The nave would have been divided from the chancel, where the choir stalls are, by a screen. The stone angel corbels which jut from the walls at this point are each missing a wing where a beam would have been, perhaps topped by a crucifix and statues.

Royal Coats of Arms

There are two. That over the main door on the south side is Tudor and comes from Sandsfoot Castle, the ruins of which overlook Portland Harbour. The painted one, on the west wall of the north aisle, is of King George I. Canny church officials made it serve two more Georges, first painting in the 'II', and then adding a third 'I', and ignoring the fact that the arms themselves changed!

This is perpendicular in style, of the same date as the church. So many thousands of babies, and a good numbers of adults, too, have been baptized into the Christian faith in it. The font originally stood in the nave between the two doors.

At the opposite end of the south aisle is the altar dedicated to Our Lady, the Blessed Virgin Mary, mother of Jesus. The altar, and the screen behind it, the reredos, were put in place about 1950. A white light burns here, indicating the presence of the Reserved Sacrament, the bread from holy communion, kept for taking to the sick and dying.

At either side of the chancel steps are the lectern and pulpit. The lectern is in the form of a brass eagle, its outstretched wings to support the bible, and carrying the good news over the world beneath its feet. The teaching ministry of the church is exercised from the stone pulpit opposite.

These form a memorial to those killed in the Second World War, some of whose names are carved here.

The main door appears to be the original one, consisting of planks, vertical on the outside, horizontal on the inside, roughly nailed together.

Just inside is a badly damaged holy water stoup, which would have contained the water the faithful used to bless themselves with as they entered the church.

There are niches in the porch, above the door, and above the entrance to the porch. These would have contained statues, destroyed in reformation times.

Corbels

The corbel heads in the aisles are nearly all of Early English period and came from the building that the present church replaced and are mainly of secular subjects. An interesting one in the south aisle, to the east of the main door is of a workman carrying a hod, and gives a good idea of the dress of those times. Another one on the nave side of the south arcade almost over the font, is of a mason carrying a mason's tool (Maul) under his arm. By the tower arch on its north side , is a very interesting corbel indeed. It represents a dog with a bone in its mouth. This corbel is probably Norman and is probably the only evidence that a Norman church once stood on the site.

Mason with Maul

Dog with Bone

The splendid west tower, for centuries a landmark for sailors in Lyme Bay, contains a ring of eight bells. The heaviest weighs in at over 16 hundredweight (0.8 tonne), the lightest 42 hundredweight. When the church was consecrated there were just four bells, these being confiscated by the Crown a hundred years later. The present ring was recast by Taylors of Loughborough in 1891.

The churchyard contains a number of mass burials of those lost at sea. Among them are eighty of those who drowned when the East Indiaman, the Earl of Abergavenny, sank in Weymouth Bay in 1805. Her captain, John Wordsworth, brother of the poet William, was buried away from the others to the south of the church, although there is no surviving stone on his grave.

A memorial was erected inside the church adjacent to the North Door, by the Wordsworth Trust in February 2005, in memory of John Wordsworth and  to mark the 200th Anniversary of the sinking of the Earl of Abergavenny.

A stone on the grave of a young smuggler, William Lewis, is reputed to have inspired the novel Moonfleet, set on this coast.

In the east churchyard is buried William Thompson, who is credited with taking the first underwater photograph in 1856.

The church serves a parish of about 8,000 people, who still come here to be baptized, married and buried.

The church is not just a beautiful building, it is also a living and worshipping community. Services are held most days subject to the Rectors availability. On Fridays there is a communion service at 10.30 am. On Sundays the main services are at 8.00 am and 9.30am. Full details can be found on the weekly notice sheets available in church. Visitors are very welcome to join us.