St Leonard’s Charlecote

My wife & I went to visit the house a month or so back and one of the first things I noticed going through the village was the Church so I persuaded her to let me visit after going round the house.

The church stands on the site of an earlier 12th century church on the edge of Charlecote Park. Most notable thing is it contains the Lucy Family Vault which dates back to 1595

The church as you see it when walking in the entrance to the churchyard

The west end where you enter the church and the rose window above

The south side with the belltower & spire

another view showing the south side of the church with the wonderful spire on the belltower

 Going inside the first thing you see is this view down the nave

 Then going into the chancel with its arched ceiling

 The altar with floral display and simple wooden cross. The East wall is decorated with an inscription on 

Look up and see this view of the beautiful stained glass window

Looking you you can see the wonderful arched ceiling. Over to the left is the Lucy Vault

 Where the remains of the Lucy Family dating back to 1500 are interred

These are some wonderful effigy's

This one has the graving  widow knelt by her husband

Sir Thomas Lucy is behind the pillars here. He died after falling off his horse

which is depicted here on the panel you see to the left

 He is leaning watching over his wife

There is a nice stained glass window in the Vault with scripture either side

There is certainly some very nice stained glass through out the church












  



Showing various scenes from the life of Jesus and some of the saints










 

 But the rose window in the west end is the most impressive

View of the choir stalls from the pulpit















The Nave looking from the pulpit

  Going back out to the churchyard you see these graves nearby

Round the north side are three tombs I presume of the one family

Further along older headstones can be seen

Going to the south side you see a mixture of old and new headstones

and if you look up you can see Gargoyles and Grotesques

On the corner a couple of angels

 This Grieving  woman was striking

The east end of the churchyard looked to have the oldest headstones 

Looking across to the west end of the churchyard

Have a wonderful weekend