The article discusses two Suffolk churches, St George and Stowlangtoft, and their Victorian restorations. The author notes that when entering a medieval church that underwent restoration in the 19th century, we are encountering a Victorian vision of the medieval, even when the furnishings are medieval. St George is a large church that was all rebuilt in the late 14th century and contains beautiful perpendicular windows. The broken tracery in the church’s wall appears to be from the original church that the late 14th-century church replaced. The font in Stowlangtoft church is from the early 14th century and features a Saint on seven of the panels, including St Margaret, St Catherine, St Peter, and St Paul, as well as St George. Mortlock dates the font, which appears mutilated, to the early 14th century. The article notes that fonts were plastered over in Elizabethan times, and only relief that stood proud of the plaster was mutilated. The author believes that the font was removed from the church, probably in the mid-17th century, and served an outdoor purpose until it was returned in the 19th century.
The article notes that Samuel Rickards, Rector of Stowlangtoft for almost the middle forty years of the 19th century, transformed Stowlangtoft church. He got the great Ipswich woodcarver Henry Ringham to restore, replicate, and complete the marvelous set of bench ends. However, some of the bench ends appear to be from a different group than others, and the article questions whether Rickards found some of these bench ends elsewhere. The author believes that Rickards may have counterfeited the church’s medieval inheritance, as the faux-medieval roundels in the windows of the nave are clearly not medieval at all, but were in fact the work of the young Lucy Rickards, daughter of Samuel Rickards himself.
Despite the Victorian restorations, there are some truly medieval things in the churches, including the vast St Christopher wall-painting still discernible on the north wall at Stowlangtoft church. The bench ends in Stowlangtoft church are medieval, as is the fine rood-screen dado, albeit repainted. Additionally, there is some medieval figure glass in the upper tracery of some of the windows, including St Agnes holding a lamb and four Old Testament prophets. The article concludes by noting that the laughable stone pulpit in Stowlangtoft church is Rickard’s commission, and the work of William White, and wonders what Rickards could have been thinking of. Overall, the article highlights the complex and often contradictory nature of the restoration of medieval churches in the Victorian era.
Posted by Simon Knott on 2018-02-13 10:33:21