St Andrew, Hasketon

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The narrow lanes north west of Woodbridge thread through high banks of spring mallow and angelica, now and then coming together at honest, working villages, straight out of the pages of Akenfield.. They are independent of each other, and often known for something. In Hasketon's case, it is the Turk's Head, its fine pub. Otherwise, this is not a village on the way to anywhere in particular. On visits over the years I have often not passed a soul as I head up from Great Bealings or down from Boulge. But Hasketon has one remarkable feature, for St Andrew has England's tallest church round tower, with its flint-set lancets and octagonal top. The scale makes the church against it seem small, but you step into a commanding space, aisleless but wide and full of light.

In several ways, this is a typical Suffolk village church. Not much evidence of its medieval life survives, but the restoration has left a pleasing, light interior. One reminder of earlier days is the early 16th century font with its angels and shields. It seems unlikely that they could be in such good condition without being recut, but the reliefs are so deep that it may simply be that they could be plastered over by the reformers without any need to knock them flush. This would have happened only a few decades after the font was made, and only revealed a couple of centuries after.

The decorative heraldic glass on the south side of the nave is interesting for being early 19th Century and pre-ecclesiological. There is also some decent later 19th century glass in the chancel by Lavers, Barraud and Westlake.

Two memorials catch the eye. One is in brightly painted alabaster and touchstone, full of the grandeur of the late 17th Century. It is to William Godstone and his two sons, merchants of the Greek city of Smyrna, the modern Izmir in Turkey. The other is host to an early 17th century elegy, typical of its period. It remembers William Farrar, who died on the eve of the English Civil War at the age of 15, and reads in part If on his yeares you looke, hee dyd but younge, If on his vertues, then hee lived long. He was the son of the rector. A modern memorial in the chancel is also worth a look, because it remembers two Wait brothers aged 19 and 21 who were killed just six weeks apart in the First World War.

A panel of 20th Century glass in the porch depicts a man in a monk's habit playing the organ. There is no inscription. A tribute to a former organist? Most curious. Stepping outside, the crowded churchyard is surrounded on all sides by hedges and roads. Two footpaths cross it, and seem to be in regular use as people walk from one part of Hasketon to another. St Andrew must feel at the heart of their village.

Simon Knott, February 2020

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