Worshippers in a struggling Cornish parish are trying to raise thousands of pounds to restore their church's stained glass windows and at the same time enhance the profile of a remarkable former priest.

Cornwall has had more than its fair share of dynamic, eccentric and controversial churchmen over the years. Robert Hawker, Edward White Benson, Billy Bray, Bernard Walke and even Bill Ind have all earned a place in the region's religious heritage.

Sometimes famous as much for self-publicity as for concrete achievements, they have nevertheless lodged themselves in the popular psyche.

Which begs the question as to how William Willimott managed to slip through the net?

Who, you might ask, was William Willimott? And to all but the keenest church historians he is a largely forgotten figure — which is a pity because he had a remarkable influence on two Cornish communities.

However, this relative obscurity may be about to change with the publication of a charming book about his life and times, which features 19 of his paintings, complete with amusing explanatory stories.

Parishioners at St Michael and All Saints in Caerhays, a small rural church nestled in beautiful scenery on the Roseland, are desperately trying to raise some £30,000 to restore the building's 10 stained glass windows.

Nothing unusual in that, except each of the brightly coloured panes were cut, painted, leaded and installed by Willimott in the middle of the 19th century.

Further investigation reveals that as well as caring for the needs of his flock, Willimott refurbished the old church, crafted wooden screens, carved emblems of the four evangelists and even made an ornate mosaic reredos, using shards of dinner plates and other broken crockery.

An energetic character, who had two wives (the second, Constance, he is thought to have met by chance while staying at Ryalls Hotel in Plymouth) and a dozen children, he was incumbent at Caerhays between 1851 and 1878, before moving to Quethiock, near Liskeard, where he worked his magic for another decade.

With such a legacy of rich stories and creativity, it seemed only sensible to use Willimott to help in the current restoration.

The idea to print facsimiles of Willimott's watercolours came from Christine Edwards, who has known about the document since she was a teenager in the 1950s.

Former county archivist and current chairman of the Diocesan Advisory Committee, she is regarded as an expert on various aspects of Cornish history. But it was while she was still a pupil at Caerhays school that she was introduced to Willimott's sketchbook. She said: "My father, Gerald Hawkridge, was estate carpenter at the time, she attended Caerhays school and I can remember when I was about 15 the rector then, Jack Jose, bringing it to show my dad when it was given to the parish. He knew my dad would be interested in it because he liked anything to do with parish history. Well, he took one look at it and said 'it's brilliant, there ought to be a copy', which showed amazing foresight."

Father and daughter then set themselves the task of doing just that, with Gerald copying the watercolours and Christine transcribing the text. This version is now held in the Cornwall Records Office.

Half a century later, Christine found herself painstakingly going through the text once again after fellow parishioners supported the idea for a reprint. She also researched Willimott's life, which forms a foreword to the volume.

Christine, whose ancestors worked on earlier restoration work at the church, said: "We were looking to find a way of raising funds and Parson Willimott's book was suggested. The original is kept in a safe at the castle, so it is still in the parish. It was photographed and this time round I checked the transcript and researched Willimott's family background with the help of Michael Warner, Jo Mattingly and Michael Swift.

"We are all very pleased with the high quality of the design and printing, which gives an authentic feel to the book. And we're pleased to be able to offer people the chance to find out more about this remarkable man.

"He was an amateur craftsman of considerable talent, as well as being an energetic priest and family man.

"He had an ear for local stories and an eye for his parishioners' eccentricities and in his retirement was able to draw and describe incidents which made a lasting impression on him."

Her views are echoed by Canon Michael Warner, who was rector at Caerhays during the 1970s and has special expertise in the Victorian restoration of churches.

"Willimott was perhaps unique because he was a skilled craftsman as well as being an energetic, enthusiastic and innovative priest," he said.

"Willimott only had one church to care for so he would have had plenty of time to dedicate to the fabric of the church. But even so, if you look at the windows alone, he did a remarkable job. He painted them, fired them, leaded them and put them in.

"Willimott is a significant figure and this church and its windows are significant and really deserve to be preserved. Above all, Willimott's work gives us a very interesting insight into the life of a rural parish at that time."

St Michael's, which was consecrated along with 18 other Cornish churches by Bishop Bronescombe in 1259, has been a place of worship for at least 700 years. Willimott described the 25 years he spent there as "the best part of my life".

The original sketchbook, completed from memory in the two years before his death in 1899, is a cloth-bound, hardback pad containing 30 pages of watercolour sketches, along with written explanations. The stories range from tales of the playboy Squire Trevanion of Caerhays, who fled to avoid the bailiffs, dog fights, hawking, hunting, wrecks, St Dennis public bakehouse, beached whales, and taking a pig to the butcher.

One of the 10 windows in need of urgent attention has already been completed by specialist restorer Sue Ashworth, who has a workshop at Lanteglos-by-Fowey. So if you are visiting Caerhays Castle and garden or nearby Porth Luny, it is worth stopping at St Michael's Church for a look, where you will also see Willimott's benign image, in the form of a photograph of a rather portly elderly gentleman, still watching over his beloved church and its parishioners.