Church of St Morwenna and St John The Baptist, Morwenstow - Fittings and Furniture

Fittings and Furniture

The pew ends are carved with Gothic tracery above Renaissance arabesques. One pew end is inscribed with "T.K.", for Rev. Thomas Kempthorne, who was vicar from 1539 to 1594; another has the date of 1575. The Norman font is roughly shaped with ropework decoration beneath a plain bowl. The pulpit dates from the 20th century and incorporates some earlier woodwork as blind tracery. The chancel screen which was initially constructed by Parson Hawker was removed after his death and then replaced in 1908. It is made from fragments of 16th and 17th carving. In the chancel is a large reredos dated 1908 which was designed by E. H. Sedding and carved by the Pinwill sisters of Plymouth. It contains a cartoon by Giovanni Battista Piazzetta and three engravings by John-Baptist Jackson. In the south wall of the chancel is a piscina and on the north wall is a fragment of a mural painting dating from the late 15th or early 16th century. The painting depicts a female holding a scroll in her left hand with her right arm raised in blessing over a kneeling monk and is thought to represent St Morwenna. In the church are a number of tomb chests and memorials. One of the memorials is a large slate plate in the floor beside the pulpit to the memory of Hawker's first wife, Charlotte, who died in 1863. At the west end of the church is a 17th-century communion table. In the south aisle is the Hawker memorial window by Lavers and Westlake which was erected in 1904. It depicts Parson Hawker and his dog, the church and various other features associated with him.