Bell Tower - St Mary's Church, Monewden, Suffolk, IP13 7DA - Bell Towers on Waymarking.com

The parish church of St.Mary is a Grade II* listed building. There are some C11th or C12th fragments but the church is mainly c1300 with some C15th additions. Built of rubble and knapped flint, and rendered with ashlar dressings it has a brick and plain tile roof.

Internally the church was refurbished in c.1906 but not all the old fixtures were changed. Eleven benches to the nave are either wholly or partially of mediaeval date with poppyhead decoration, and the Rood staircase with both openings are still there. There is one of the few wooden chancel arches in Suffolk, at once simple and elegant, it draws the eye towards the excellent window of the Crucifixion, installed here after the Second World War as a memorial to those from the village who died fighting in that conflict.

The most imposing feature of this church is the west tower which appears to be of a style more suited to much larger parishes but the builders were using the most available materials, flint rubble for the walls and knapped flint covering with ashlar dressings. The nave and chancel are much simpler, rubble built and cement rendered. The church plan is very basic, an in-line chancel, nave, and west tower, the south-western porch is a C15th addition.

The tower is built on a slightly projecting plinth with an arcade of trefoil-headed flushwork panels around it and diagonal buttresses which have flushwork panels to their outer faces and die back via three offsets. The central west doorway has a richly-moulded ashlar surround with wave and bird-beak moulding with shields to the spandrels. The two-light west window above this has trefoil heads to the lights. There is a cusped lancet above this and a two-light belfry opening above a string course at the level of its sill and trefoil heads and dagger to apex. A further string course below the battlemented parapet has similar panels of flushwork tracery. The north and south faces are blank except for a similar belfry opening on each with a projecting canted staircase bay at right side of the south face. This has ashlar quoins. The east face abutts the nave body and a drip mould shows that the nave roof was higher or thatched at some time in the past, it has a belfry opening as well. There is a ring of six bells in the belfry cast by Mears and Stainbank in 1890 and hung for ringing in the English style. These are rung from a balcony erected in the tower and accessed from the spiral stair in the projecting canted bay.

The ring of six bells are hung in the church tower to enable ringing in the English style. They are rung from a balcony constructed in the tower and were placed here in 1890 having been cast by Mears & Stainbank at the Whitechapel Bell Foundry in London and cast using the metal from the three old bells which used to hang here. Further work by the Whitechapel Bell Foundry, the successor to Mears & Stainbank, in 1990 resulted in re-tuning and rehanging the bells in a new metal frame positioned below the old timber frame. Following is a table extracted from Dove's Guide for Church Bell Ringers showing the weights in kg, and sounding note of the bells.

          Bell    Weight     Note       Casting date         Founder
           1 	  155.58      G#           1890 	  Mears & Stainbank
           2 	  169.19      F# 	   1890 	  Mears & Stainbank
           3 	  195.04      E 	   1890 	  Mears & Stainbank
           4 	  204.57      D# 	   1890 	  Mears & Stainbank
           5 	  235.87      C# 	   1890 	  Mears & Stainbank
           6 	  301.64      B 	   1890 	  Mears & Stainbank

Mears & Stainbank cast bells at the Whitechapel Foundry from 1865 to 1968, the foundry having been started by Robert Chamberlain about 1420. The Mears family was involved from 1781 when Chapman & Mears cast bells. The succession of Mears founders included William, Thomas I, Thomas II, Charles and George. (Info from the Bell Founders Database).

The given co-ordinates are for the south porch.

Address of Tower: St Mary's Church Monewden, Suffolk UK IP13 7DA Still Operational: yes Number of bells in tower?: 6 Rate tower: Tours or visits allowed in tower?: Yes Relevant website?: Not listed

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