George Fellowes Prynne

George Halford Fellowes Prynne (2 April 1853–7 May 1927) was a Victorian and Edwardian English church architect.^[1] Part of the High Church school of Gothic Revival Architecture, Prynne's work can be found across Southern England.^[2]

George Halford Fellowes Prynne was born on 2 April 1853 at Wyndham Square, Plymouth, Devon. He was the second son of the Rev. George Rundle Prynne and Emily Fellowes, daughter of Rear Admiral Sir Thomas Fellowes.^[3] He was raised High Anglican; his father who was the perpetual curate of St. Peter and The Holy Apostles church in Plymouth. His elder brother was the painter Edward Arthur Fellowes Prynne. George studied at St Mary's College, Harlow and St Andrew's Academy in Chardstock then, after briefly studying to enter the Church, went instead to Eastman’s Royal Naval Academy at Southsea.^[1][3]

Prynne's family was not wealthy and found his education to be expensive. In 1871, aged 18, Prynne sailed America to work with a cousin who had taken land, and spent two years farming in the western states of America. Here, he learned about building log houses, barns and a brick and wooden house. But finding the work "trying and severe", he travelled to Toronto and was appointed to the role of Junior Assistant in the office of architect Richard Cunningham Windeyer. Windeyer helped Prynne further his studies and, by 1875, he had gained a senior position. ^[4][5]

Also in 1875, Prynne received an offer of employment from the architect George Edmund Street, an English ecclesiastical architect who had begun his career thanks to Prynne's father.^[4] Prynne returned to England and, after a year at Street's firm, went back to school, studying at the Royal Academy of Arts for two years. After graduating in 1878, he went to work for Swinfen Harris, Robert Jewell Withers, Alfred Waterhouse, and at the London School Board offices. He commenced independent practice in 1879. Prynne became Architect to the Diocese of Oxford from 1913.^[5]

Prynne designed many parish churches in England, mostly in the southeast and southwest, and almost always on a grand scale of high church Gothic Revival architecture. He also undertook significant restoration work, and in all is said to have been designed or restored over 200 buildings. Examples include All Saints Church, West Dulwich^[6] and St Peter’s, Budleigh Salterton.^[7]

Prynne collaborated extensively with his brother Edward Arthur Fellowes Prynne who provided artwork for a number of the architect's churches. This includes St Peter’s Church Staines, which possesses Edward Arthur Fellowes Prynne windows of remarkable quality and beauty.^[8] Other examples include altar panels at Holy Trinity, Roehampton, and St Mary, East Grinstead, and a reredos at St Mary the Virgin Church, Hayes,^[9] where both brothers Prynne are now buried.^[10]

Prynne married Bertha Geraldine Bradbury in June 1882 in Wandsworth, London. They lived at Bloomsbury, then Kensington and, finally, Ealing, with a country residence near Exeter. They had two daughters and five sons, two of whom were killed in action in World War I.^[11][12]

Their son Harold Fellowes Prynne, ARIBA, (1892–1984) spent several years working as a commerical illustrator in Madras before becoming an architect. He worked as the architect for the Church of Ireland diocese of Tuam from 1942 to c 1963.^[13]

After moving to Ealing, Prynne was very involved in the life of its parish. He designed St Saviour's Church,^[14] new buildings for St Saviour's Infant School (1927), and the Clergy House.^[15] St Saviour's Church was demolished in 1940 following bomb damage; the Clergy House survives.^[16][17][18]

Prynne's last project was an extension to Ealing Town Hall, including a new octagonally towered entrance.^[19][20] He had completed the design when, in 1927, he died suddenly; the work was completed by another architect in 1931.

• The Grange, Private Residence, Hadlow Down, East Sussex, 1893^[21]
• St Winwaloe Church, Poundstock, Cornwall, 1896, Restoration^[22]
• Church of Holy Cross, Newton and Noss, Devon, 1886, Restoration^[23]
• St Peter's Church, Streatham, London, 1888
• Church of St Mary, Payhembury, Devon, 1889^[24]
• All Saints Church, West Dulwich, London, 1891
• All Hallows Church of Saint Kea, Kea, Cornwall, 1894^[25]
• St Peter's Church, Staines-upon-Thames, 1894^[26]
• Bar Lodge, Private Residence, Porthleven, Cornwall, 1895^[27]
• Church of All Saints, Elland, West Yorkshire, 1896^[28]
• Holy Trinity, Roehampton, London, 1898
• Parish Church of Holy Trinity, Ilfracombe, Devon, 1899, Chancel Roof^[29]
• Church of St Andrew, Sampford Courtenay, Devon, 1899, Restoration^[30]
• St John's Cathedral, Mthatha, Eastern Cape, South Africa, 1901^[31]
• Parish Church of St John the Evangelist, Bexley, London^[32]
• Church of All Saints, Winkleigh, Devon, 1902, Restoration^[33]
• Church of St Peter, Ilfracombe, Devon, 1902^[34]
• Church of St Peter, Chepping Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, 1903, Additions^[35]
• Church of All Saints, Lewisham, London, 1903^[36]
• Church of St Paul, Weymouth, Dorset, 1903^[37]
• Church of All Saints, Thurlestone, Devon, 1904, Restoration^[38]
• St Mary's Church & Hall, Johannesburg, South Africa, 1905^[39]
• New Church, Belvedere, London, 1905^[40]
• Church of St Martin of Tours, Ashurst, Kent, 1905, Refurbished^[41]
• Holy Trinity Church, Exmouth, Devon, 1907, Restoration
• Clergy House, Christ The Saviour Church, Ealing, London, 1909^[42]
• St Alban's Church, Bournemouth, Dorset, 1909
• Church of St Mark, Croydon, London, 1910^[43]
• St. Peter's Church, Harrow, London, 1912^[44]
• Church of St Barnabas, Leighton–Linslade, Bedfordshire, 1913, Extension^[45]
• St Mark's Church, Hadlow Down, East Sussex, 1913, Reconstruction
• Church of St Catherine of Alexandria, Whitestone, Devon, 1914, Restoration^[46]
• Church of St Michael and All Angels, Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, 1916^[47]
• Church of St Mary, Wargrave, Berkshire, 1916, Reconstruction^[48]
• Church of St Paul, Fareham, Hampshire, 1880 and 1922, Restoration^[49]
• Church of St James the Great, Hanslope, Buckinghamshire, 1924, Restoration^[50]
• Church of St Martin, Worcester, 1920, World War I Memorial^[51]
• Parish Church of St Barnabas, Royal Tunbridge Wells, Kent, c 1925, World War I Memorial Chapel.^[52]
• Church of the Holy Trinity, Folkestone, Kent, 1913 and 1928, Extensions^[53]
• Ealing Town Hall Expansion, 1931

• All Saints Church, West Dulwich, South London, completed in 1897
• Window and glass at St Peter's Church Staines by George and Edward Fellowes Prynne
• St Peter's parish church, Staines, Middlesex, completed in 1894
• St Alban's Church, Bournemouth. completed in 1909
• Rood screen at the Church of St Peter, Draycott, Somerset, 1894, which Historic England suggests may be by Prynne.^[54]