Church of St John the Baptist

Church of St John the Baptist

Parish church with 13th-century origins, partly rebuilt between 1754 and 1756 by Sanderson Miller, with a north aisle and arcade added in 1828 by Rickman, and further partly rebuilt and remodelled between 1858 and 1865 by Street. The church is constructed of sandstone ashlar with plain tiled roofs featuring gable-end parapets and a cross-finial at the east end. It comprises a west tower, a four-bay aisled nave with a south porch and sanctus bellcote, and a three-bay chancel with a north vestry and organ chamber. The architectural style is Decorated.

The west tower rises in roughly three stages with strings and a chamfered plinth that continues around the building. It has gabled diagonal corner buttresses, a pointed west doorway with a stepped plinth string forming a hood mould, and a two-light window above with a sill string and hood mould. Two loopholes appear on the west side of the second stage, while the belfry stage features large two-light louvred bell-chamber openings with ball flower mouldings, a sill string, and a continuous hood mould. Above the belfry sits a trefoil frieze beneath a broach spire with lucarnes set beneath a quatrefoil frieze and a weathervane.

The nave has separate gabled aisles with a continuous sill string. All windows have hood moulds with returns or decorated stops. The north aisle has buttresses with offsets at bay divisions, a gabled diagonal west corner buttress, a three-light west end window, a three-light window, and three two-light windows in the north elevation. The south aisle includes some medieval masonry, with angled corner buttresses and a central south buttress with offsets. It contains two-light west and east windows and three two-light windows in the south elevation. An oval early 19th-century memorial stands west of the central buttress.

The south porch is gabled with corner pilaster buttresses, a string above, a pointed archway with hood mould, and a string in the gable apex with a loop-hole above. A similar arched doorway appears within. A gabled sanctus bell-cote with a single pointed archway adjoins it.

The chancel has buttresses with offsets at bay divisions and is angled at the east end. It features a stepped sill string and windows with hood moulds with head and foliated stops. A three-light east window and two two-light windows occupy the chancel, along with a three-light window in the south elevation beneath which sits a Virgin and Child relief flanked by early 20th-century memorials.

The north vestry and organ chamber are partly gabled and partly constructed as a lean-to with catslide roof. They have two two-light windows and a pointed doorway, with 20th-century lean-tos on each side and a large stone stack at the junction.

The interior features four-bay nave arcades of two chamfered orders on octagonal columns with moulded capitals and bases, with some 13th-century masonry in the south arcade. The chancel and narrow tower arch are similarly detailed, with their inner orders on colonnettes. The roof structure comprises arch-braced collar trusses with paired swept wind-braces; the chancel roof has a cusped pointed arcade above a moulded wall-plate and cusped pierced braces. The east window has slender nookshafts and a hood mould with angel stops.

An ornately painted and gilded arcaded reredos with marble panels and a central marble cross dominates the chancel. A cusped pointed aumbry and three-bay sedilia flank it. A gilded traceried wrought iron chancel screen, dated around 1915 and designed by Sir Thomas Jackson, separates the chancel from the nave.

An octagonal stone font with an arcaded stem and cusped frieze around the basin stands in the nave. A circular pulpit with cusped arcading, marble panels, and foliated detail, probably by Street, adjoins it. A finialed tomb recess in the north aisle contains a 13th-century coffin lid decorated with a foliated cross. The south aisle has a piscina and at its east end is a carved panel with an animal relief of probable Norman date, discovered in 1984, which suggests an even earlier church occupied the site.

The tower contains numerous 18th and 19th-century memorials, mainly to the Lyttleton family. The most notable is by Roubiliac to Lucy Lyttleton, died 1747, executed to a design by Sir Charles Frederick and featuring a putto seated next to an urn.

The east window and one window in both aisles contain glass by Kempe. Two windows in the south aisle are by Henry Holiday.