Branscombe No. 2

Noted in Pevsner (1952): "Font. Big, C15, with octagonal bowl with quatrefoil panels. Large leaves and a head to support the bowl. The pillar with blank tracery panels." 'A Guide to the Church of Saint Winifred Branscombe', by Ronald Branscombe, 1996, with a drawing of the font by Angela Lambert [e-text at www.geocities.com/Athens/2155/c20.html], informs that the church building was reported "in deplorable condition" by Beatrix Cresswell in 1905 [NB: besides her published works on Devon churches, Cresswell provided Kate M. Clarke with a collection of 150 font pencil drawings for Clarke's work on Devon fonts that was published in the Transactions of the Devonshire Association... between 1913 and 1922]. Branscombe further informs that a restoration was carried out in 1911: "With Saint Winifred's now restored to something approaching its former glory, the problem of the lost Norman font remained. The poor earthen basin had outserved its use after three hundred and fifty years, and the Reverend Puddicombe's fluted pedestal, described in 1906 by local church historian Elijah Chick as 'peculiar', had been consigned to the new boiler-house, where it was employed as support. So it was cause for celebration when a fifteenth century stone basin was offered as a gift by East Teignmouth parish. It had been found buried beneath the original floor of that church which, as we have seen, may have been a sister church in design to Saint Winifred's, seven hundred years before. It has an octagonal bowl with four-leafed panels, with large leaves and a head to support the bowl. The pillar is modern." [cf. Index entry for Branscombe No. 3 for the "peculiar" font relegated to the boiler-room -- cf. Index entry for East Teignmouth for another font of about the same period in that church]