between reclining figures on swans neck pediment; undecipherable fine early C18 wall monument to S of chapel alter with black panel framed in fruit festooned Corithian pilasters supporting a broken pediment with fresco painted achievement and heavy swags on surrounding plastered wall; wall monument in N aisle to Brabazon Ellis d.1780 with draped urn and achievement on grey marble cenatoph over a grey marble surround to white marble tablet. Figure carved in oval frame on tooled based. Fittings: mid C19 communion rail, lectern, pulpit and seats. Chapel alter frontal of wood with blind C14 tracery. C19 screen to tower arch carefully copying early C17 screens to N chapel. Some moulded C17 panels incorporated in C19 pews. A medieval church of outstanding interest for its brick N aisle and N chapel of 1532 and the C16 stained glass, monuments and C17 carved woodwork. (RCHM (1911) 244-5: VCH (1914)117-8: Kelly (1914) 295: Pevsner (1977) 411).
This is a traditional cache and IS at the published coordinates.
The cache is a small screw top beaker.