Church Of St Mary

The Church of St Mary is a parish church dating from the early 12th century, with significant additions and alterations throughout its history. It comprises a chancel, flanked by a modern organ chamber and vestries, a clerestoried nave with north and south aisles, a south porch, and a west tower.

The earliest part of the existing structure is the south arcade of the nave, dating back to the early 12th century. Around the end of the 12th century, the west tower was added. The aisles were largely rebuilt during the 13th century, and the south doorway originates from this period. The chancel was rebuilt in the 14th century, a period when the windows were also constructed. The north arcade was rebuilt in 1885, and both aisles were extended eastwards to incorporate vestries. The porch was also rebuilt during this time. In 1899, the nave and chancel roofs were renewed.

The external masonry of the medieval portions is of red sandstone ashlar, while extensions to the aisles, the top courses of the tower, the battlements, and the wall of the south aisle are constructed from grey sandstone. The chancel features a modern east window with three lights and reticulated tracery. Modern windows on both the north and south sides each contain two trefoiled lights with a quatrefoil in the head. The south wall incorporates an aumbry, a piscina, and three sedilia. A tomb recess, or Easter Sepulchre, is located in the north wall. The chancel arch is two-centred, with two hollow chamfered orders that are continuous without imposts. The clerestory windows, of which there are two on each side, are of late 15th-century design. The south arcade, dating from the early 12th century, comprises three semicircular arches of two plain orders, carried on circular shafts and responds, with cushion capitals carved with scalloping. The north arcade, rebuilt in 1885, consists of three two-centred arches carried on two octagonal columns and responds. The north wall of the north aisle features modern windows, a door with plain chamfered jambs and a two-centred head, and a square aumbry recess. The south wall of the south aisle also houses modern windows, alongside a door with elaborate mouldings typical of the 13th century, a double recess with a moulded two-centred head (one of which is a piscina).

The tower is set slightly to the south of the main axis of the church and is entered from the nave via a two-centred arch of three-chamfered orders. Externally, the tower is of two stages with clasping buttresses on the west angles. The west window is a narrow lancet, deeply splayed, and the belfry windows are of two-lights with four-centred heads. The tower is topped with a 15th-century embattled parapet with crocketted pinnacles.

Inside the church, a 12th-century font with flower-pot shaped features sits on a modern base in the tower. A carved wooden monument to Captain Abraham Murcott, who drowned off the Scilly Isles in 1702, is located on the east wall of the nave, depicting foliage, a boat supported by a sailor and Neptune. Mid-19th-century communion rails, made of heavy brasswork by Skidmore of Coventry, are also present. A late 18th-century Royal Coat of Arms is displayed as an oval.