Westmeston

In his novel After My Fashion, set in West Sussex, Powys describes the church at Littlegate in terms which might apply to many Sussex churches.

'...one of those typical smaller Sussex churches...with the little squat erection, half-tower, half-spire, like an extinguisher upon an extinguished candle, plumped down upon its west end. [...] It was certainly the roof of the church, high-tilted and sweeping down almost to the ground, that gave the building its character.'

Westmeston is not Littlegate, which seems to be based on a number of places near Arundel and Chichester. But in his unpublished work set in East Sussex, written while he was living at Court House, Powys describes Godbarrow church, nestling under the Downs at Godbarrow Beacon and having narrow lancet windows, large buttresses, a square spire at the base narrowing to a weathervane at its point, a wooden porch, brick steps up from the road and the remains of a vast yew-tree in the churchyard.

Other churches in the area have one or more of these features, but Westmeston, which nestles under the Downs at Ditchling Beacon, seems to combine them all, including the tree: a large yew-tree in the churchyard was blown down in 1882. Its remains would have been noticeable in Powys's day and can still be identified today.

 

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