St Mary, Benhall

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You step into a charming interior of brick floors and box pews clustered under a gallery. They came with a major restoration of 1841-42 paid for by the Reverend Edmund Hollond of Benhall Lodge. His is the impressive broken column memorial of 1900 on the south side of the chancel. The nave is furnished entirely in the pre-ecclesiological Georgian style. This restoration also brought a birdbath font, and the 17th Century pulpit was rather awkwardly integrated into the pews. As James Bettley pointed out in his revision of the Buildings of England volume for East Suffolk, it has unfortunately been grained to match them. The narrow nave can feel rather crowded, but beyond the pulpit the interior opens out into the chancel, an effective transition. Two figure brasses to the Duke family of c1600 are now under the blue carpet. But perhaps the most striking feature of the nave is the imposing organ set on the north side, backing on to a transept, from which the previously mentioned room extends to the east. These also came in the 1840s restoration, and are an unusual survival because the eastern part is the former parish schoolroom. It's now used as a meeting room, and along with the transept is not normally accessible to visitors. James Bettley records that there is a gallery within the transept facing into the nave, another most unusual survival ,but that since the installation of the organ in the 1970s it has been hidden.

The imposing memorial on the north side of the chancel records the genealogy of the Duke family from the 16th Century through to Sir Edward Duke, the 5th Baronet, who died in 1732. There is no coloured glass to speak of other than four shields in the upper lights of the east window, and on a sunny day the open space of the chancel is filled with light, a dramatic contrast with the crowding of the nave. Nothing medieval has survived here, but Simon Cotton records a bequest of 1508 made by one Simon Jeffrey of 20d that my goostly father for to syng v masses of the v woundes of our Lord Iesus Crist here. Hard to imagine now.

At the time of the 1851 Census of Religious Worship, Benhall church was in the care of a curate, James Stuart, who was in receipt of £80 a year (about £16,000 in today's money) and all fees, as well as having the benefit of a field. The Vicar of Benhall since 1810 had been the Reverend John Mitford, who was also the rector at Stratford St Andrew and at Weston, an example of the plurality that the Anglican revival was slowly getting rid of. His income from his three parishes was a little under £750 a year, roughly £150,000 in today's money. As the return for Benhall noted, he resided here and in London, and he was a literary man. In fact, he was the editor of the Gentleman's Magazine and, among other things, a popular edition of the works of Thomas Gray. His death in 1859 brought the plurality to an end.