Parish Church Of St Swithun

Parish Church of St Swithun

This parish church at Great and Little Chishill is built of flint rubble with limestone and clunch dressings, with lead and slated roofs. The building comprises work of several periods from the 13th to 20th centuries.

The earliest elements are the 13th-century nave and chancel walls. The south nave arcade dates to around 1275 and has four bays with two-centred arches of two hollow-chamfered orders on octagonal piers with moulded capitals and bases. The chancel was rebuilt around 1330. The south aisle is late 14th century, as are the clerestorey windows. The north nave arcade, clerestorey, north aisle, south porch and west tower are 15th century. The tower collapsed in 1892 but was rebuilt in 1897 when the nave and aisles were restored by the architect F.E. Penrose. A vestry and organ chamber were added in the early 20th century.

The south elevation presents the tower, nave, aisle and porch, all with embattled parapets. The tower is in three stages with a moulded plinth continuous around diagonal buttresses and chamfered string courses. It has one lancet light and one two-light belfry window recessed in a two-centred labelled arch. The nave has four clerestorey two-light trefoiled windows with flat arches, and the aisle has three windows with two cinquefoiled lights and mouchettes in the spandrels of flat arches. The two-storey south porch has a floor that has been removed. The archway is two-centred with two-chamfered orders and semi-octagonal responds with moulded caps and bases, with a two-light chamfered-mullioned window above. The chancel has a steeply pitched slated roof with a two-stage diagonal buttress, and contains two restored two-light trefoiled windows in two-centred labelled arches and a four-centred arched priest's doorway.

Interior features include the nave arcades described above. The north arcade has two moulded orders, the outer continuous and the inner on piers with semi-octagonal shafts with moulded caps and bases. The tower arch has three-chamfered orders with responds and moulded capitals and bases. The chancel arch is two-centred with a light continuous outer chamfered order and an inner chamfered order springing from defaced carved corbels. North of this arch is a deep two-centred arched recess with an opening and four-centred arch. The organ chamber opens in the north wall, and the vestry has a resited window from around 1330.

The nave roof is 15th century and comprises four bays with tie beams supported on wall-posts and curved braces with traceried spandrels, king-posts and queen-posts to the ridge and side purlins. The north and south aisle roofs have chamfered principal rafters and purlins, with foliate stops in the south aisle. The south porch roof is 15th century with rafters laid flat and a carved lamp bracket above the south door.

Furnishings and monuments include piscenae in the south and north aisles. The font is late 14th century with an octagonal bowl decorated with quatrefoil panels and moulded soffit, on a plain octagonal to square stem. The glass contains 15th-century fragments in the north and south aisles. Inscriptions on the tower arch date from the 15th century, and there is a brass of a shield in the tower floor along with four indents of figures with inscription plates. Monuments in the chancel commemorate John Cooke (died 1701), High Sheriff of Essex by appointment of King William, with a white marble inscription panel with scrolls and winged skull with cartouche of arms above, and Jane Cooke (died 1681). Further monuments in the tower record George Brownest (1650) and Samuel Harris, citizen and brewer of London (died 1681). The organ case is painted deal with applied Rococo ornament from the early 18th century.