Details
HERTFORD
TL3313NW ST LEONARD'S ROAD, Bengeo
817-1/14/289 (South side)
10/02/50 Church of St Leonard
GV I
Anglican church. C12, alterations C13 to C15, C18 porch, late
C19 and early C20 restoration.
MATERIALS: flint rubble with ashlar, clunch and Barnack stone
long and short quoins and red brick stitching, traceried stone
windows. Porch of Flemish bond red brickwork. Clay tiled roofs
with curved east apsidal end, and C19 wooden bellcote, with
moulded framing, trefoil heads, pierced trefoil openings in
lower panels and tall pyramidal shingled roof, with 1 small
lucarne on each face, and with iron finial.
PLAN: simple 2-cell plan, nave and chancel with curved apsidal
east end.
EXTERIOR: south elevation has a 2-light C17 window, 2-lights
with elliptical heads, moulded brick jambs and dripmould. To
right C14 2-light window with ogee tracery and mouchettes,
flat head with moulded dripmould. Chancel windows C13, 1 flat
head, 1 lancet either side and above C15 priest's door with
low 4 centred arch, blocked with red brickwork with stone
panel dated '1889'. Large 2-light C15 window with traceried
cusped quatrefoil heads, and flat dripmould, small lancet east
window with long and short jambs, single blocked round-arched
Norman window on north wall of chancel.
North wall of nave has single altered C12 window and early C20
north doorway with red brick jambs. Tudor arch with ashlar
kneelers; three light C15 west window.
INTERIOR: south porch has earlier roof structure than its C18
exterior brickwork, C15 paired rafters originally with pegged
collars. South doorway has C12 imposts with rough pilasters
with roll moulded caps, and remains of 2 incised mass dials,
Barnack stone lintel, semicircular headed arch internally, C14
battened door with original iron hinges and handles.
Nave with C19 collared roof, west end with arch bracing. C12
chancel arch with colonnettes and roll moulded round head,
internal piers with splayed caps, mutilated at lower level in
C18, allegedly to accommodate the box pew of Thomas Hall of
Goldings. Paintings on wall of chancel arch discovered 1938,
C13 representation of Deposition from the Cross, with figures
of the Virgin, Joseph of Arimathaea and Nicodemus, with
fragmentary 4 leaf patterns on the opposite wall.
Chancel 2 steps down from nave. Chancel with apsidal end, C12
east window with C13 outer square head and rebated jambs, on
north of blocked C12 window, with remains of Anchorite's cell
and squint below. On south wall the east inner jamb of the
2-light window is C13, the remainder C15 carried down to form
a sedilia. Piscina C13 with roll moulded pointed arch, with
sill formed from part of stone coffin lid. Crown post roof
over chancel with octagonal post with moulded base and caps,
and curved boarded ceilings. Walls have a fragmentary painted
pattern of masonry blocks, with lozenges in red and white. At
east end panel of C14 encaustic tiles, recovered when the C18
vault, dug for the families of Goldings, was opened in 1882;
the designs are comparable with those at Much Hadham.
Communion rails c1700, vase balusters, heavy moulded rail.
MONUMENTS: John Byde 1665 Alderman and Sheriff of London,
mural tablet with broken scrolled pediment, reset from
Shoreditch church 1736, William Stanton artist. Humphrey Hall,
1695, obelisk with armorial cartouche, profile medallion held
by modelled putti, Thomas Adey, artist. Daniel Minet FRS 1790,
a modest wall tablet by Nollekens, and a tablet to Martha
Hirst, 1756, and Rev William Hirst, 1760, Master of Hertford
Grammar School, Vicar of Bengeo and Rector of Sacombe. 3
framed hatchments, 2 in nave, 1 in chancel.
HISTORICAL NOTE: St Leonard's Church is named after a French
saint d.559. The church was held by the de Tany family in C12,
and was given to the Priory of Bermondsey, remaining their
property until the Dissolution. The church passed to the Byde,
and Fanshawe families and in 1846 the Abel Smiths of Woodhall
purchased the rectorial tithes and turned the living into a
rectory.
(Victoria History of the Counties of England: Hertfordshire:
London: 1902-1912: 426-7; Royal Commission on Historical
Monuments (England): An Inventory of the Historical Monuments
of Hertfordshire: London: 1910-: 49-50; Pevsner N: Buildings
of England: Hertfordshire: Harmondsworth: 1977-: 93; Page FM:
History of Hertford: Hertford: 1993-: 57; Hertfordshire
Countryside: Wood J: Bengeo's Norman Church is virtually
intact: 1970-: 36-8; St Leonard's Church Bengeo).
Listing NGR: TL3301813638
