All Saints Church in Hooton Pagnell II

 

A view from the chancel along the nave to the tower arch

After making the most of the sunny conditions at Hooton Pagnell, to quickly photograph the exterior of All Saints church, I took a couple of photos of the locked south door, where I didn’t notice any of the fine decorative detail that has been highlighted by the Corpus for Romanesque Sculpture in Britain and Ireland (CRSBI). 

 

The south door

 

Entering the church by the priest’s door in the chancel, I introduced myself to the churchwarden, Ann Macdonald, with whom I had been liaising about my planned trip and obtained a copy of the church guide – produced by the now defunct Heritage Inspired initiative and like very many others that I have collected during my travels around South Yorkshire. 

 

The All Saints church guide

 

With Ann leaving me to get on with my work, I just took a set of general photographs of the east end of the chancel, without stepping over into the sanctuary to look closely at the masonry detailing around the large east window, which Peter Ryder’s church plan in Saxon Churches of South Yorkshire shows to be from the Victorian restoration in 1876, by J.L. Pearson, or the C13 lancet windows to the east end. 

 

A few views of the chancel

Historic England dates the round arch from the chancel to the Stotfold Chapel to the C15, as does Ryder, who dates the north-east corner of the church plan – now occupied by the vestry and inaccessible – as being from this period. Pevsner says that it is difficult to assign a date to the N. chapel arch, but he doesn’t specify if this is the round arch from the chancel or the pointed arch from the north aisle.

 

The arch between the chancel and Stotfold chapel

Turning to look at the west end of the chancel, with its C11 rubble walling that incorporates the chancel arch and extends further into the nave and to the tower, there is a very great difference between this and the squared and coursed masonry used for the later C12 east end. 

 

The west end of the chancel and the chancel arch

 

Ryder’s church plan shows the surrounds of the priest’s door and the reveals of the west window as being restored in 1876, but I just took a few photos to record the very plain east chancel arch and the surrounding walling, which includes small sections of herringbone masonry. 

 

The chancel arch

 

Moving into the nave and turning round to look at the west side of the arch, Historic England describes this as having shafts and roll-moulded voussoirs on the west side and carved imposts with cable mould beneath lozenges, but I didn’t look closely at these. 

 

A view of the chancel arch from the nave

 

I didn’t spend any time looking at the physical characteristics of the original C11 walling, with its windows restored in 1876, or for the presence of herringbone masonry, but I could quite clearly see the moulded shafts to the windows when walking down to the tower.

 

The south wall of the nave