Church Of King Charles The Martyr

The Church of King Charles the Martyr is a parish church located in Newtown, Wem Rural, built as a chapel-of-ease between 1869 and 1870 by Edward Haycock, Junior, on the site of a 17th-century chapel. The church is constructed from rough-faced snecked sandstone with a chamfered plinth and ashlar dressings, featuring machine tile roofs with coped verges and ornamental cresting.

The structure includes a nave with a west bellcote, a chancel, a south porch, and a north vestry. The nave is divided into four bays with plain lancets, with paired lancets on the south side towards the east. The gabled south porch is situated between the first and second windows from the west. The west wall features two broad lancets connected by a hoodmould, topped by a gabled bellcote. The chancel consists of two bays with cusped lancets on the south side, a triple lancet on the west bay, and a single lancet on the east, all linked by a cill band that extends from the hoodmould of the east lancet. The east window comprises three broad lancets with a hoodmould and a moulded cill band. A lean-to vestry is located on the north side, complete with a lateral stone stack at the junction with the nave.

Inside, the nave has a double-purlin king-strut roof in four bays, while the chancel features a trussed rafter roof. The pointed chancel arch is adorned with an elegant wrought-iron screen, dating from around 1870, which has Gothic tracery set on a low stone wall. There is a marble pulpit dated 1898, along with other fittings and furnishings from the late 19th century. The church also contains late 19th-century stained glass, including in the east window, and two early 20th-century windows in the nave that commemorate victims of the Boer War. A plain wall memorial to Francis Chambre, who died in 1791, is located at the west end of the nave. The parish was established from part of Wem in 1861.