St Leonard's Church, Downham

The church is built in sandstone with a slate roof. Its plan consists of a nave and chancel under a continuous roof, a south chapel, a north organ chamber, a south aisle, a south porch, and a west tower. The tower has diagonal buttresses, and a west door with a moulded surround and a pointed head. Above it is a three-light window with a Tudor arched head.[1] The window contains Perpendicular tracery.[2] Above the windows the bell openings have two lights and pointed heads, and at the top of the tower is an embattled parapet with corner pinnacles and gargoyles. The windows of the south aisle have three lights, and the eastern bay is gabled.[1] The parapet of the aisle is embattled.[2] The outer and inner doors of the porch have chamfered jambs and pointed arches. The east window has five lights and a Tudor arched head.[1]

Inside the church the arcade between the nave and the aisle has three bays and pointed arches. The chancel arch is also pointed and is chamfered. The nave and chancel have barrel roofs. The font is in sandstone, it is octagonal in the style of the 16th-century, and on its sides are shields. One shield is carved with the Legs of Man, another with a chevron and three fleur-de-lis, and the others are blank.[1] In the church is a brass chandelier in Baroque shape. The stained glass in the east window was given by Ralph and Richard Assheton of Downham Hall in 1869, and has been re-set by Shrigley and Hunt. Shrigley and Hunt also designed a window depicting Saint Leonard, and dating from the early 20th century. The monuments almost all commemorate members of the Assheton family, and include one by Richard Westmacott to Frances Arabella Assheton, who died in 1835.[2] The two-manual pipe organ was built by Forster and Andrews and moved here from Meols in 1909.[3] There is a ring of five bells. Two of these date from about 1480 and were cast in London. The others were cast by John Taylor & Co, two in 1881 and the other in 1948.[4]