The Assumption Of The Blessed Virgin Mary, Redenhall, With Northern Churchyard Walls And Gate Piers
Harleston
Norfolk
A Medieval parish church, with fabric dating from the C14 to the early C16, with phases of restoration or renewal in the C19 and early C20.
Architectural Features
There is a striking display of flint flushwork panels on the west face, on three sides of the bell-chamber, and on all sides of the parapet and buttresses. ‘1616’ is written on the north face in large iron numerals.
The west door is within a Perpendicular Gothic portal with angel spandrels, a shield of friezes and flanking statuary niches with heraldic crests of the church’s donors.
The chapel has cement render, a three-light window, and a small doorway beneath a carved tortoise.
The south side of the C14 chancel has stepped buttresses, a priests’ door, one reworked Perpendicular gothic window and a Y-tracery window.
A hammerbeam roof rises from carved stone corbels.
The C19 oak pews have bench ends carved with blind tracery.
At the base of the tower is a late-C17 staircase with a closed string, vase-and-bottle balusters and broad handrail.
The stair cuts across a painted C15 consecration cross.
Within the ringing chamber an historic exhortation is painted onto the wall reading “Use no Bad Words! THIS is a Sacred Place!!!” In the south aisle the octagonal stone font was replaced in the C19.
It bears the signs of the evangelists alternating with angels holding symbols of the Passion in panels on each side and stands on a stem supported by four lions.
The C16 south door has linenfold panels and the initials A and T, possibly referring to William Alen and William Tompson, churchwardens in the 1550s.
The 1858 pulpit has a ‘wine glass’ form and blind tracery carvings.
The Gawdy chapel is approached through a private pew with carved fronts, and a gateway with tortoise finials.
The chapel reredos is a monument to the Wogan family, produced by J. Francis Moore for Elizabeth Wogan , it shows a woman’s soul received into heaven.
The 1920 rood screen was made from oak grown at Gawdy Hall and incorporates 12 C15 painted panels that have been heavily overpainted.
St Mary's church > http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1431114 is situated on an elevation above the small village of Redenhall. Its magnificent 15th century tower, which took 60 years to build, can be seen for miles > http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1431112. Like the equally grand north porch its west facade is covered entirely with flushwork > http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1431143. The chancel dates from the 14th century but the church was extensively restored in the second half of the 19th century and the reredos are from this time. The rood screen was re-assembled in 1920 and the panels are over-restored. The tomb of Sir Thomas Gawdy lies between the chancel and the Gawdy chapel > http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1431182 at the east end of the north aisle. The heraldic glass in the chapel window > http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1431183 comes from the demolished Gawdy Hall as does a 15th century Venetian chest > http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1431187 made from cypress wood and with rare paintings inside. The large organ > http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1431195 at the west end was built by G.M. Holdich in 1843 - it is the biggest organ he ever built and it has not been altered. The font > http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1431201 is a 19th century copy of an older one. St Mary's church is kept locked.
This includes the choir stalls, panelling (by J.A. Reeve), intricately carved reredos and triple sedilia.
A segmental panel with an arched frame on the south wall that shows the tetragrammaton appears to be a relocated remnant from a C17 or C18 reredos.
The earliest stained glass to survive in the church is that by S.C. Yarington in the Gawdy Chapel Later glass includes some by Ward & Nixon , and Thomas Baillie , and Herbert Bryans (east window, early C20).