Fleet - All Saints Church with a very slight Jane Austen connection The photos on this page were taken in July 2014 Very sadly, the church was badly damaged by a fire in June 2015 Details Here |
||||
 |
||||
| This impressive monument in the
equally impressive church represents Charles Edward Lefroy (1810-61) and his wife
Janet Walker. He founded and paid for the church but died before it was
completed. He was a barrister and Secretary to the Speaker of the House
of Commons. Jane Austen met him when he was five years old and was uncertain about him. She wrote in a letter to her niece in 1815: " - we thought him a very fine boy, but terribly in want of Discipline. - I hope he gets a wholesome thump, or two, whenever it is necessary." (Jane Austen's Letters, ed. Deirdre Le Faye) More of the monument at the bottom of the page. |
||||
| Click photos
below to enlarge. Notes below in italics are from Hampshire and the Isle of Wight by Nikolaus Pevsner and David Lloyd (1967) Yale University Press, New Haven and London. |
||||
 |
||||
 |
||||
| ALL SAINTS, Church Road. By Burges, 1861-2, lengthened to the W in 1934 by A.J. Stedman (by two bays). ...The church is of red brick and externally astonishingly restrained. Good steep bellcote over the E end of the nave. Lower chancel and apse. Lancets and plate tracery all of brick. Most windows are leaded, those in the apse and west front are stained glass (see below). | ||||
 |
||||
| Tympana of Transfiguration over the N door (originally at the W) and of Christ in Majesty over the S door. Like the Lefroy monument probably by Thomas Nicholls. | ||||
 |
||||
 |
||||
| The interior is impressive by the great height of the nave, with the square brick pillars and the steep pointed transverse brick arches. Between them the vault is boarded. Much painted-on decoration of blue brick bands and geometrical ornamental motifs. | ||||
 |
||||
| Looking east from the chancel. Although the nave was extended west in 1934 the rose window of 1906 by A.L. Moore was retained. | ||||
 |
||||
| 1. North arcade 2. North aisle 3. The Organ | ||||
 |
||||
| The stained glass in the apse windows are by Clayton and Bell and dating from 1902. | ||||
 |
||||
 |
||||
| MONUMENT. C.E. Lefroy † 1861,
and wife (Janet Walker, died 1858). They were the donors of the
church. It was originally on the N side of the chancel. Recumbent
effigies under an arch with large carved angels. Watch for the two dogs
by the feet of the effigies. Lefroy is holding a model of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Born 1810, he was a barrister and became Secretary to the Speaker of the House of Commons. |
||||
| Map | ||||
