"The circular tower of this church is, probably, as ancient as the reign of Edward the Confessor, and a careful survey of its interior will amply repay the student of ecclesiastical architecture. It was much damaged some years ago, by lightning, which split the walls, and melted all the bells but one, which remains the solitary occupant of the belfry.
It appears by the churchwardens' books that a large bell was made for this tower in 1566, which cost £8. 10s., and weighed 25 cwt., except 10lbs. It was sold in 1755 by John Meen and William Pell for £82. 7s. 6d., and the produce applied towards enlarging the church. The octangular parapet of this ancient tower is enriched with eight shields bearing the armorial cognizances of Bigot, Brotherton, Montacute, Beauchamp, Westminster, Edward the Confessor, Bury, or Norwich See, and Spencer, Bishop of Norwich. Some of them commemorate families and individuals once powerful here.
The church to which this tower is attached exhibits marks of considerable antiquity; but neither its keeping nor condition can merit commendation. It comprises a very lofty nave, divided from a south aisle by clustered columns with plain moulded capitals, which sustain pointed arches. This aisle was probably erected by the Bardolphs, as their arms are cut in stone on its western angle.
There are two very lofty and wide windows, which occupy the greater part of the north wall of the nave. They contain perpendicular tracery; as do the other lights in the church, except the east window, which is below criticism.
The ruins of the chancel were removed in 1754, or the following year. The part of the church now used as such is deemed a chancel only, as appears by the churchwardens' books. Before the chancel was ruinated, a screen was erected about 1558; for in that year the 'Churchreeves' paid to Robert Bateman for timber, work, and meat, for making a partition between the church and chancel, 13s. 4d. It is said that this chancel perished by fire.
The only elegant fitting now in this edifice is the pulpit, which is finely carved out of brown oak, and dates as high as Queen Elizabeth's reign. In the Churchreeve's books is a charge of 5s. paid in 1558 "for making the pulpit;" but I think this could scarcely have been completed, even then, for so small a sum.
This church possesses no font, its use being supplied by a wooden moveable stool; though there is little cause, perhaps, to lament its disappearance, disreputable as is its successor. It could not have been very elegant, for we learn, from the authority above quoted, that in 1558 the churchwardens "paid the mason and his lad for 3 days work making the font, wages and meat, 3s. 9d." In the centre of the church is a large faculty pew, now the property of Mrs. Barlee, but granted in 1705 to her ancestor, Gregory Clarke, and his successors for ever, as proprietor and occupier of a mansion near Duke's-bridge. The gallery over gallery erected at the end of the nave of this church shows how serious an injury the pew system has proved to the interests of religion. Before the Reformation the two parishes of St. Mary and Trinity buried their dead in Trinity church-yard, the former parish having no cemetery; the present burial ground being then the private property of the Priory. The public road, which now separates the two church-yards, was a foot-path only till within a very few years, and has been abstracted from Trinity church-yard. No hole can be dug in this road without disturbing human bones, and there is reason to think that the garden which now abuts upon the south side of Trinity church was once also a receptacle for the dead."
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