St Peter's Church, Stainforth

St Peter’s Church stands in the quiet village of Stainforth, North Yorkshire, beside the River Ribble. Built between 1839 and 1842, it replaced an earlier arrangement where the village belonged to St Alkelda’s parish in Giggleswick. Three sisters from the local gentry family, the Dawsons, promoted its construction. The Lancaster architect Edmund Sharpe designed the building in Perpendicular style. In 1873 the church was ‘thoroughly improved’ after its consecration by the Bishop of Ripon in September 1842. The church is made of squared rubble stone with ashlar dressings and slate roofs. Its plan includes a four-bay nave, a porch at the southeast corner, a single-bay chancel, a northeast vestry, and a west tower. The tower rises in three stages marked by string courses and buttresses at the corners. Carved heads decorate the top string course, and clock faces appear on the west and east sides. The nave bays are separated by buttresses, each containing a three-light window. William Wailes designed the stained glass in the east window, above which the Dawson family’s heraldic shield is displayed. Inside, visitors find a two-manual organ built by Nicholson and a ring of three bells cast in 1842 by Thomas Mears II at Whitechapel Bell Foundry. The chancel has a four-light east window and an embattled parapet, while the vestry disguises its chimney as a turret. Gargoyles crown the tower’s embattled parapet, and the whole building shows the careful craftsmanship of its period.