Church Of Saint Mary The Virgin

The Church of Saint Mary the Virgin is a parish church dating from the 14th and 15th centuries, with significant rebuilding in 1850 by Henry Woodyer for the Reverend Lord John Thynne. It is constructed of coursed ironstone rubble with ashlar dressings and features slate roofs with stone coped gables. The church comprises a chancel, north vestry, north chapel, nave, north and south aisles, a south porch, and a west tower. Most of the windows were reworked in the 19th century and have pointed heads.

The chancel includes a three-light east window and a two-light southwest window. The north vestry has a doorway on the north elevation and single lights. The north chapel, added by Thynne, features an oeil-de-boeuf window to the east and two single lights to the north, topped with a gabled roof. The nave has four bays with pointed arched arcades; the south arcade is from the 14th century, while the north arcade is from the 19th century. The aisles mainly contain two-light windows, and there is a pointed arched doorway to the north. The southeast bay has a rose window serving the Carteret chapel.

The south porch is gabled and has a pointed doorway. The west tower, dating from the 15th century, consists of three stages and includes an octagonal stair turret at the southwest angle. It features two-light pointed windows on all sides of the bell stage and the lower stage on the west elevation, along with a pointed west doorway, an embattled parapet, and angle buttresses.

Inside the chancel, decorative ribs and a polychrome stencil pattern adorn the roof and walls. There is a brass memorial to Anthony Newdigate, who died in 1568. The Thynne chapel contains an alabaster effigy of Lady Thynne, created in 1868 by H. H. Armstead, with a canopy, floor, and ironwork designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott. The east window was made by O'Connor, and the roof features polychrome stencil decoration and angel corbels by Clayton and Bell. The Carteret chapel holds monuments to the First Lord Carteret, who died in 1826, featuring a marble portrait head in an oval surround by Westmacott, and to the Second Lord Carteret, who died in 1838. The rose window includes a six-cornered star designed by Woodyer.