HISTORY
A chart on the wall in the Nave lists all the Rectors of Odcombe - 41 of them - from the year 1245 to the present. Unfortunately we do not have much information on the early Church, although an idea of the old building can be obtained from the drawings of the pre 1870 Church which are displayed in the vestry.
Although the ground floor plan of the Church before restoration was much smaller, there may have been a gallery, for in 1851 a Faculty was granted to "take down and remove the present Communion Rails and Screen in the Chancel, and the Pulpit, Reading Desk and Clerks Desk, Font and the whole of the pews and seats on the Ground Floor, and to erect and set up Communion Rails and a Pulpit, Reading Desk and Font and repew or reseat the whole of the Ground Floor ...whereby thirty additional sittings will be obtained, twenty six of which will be free and unappropriated" The emphasis on "the Ground Floor" suggests there must have been a gallery or first floor. We know that prior to the installation of the organ, music was provided by a band, which would have played from this upper level.
At the time these changes were being made the Chancel screen was taken down, and there can be seen on the Chancel arch the 'filling-in' where the fixings for the screen once were.
Even with 30 extra seats, the church was apparently too small to cope with the congregation twenty years later, hence the major reconstruction
Even with 30 extra seats, the church was apparently too small to cope with the congregation twenty years later, hence the major reconstruction
So, in 1870 the Incumbent, George Bale, coming to the end of a long stint in the Parish (he became Rector in 1836) decided to have it enlarged at his own expense.
He engaged an architect from London, whose ideas were adopted and put into effect. The Church was virtually pulled down, except for the tower and the porch, and was rebuilt to the new plan, using the old materials as far as possible. Unfortunately all the old woodwork, except for the font cover and the altar table - now the vestry table - was removed and given away . Mr Aubrey Fisher, who used to live at Carlton House, Lower Odcombe, recalls being told by his grandfather that the octagonal dining table they used on special occasions was originally the sounding board above the pulpit! Otherwise, apart from a pair of coffin stools which are probably over 300 years old, there is no trace of the original roof timbers or other wooden furnishings.