Church of St Peter

The Church of St Peter is a parish church dating back to the early 12th century, with significant additions and alterations in the early 13th century and around 1315. It was restored in 1875, 1884, and 1909, with the final restoration overseen by Sir Charles Nicholson. The church is constructed of ashlar with a plain tile roof. It comprises a nave and chancel, a west tower, a north vestry (built in 1875), and a south porch dating from around 1184.

The chancel, of three bays, features an early 13th-century north wall with two lancet windows and a north vestry. The east window is a restored Decorated window from the early 14th century with three trefoiled lights. The south wall has an early Decorated window with two trefoiled lights, followed by two larger windows, each with two ogee trefoiled lights; these formerly illuminated the Mortimer chapel, which was consecrated in 1315 and later demolished. A three-centred-headed priest's door is flanked by these windows, with stepped buttresses marking the corners.

The nave, also of three bays, has restored Decorated windows with two trefoiled lights on both walls. The original south door, dating from the early 12th century, has a timber porch added in 1884. A blocked north door is more complete and similar in design. The doorway projects approximately 150mm from the wall face and features a decorated semicircular head and a consecration cross. The wall is punctuated by early 12th-century pilasters, with the top four courses of the walls containing alternating bands of red and white sandstone.

The west tower, constructed in the 15th century, is three stages high, separated by moulded string courses. It has a moulded plinth, an embattled parapet (with pinnacles added in 1909) atop diagonal corner buttresses. The 15th-century west window is Perpendicular in style, with three cinquefoiled lights. The first stage features single trefoiled lights, while the bell chamber has windows with two cinquefoiled lights under two-centred heads.

Inside the chancel, a double aumbry is found in the north wall, and a piscina with a priest’s head as a label stop is in the south wall. The nave reveals an entrance to the rood stairs, with a now-lost external projection. The tower arch comprises two chamfered orders with moulded abaci at the springing.

The nave and chancel roofs are similar, with a slightly lower pitch on the chancel roof. They are collar-rafter roofs with straight braces from rafter to collar and ashlar pieces; the nave has five tie beams, and the chancel has two, likely dating from the early 14th century. A framed tympanum, probably from the 17th century, divides the nave from the chancel roof.

Notable fittings include 15th-century wall paintings in the nave depicting St Martin on horseback and dividing his cloak, and late 13th- and 15th-century wall paintings in the chancel, featuring a 15th-century canopy design on the east wall and a 15th-century Annunciation group on the south wall. A few late 15th-century Malvern tiles are embedded in the chancel floor. Later additions include an early 20th-century screen, font, pulpit, and organ. A late 15th-century recumbent alabaster effigy is set against the north wall of the chancel, and a ridged coffin lid with traces of an incised cross and pastoral staff lies to the south. The two eastern windows in the south wall of the nave and the central window in the north wall were added around 1915 by Walter E Tower.