Until the end of the eighteenth century the curate was also schoolmaster, and as late as 1761 was nominated to the dual office by the six men or sidesmen representing the inhabitants. The patronage was afterwards in the hands of the Braddylls of Conishead Priory; eventually it passed into the possession of the Rev. A. Peache, and the living is now in the gift of the Peache trustees. Its net value is £220.

The original church, for we do not know that it was rebuilt between 1586 and 1818, was a small oblong structure with lattice windows and a western belfry tower.

In the Coniston Museum there is a mutilated document (found by Mr. Herbert Bownass among some old deeds) which not only shows the quaint arrangement of seats in the church separating the sexes, but also gives what is practically a directory of the parish in the time of Charles II.

Coniston A Devision of men's and women's fforms made by the
Church Minister, six men & churchwardens in the year of our
Lord 1684.

Imps Seats in the Quier:

In the seat with the Minister, one for Silverbank & one for ffarr end.

2 The next seat above:

One for Silverbank for Robert Vickers, for Robert Dixon Bridge End & Jno. Atkinson de Catbank & for Holywarth.

3 The second fform above:

Edward Tyson, Rich. Hodgson, John Holms, Wm. Hobson de Huthwt, Wm. Atkinson de Gateside.

The third fform above:
Wm. ffleming junr de Littlearrow, Jam. Robinson, Tho. Cowerd, Park Yeat.

The fourth fform above:
Tho. Dixon de Littlearrow, Mich. Atkinson, Huthwt, Geo. Towers, Hows bank.

The fform next the wall or the highest fform:
David Tyson de Tilbrthwt, Wm. ffleming de Catbank, one for ffar end.

The back fform next Quier door:
Jo. ffleming, Low Littlearrow, Henry Dover de Brow, Wm. Harrison de Holywarth, Wm. Atkinson, Above beck, Myles Dixon & Robt. Dixon de Tilbrthwaite.

The fform above it:
Wm. ffleming de Park Yeat, Geo

The fform under the Pulpit:
Jo. Harrison de Bowmansteads

Men's fforms ith church:
ffirst Jo. Dixon, Wm. Dixon, Tho. Dix ffleming of Bowmansteads.

The second fform beneath:
One seat for ffarr end, Wm. Towers

The third fform
Smartfield, Jo. Tyson, Low House Low Udale, Wm. Denison

The ffourth fform:
One for Silverbank, Rob. Walker Parks.

Womens fforms

The Highest ith Church:
Wm ffleming wife de Upper
Sams. Henry Dover wife de Brow
Hallgarth and Myles Dixon wi[fe]

2 The second fform Beneath:

David Tyson wife de Tilberthwt
wife, Dixon Ground, Wm. Dixon, Geo

3 The third fform:

Outrake, Gill, Howsbank wives, Jo. ffleming wife, Low Littlearrow, & Park Yeat.

4 The ffourth form:

Silverbank, ffarr end, Ed. Tyson de Nook, Tho. Dixon de Littlearrow, Wm. Atkinson, Above beck, their wives.

5 The ffifth fform:

Smartfield, Wm. Atkinson, Wm. Cowerd, Wm. Hobson de Huthwt, Jo. Atkinson and Wm. Atkinson, Catbank, their wives.

6 The sixth fform:

Jo. Harrison & Tho. ffleming de Bowmanstead, [——] Dixon ground, Ed. Park, Wm Denison, Upper Udale, their wives.

7 The seventh fform:

Myles Dixon, Upper Udale, Rob. Walker & Wm. Addison, Low Udale, Wm. Walker, Wm. Harrison & Elizabeth Parks.

To this devision we the Minister, six men and churchwardens have set our hands the year ffirst written, Anno Dnî 1684

Jo. Birkett cur.
Wm. ffleming}
Wm. ffleming}
Christo. Dixon} Sidemen
Wm. Harrison}
Wm. ffleming}
Myles Dixon}
Mich. Atkinson} Churchwardens
Myles Dixon}

In 1817 the curate in charge, John Douglas, and the churchwardens, Joseph Barrow and William Townson, obtained a faculty to rebuild the church. A sum of £325 was raised by subscription, a further sum by assessment, and the Incorporated Church Building Society made a grant of £125. The new church was consecrated by the Bishop of Chester on November 20th, 1819—Coniston being still within the diocese of Chester, not yet transferred to that of Carlisle.

In 1835 a faculty of confirmation was issued from the Consistory Court of Chester by which pews were assigned to the contributors of the building fund and other parishioners. In 1849, Dr. Gibson described the building as "oblong and barn-like, with a few blunt-arched windows in its dirty yellow walls, and overtopped at its western extremity by an unsightly black superstructure of rough stone, which some might call a small square tower badly proportioned, and others, with apparently equal correctness, the stump of a large square chimney."

In 1866 the same writer, in a paper read to the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, said:—"The church of Coniston, which occupies a position central to the village, is a chapel of ease under Ulverston, with a stipend of £146, recently augmented, derived from land, houses, bounty, dividends and fees. It was rebuilt in 1819 on the site of an older edifice. The only part of the former church that remains is the belfry tower, which, being out of keeping and small in proportion to the body of the present building, confers but little ecclesiastical and no architectural distinction upon it."

The late Mr. Roger Bownass, in marginal pencillings on this paper, noted:—"This is an error. The Belfry Tower was wholly rebuilt at the same time as the church, i.e., in 1818-19; the writer of this note having seen the old Tower pulled down, and new Foundations laid; One reason for the Landowners rebuilding the Church (which they did chiefly at their own expense) being the alleged state of the old Tower, the Bells of which, the Sexton pretended he durst not ring for fear he should bring the Tower down about his ears, though it was so difficult to get it down. So strongly was it built and cemented together that it had to be cut through nearly, near its base, before it could be brought down." Mr. Bownass goes on to say that his father, as one of the guarantees, contributed nearly £50, "which his widow had to pay, he himself dying before it was finished, and was the first person carried into the Church while the shavings, etc., lay on the floor, as the writer, his son, of 6 years of age, can well remember."

To resume Dr. Gibson's account:—"The new building is plain even to meanness; but being now well screened by trees and flourishing evergreens—and I may state that evergreens grow here with a luxuriance that I have not seen elsewhere—it is not so offensive to the eye as formerly. The interior has been greatly beautified by improvements made in 1857, the cost being defrayed by subscription. The addition of a reading desk, pulpit, reredos and altar rail in handsomely carved oak, the painting of what used to be an unsightly expanse of white ceiling, in imitation of oak panelling, and the spare but tasteful introduction of tinted glass into the windows, have made the inside as handsome as it is likely to be whilst the pews are allowed to remain. The parish register dates back to 1594. In the vestry is stored a library, chiefly of works in divinity, sermons, etc., which have been purchased from time to time with the interest of different sums left by the Fleming family, commencing with £5 under the will of Roger Fleming of Coniston, dated February, 1699. In the vestibule of the southern entrance to the church is kept one of those curious old chests, made from a solid block of oak, like that containing the muniments of the Grammar School at Hawkshead. The only contents of this are a number of slips of paper, each bearing the almost illegible affidavit of two women that the corpse of each person interred was shrouded in cloth only made of woollen material. These worn and fragile evidences of a curious old protective law—for I infer it could only be enacted to support the landed interest—serve, if they do nothing else, to explain the line in Pope which has puzzled many modern readers—