Listed Building: St. Crispin Hospital Chapel (3/12)

Chapel. 1877 by Robert Griffiths of Stafford; minor C20 alterations. Rock-faced ironstone in small rectangular blocks, limestone dressings and plain tile roofs. Chancel, vestry, organ chamber, aisled nave and south porch. Early Gothic style. Chancel has 3-light east window with large roundel to head, filled with 7 small roundels and hood mould. Single light windows north and south with quatrefoils to heads. Organ chamber to south side has octagonal east window with plate tracery of 8 roundels surrounding 8-foiled central roundel; cinquefoiled rose window to south. Vestry to north side has 2-light east window with Y-tracery and roll-moulded east door with hood mould. 1-light cinquefoil-headed windows to north and porch with blocked round trefoil-headed door with hood mould and cusped 1-light window to east side. Nave has quatrefoil clerestorey windows above aisles, which stop short of 2 western bays of nave and have 2-light windows with Y-tracery and geometrical tracery to alternate windows. Those to west ends of aisles have hood moulds. South door has chamfered arch, double-leaf door with ornamental hinges and hood mould. South porch has double-chamfered doorway with dog-toothed hood mould and cusped 1-light windows to east and west. West end of nave or narthex has 1-light windows at high level north and south with quatrefoils to heads and polygonal stair turret to south-west. Turret serves gallery and has roll-moulded door to south, arcaded upper storey, blank to east and with small 1-light chamfered windows to other sides, and pyramidal roof with wrought-iron finial. West front of nave has 4-bay arcade with shafts, moulded bases and capitals and hood mould framing pair of central doors, roll-moulded and with caernarvon-arched heads and blank quatrefoils above, flanked by lancet windows. 3-light west window with 8-foiled roundel to head and hood mould. Bell-cote to gable with dog-toothed arch framing bell and tall gable with wrought-iron finial and weather-vane. Chamfered plinth, string courses and chamfered stone eaves. Stone-coped gables with kneelers. Foliated stone cross to chancel gable, wrought-iron cross to east gable of nave. Offset angle buttresses and offset buttresses between bays. Interior: Chancel has raised sanctuary with ornamental tiled reredos and side walls, encaustic tiled floors and scissor truss roof. Nave has 4-bay arcades with circular columns, chamfered plinths, moulded capitals and double-chamfered arches. West gallery with rooms below either side of entrance passages said to have been formerly used for observing patients' behaviour. Arch-braced collar truss roof and encaustic tiled floors. Complete scheme of polychromatic decoration and wall paintings of historical, biblical and legendary figures with portrait heads of well-known local residents and members of staff, by H. Bird and G.H.B. Holland of 1953. Early C18 small veined white marble octagonal font with moulded bowl on baluster, moulded plinth and black marble base. Polygonal stone pulpit with timber handrail to steps. Complete set of pitch pine pews, stalls and desks. Organ of 1905 in painted case. (Buildings of England, Northants, 1973, p385)

Record last edited

Jul 2 2014 10:50AM