Stradbroke

All Saints, Stradbroke

The imposing tower of Stradbroke. Phipson did rather a good job of preserving the De La Pole's finest moment.

Stradbroke is perhaps the least well-known of Suffolk's small towns. But it has a busy, independent air, with its shops, school, library and leisure centre. It reminds me of places of a similar size in France.

The church is in the centre of town, a large, imposing building. The 15th century tower, with its raised stair turret, is visible from miles away. Niches flank the west window, other windows build via a bell window to high battlements.

It is one of Suffolk's biggest towers, probably because this was the parish of the De La Poles, now sleeping peacefully at Wingfield. Simon Cotton found a bequest for a new bell in 1428, which usually followed hot on the heels of a new tower, so is probably a good date.

I have to say that I was in a fairly foul mood when I arrived here, having found Syleham, Denham and Wingfield all locked against me. But All Saints was open, and I stepped into a most welcoming interior that cheered me up no end.

The vicar in the second half of the 19th century was the formidable J.C. Ryle, the famous protestant evangelical. He had a curious enthusiasm for plastering any available space with quotations from the bible.

His are the Soviet-style slogans at Helmingham, designed to keep any Tractarian tendency of the Tollemaches in its place.

Here, his work is rather more subtle, and aesthetically sound, on the chancel arch and roofbeams.

They were painted as part of a major restoration of the 1870s. The architect was R.M. Phipson, fresh from his complete rebuilding of Ipswich St Mary le Tower; this church is on a similar scale, although the exterior is pretty much intact, apart from a thorough refurbishment.

Above, the chancel arch. Below, roof beams.

Below the tower, there is a dramatic picture of the interior during this restoration, a reminder of just how drastic some of these makeovers were. Ryle and Phipson reduced All Saints to a gaping shell.

Consequently, not much survives of the medieval liturgical integrity, except the font, which still retains its dedicatory inscription, and an amazing niche in the sanctuary. Mortlock feels it was probably an Easter sepulchre, but I don't see why it can't just have been a niche.

Other points of interest include a large number of ledger stones at the west end of the nave. One is to two parents, who both died at the age of 25, "leaving two infants too young to be sensible of their loss".

Also of interest are the altar frontal and hangings in the south aisle chapel, beautiful designs of wild flowers weorked by a one-armed curate, a delightful contrast with the stern puritanism of J.C. Ryle's chancel.

Stradbroke's most famous son was the loony xenophobe Robert Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln in the 13th century. He was lionised after the Reformation for, supposedly, standing up to the Pope; in fact, he aligned his diocese with the Barons rather than the King, and thus creamed off money that would have gone to Rome via the Crown.

Above: An amazingly ornate niche in the sanctuary, a testimony to the patronage of the De La Poles.

Left: The flower frontal.

He became fabulously rich, as did his crony Simon De Montford, who led the landed nobles against Henry III in the Barons' War. Barmy old Arthur Mee, in his The King's England, treats Grosseteste as some sort of all-round Great Englishman and proto-Protestant hero; mind you, Mee seems to think that Foxe's Book of Martyrs was a work of great humanity. The church that Grosseteste knew, and was baptised in, was not this one, but was probably on the same site.

The font step, with its dedicatory inscription to "Johannes Smyth et Joanne Rouse".

J. C. Ryle left here to become first Anglican Bishop of Liverpool; the logolatrous mark of his sleeves-rolled-up Muscular Christianity survives here.

But the flower festival that had just finished suffused the air with a smell like incense, which would have appalled him, I'm sure. It cheered me up no end, although the pretty blonde girl who came and chatted to me as I was taking photographs also helped.

Memo to churchwardens: such a presence in your church virtually guarantees you a good write-up.

All Saints, Stradbroke, is located in the centre of the town, which will be found halfway along the B1118 Hoxne to Laxfield road. The church was open.

J.C. Ryle's logolatrous sanctuary should send you all diving for your dictionaries.