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1st window – the old & original window
- Trumpeter astride a hobby horse, believed to be Flemish, 16th century
- Located in the West window of the nave
2nd window
- Trumpeter astride a hobby horse, late 20th century copy of the original
- Located in the cloisters
West window of the nave
- Old ‘bicycle window‘
- World War Two memorial
- Diocese of Oxford official blazon
Cloisters window
- Modern (2nd) ‘bicycle window’ was fitted to replace the gap left when the original was moved to the West window of the nave
- Fragments of glass inserted over different centuries, some added were repairs
- One fragment of glass has the date of 1642
A visual comparison from the early 20th century to the early 21st century of the panel containing a ‘bicycle window’ in the cloisters
Why such fine stained glass in a village church?
It is rare for a village church to have high quality old stained glass in cloisters.
Throughout the centuries there have been very wealthy Lords of the Manor owning the surrounding Stoke Park estate.
The Parish has had other wealthy residents living in substantial properties.
A lot of the stained glass came from the adjacent Manor house.
The Manor house was built in 1555 for Francis Hastings, 2nd Earl of Huntingdon. His stone effigy is in Ashby de la Zouch Parish Church.
In Elizabethan times the Manor house had been lived in by Sir Edward Coke: England’s first Lord Chief Justice. The monument to him is in the adjacent Stoke Park.
Both the Hastings family and Coke left their mark with stained glass