Church of St John the Baptist is a Grade II listed building in the Chorley local planning authority area, England. First listed on 30 January 1987. Church. 1 related planning application.

Church of St John the Baptist

WRENN ID
inner-ashlar-ochre
Grade
II
Local Planning Authority
Chorley
Constituency
South Ribble MP: Mr Paul Foster (Lab)
Country
England
Date first listed
30 January 1987
Type
Church
Address
Church of St John the Baptist, South Road, Bretherton, PR26 9AH
OS grid reference
SD 475 204
Coordinates
53.67773, -2.79513
Source
Historic England listing

Also on this page: related consents · flood risk · radon risk · weather exposure · detailed attributes ↓

Description

The Church of St John the Baptist, built in 1840 by Edmund Sharpe, features a chancel and organ house added in 1909. Constructed from sandstone with a shallow pitched slate roof, the church exhibits a simple Gothic style for the nave, which includes a porch and a west steeple, while the chancel and organ house are designed in the Perpendicular style.

The slender west tower is supported by diagonal buttresses and features large open 2-centred porch arches on three sides, with bands on three levels. The topmost band is stepped over a single belfry louvre on each side, and the tower is topped with a stepped parapet, crocketed corner pinnacles, and a slim octagonal spire. The five-bay buttressed nave has four square-headed windows, each with hoodmoulds and two cusped lights. At the west end, there is a gablet over a 2-centred arched doorway, which has a lancet above it; however, the door on the north side is missing.

The chancel, which has a higher and steeper roof, consists of two bays and features two 3-light windows with Perpendicular tracery, along with an east window that has five lights and similar tracery. Inside, the nave is ceiled except at the west end, where there is a gallery supported by four slim iron columns with foliated openwork brackets. The gallery staircase has a closed string, stick balusters, and a ramped handrail. The chancel boasts a wagon roof, and on the north side, there is half of an arch that dies into the wall but continues externally on the wall of the organ house, possibly as an architectural joke.

Local climate

Church of St John the Baptist sits in one of the wettest parts of the UK, with an average of 1,240 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 93% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 92% of listed buildings.

It experiences an average of 23 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 76% of listed buildings. Of these, 10 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.

Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.

More on this building

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  • No EPC on record for this property
  • No sale records on file
  • Related listed building consents — 1 application
  • Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
  • Flood risk assessment
  • Radon risk assessment
  • Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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