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Brantham is border country.
The rather industrial village straggles
down to the muddy Stour, and on the far
bank sits the fine Essex town of
Manningtree. The busy Ipswich to
Manningtree road funnels through Brantham
and is rather unpleasant, I'm afraid.
This is not cycling country. But the
church is away from it, tucked among
cottages in a little lane, and you
wouldn't know any different. The
most striking sight as you approach St
Michael is E.S. Prior's wonderful Arts
and Crafts lychgate, all curves and
dynamic tension. It is quite different to
his other Suffolk piece at Kelsale.
It really is a beautiful object, and
would grace any church. St Michael looks
attractive behind it, a pleasant village
church, despite being thoroughly
Hakewilled in 1869. E.C. Hakewill was one
of the 19th century's less distinguished
architects; his work is sound, but not
outstanding. Typical Hakewill churches
include Shottisham
and the old part of Rushmere
St Andrew. His most familiar
motif is a north aisle
which slopes down under the nave roof to
within five feet of the ground; there's
one at Shottisham and at Rushmere, and
there's one here, too. Hakewill reset
headstops from medieval windows rather
oddly at the west end of the south aisle,
and his little vestry tucked in at the
other end of that aisle is really rather
lovely.
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E.S. Prior's lychgate is, perhaps,
an unlikely adornment for Hakewill's work, but is
drawn into unity by the churchyard wall, also
Prior's design, which incorporates a funny little
gate and then runs along the edge of the steeply
banked graveyard close to the western face of the
tower. St Michael has a
fine setting, sitting squarely in its wide
graveyard, the tower peering to gaze westwards
out across the graveyard extension. The lower
part of the tower is still pretty much all its
medieval self, the upper part Hakewill's. I like
the jaunty figure of St Michael on the wind vane.
This church is proudly, militantly
open every day, and you step into a plasantly
rustic interior, miles better than the 19th
century restoration a few miles off at Stratford St Mary. The hand
of Hakewill is a light one here. He reset a piscina and image
niche inside the church, possibly not in their
original places. He also reset some fragments of
medieval glass. The 19th and early 20th century
glass is generally good: that in the west window
beneath the tower is later than that to the east.
| Another striking 19th
century feature is the magnificent pair
of corbel
angels either side of the chancel arch.
One is St Michael, the other St Gabriel.
Their style is reminiscent of the 1890s
drawings of Beardsley and Mackintosh,
although it reminded me even more of the
work of the Glasgow artist Alasdair Gray.
The pulpit is also in an Arts and Crafts
style, but was the work of a
parishioner.This church has a painting by
John Constable which used to stand behind
the altar. It was one of three local
church pieces (the others were for
neighbouring Manningtree, and Nayland,
the best). This one shows Christ
welcoming the children, and hangs on the
south chancel wall - or, at least, a copy
of it does. The original has long since
gone elsewhere. The
grand organ pipes above the north doorway
are an unusual feature, and the lectern
remembers Captain Charles Berjew Brooke, son of Charles Berjew Brooke
and Maud Gwenddolen Brooke, of Colne
House, Brantham, Suffolk. Their son was
one of many Suffolk soldiers killed on
the 1st July 1916, the first day of the
Battle of the Somme. He was mown down
while leading his men into battle. He was
just 21 years old.
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