Church Of St Peter

Church of St Peter

Parish church, mainly of the 14th century with a 16th-century rebuilt west tower, 16th-century south porch, and much 19th-century restoration. The building is constructed of flint rubble with some Roman tile, with limestone and clunch dressings. Red brick parapets and crenellations form the north and south aisles. The roofs are covered with red plain tiles over the nave and chancel, with stone corbels, stone parapet verges and crosses to these elements, while lead roofs cover elsewhere.

The chancel has a 19th and 20th-century east window of five lights with intersecting tracery beneath a stone label and red brick two-centred arch. The south and north walls contain two and one windows respectively, which are restored 14th-century examples of two trefoiled ogee lights with flowing tracery, two-centred heads and labels. A central 14th-century south doorway has moulded jambs and a two-centred arch with label, fitted with a plank and muntin door. Buttresses are positioned at the north east and south east angles and along the south wall.

The nave's clerestorey has three windows to the north wall and four to the south, all 19th and 20th-century circular quatrefoil windows with some remains of 14th-century rear arches and splays. The south aisle is crenellated and features a moulded brick string course. Its south wall contains three windows, with one each to the east and west walls, all of two or three ogee lights with flowing tracery beneath segmental pointed heads, mostly 19th and 20th-century work retaining remains of 14th-century splays and rear arches. Buttresses stand at the east and west angles.

The north aisle's north wall contains three restored 14th-century windows of two lights similar to those in the south aisle, while the west wall has one window matching the chancel north wall window. A 19th and 20th-century north doorway retains 14th-century splays and rear arch, with a moulded two-centred arch and label, fitted with a plank and muntin door. A buttress is positioned at the west angle.

The north vestry has one light windows in both its east and north walls, each with moulded jambs, square head and label. A 20th-century two-light window matches the chancel north wall. A 19th and 20th-century vertically boarded door stands beneath the eastern window. Two angled buttresses flank the original vestry and aisle walls. A red brick chimney stack is present.

The south porch features a plastered crow-stepped parapet and a 19th and 20th-century two-centred entrance arch. Its east and west walls have 15th and 16th-century windows of two trefoiled lights beneath four-centred heads with moulded labels. The south doorway has a plain chamfered two-centred arch, with two vertical and a central horizontal moulded panels to each of the double doors. The roof is a late 15th and early 16th-century camber beam with stop-chamfered and moulded beams and wall plates. Seven carved bosses include foliate examples, one bearing the Bouchier knot, one the De Vere star, and one depicting an angel with outspread wings.

The west tower comprises three stages with angle buttresses and is crenellated, with gargoyles to each face. It has a moulded stone plinth and a south west angled stair turret with hipped roof and four small slit lights. The 14th-century west doorway is reset with moulded jambs, two-centred arch and label, fitted with a 17th-century oak nail-studded vertically boarded door. The 14th-century west window is reset and repaired, showing two trefoiled ogee lights with tracery in a two-centred head and moulded label. Above this window is a 14th-century moulded stone octfoil panel, which once enclosed a carved bird, possibly for Hawkwood; a similar panel appears on the south wall. Loop windows light the second stage on the north, south and west walls. The bell chamber has restored early 16th-century windows of three cinquefoiled lights with transoms beneath four-centred heads on all walls. A plain wooden bellcote with concave leaded roof and wooden finial crowns the tower.

Interior

The chancel features a hammerbeam roof of 5 bays on stone corbels with carved and moulded wall plates, moulded rafters, pierced carved spandrels, shields to the hammers, and a ridge board. A 19th-century carved low screen and wrought iron altar rails are present, along with a painted reredos of twelve saints. The east window contains stained glass dating to circa 1892 in memory of Agnes Warburton, while the tracery of the north and south windows retain 14th-century and 19th and 20th-century stained glass. The piscina is probably a 15th-century restoration with shafted jambs, a cinquefoiled and sub-cusped head, and quatrefoiled drains. A rectangular recess occupies the north wall. A 14th-century north vestry door has moulded jambs and two-centred arch with a nailed edge mouldings to its horizontally boarded door. A moulded segmental arch leads to a 20th-century organ alcove. The 14th-century chancel arch is two-centred with two sunk chamfered orders and two-order responds featuring moulded capitals and bases.

The nave has a five-bay hammerbeam roof similar to that of the chancel but without shields, supported on stone corbels. The windows feature coloured glass margins, and the clerestorey similarly displays coloured glass. An octagonal panelled pulpit features ogee and quatrefoil tracery with four splayed legs. Various 17th and 18th-century floor slabs commemorate the Sparrow and Jegon families. The 14th-century north and south arcades comprise four bays with octagonal columns bearing moulded capitals and bases and two-centred arches.

The north aisle's east wall contains a 14th-century three-light window beneath a four-centred head, under which stands a 20th-century four-centred arched doorway with a nailed vertically boarded door. Corbels line the nave wall. The roof features 17th-century stop-chamfered rafters. A moulded hatchment decorates the north wall. A slate floor slab bears the coat of arms of the Sparrow family. The north doorway retains 14th-century splays and a segmental pointed arch. Leaded windows with coloured glass margins also appear in the south aisle, which has a similar east wall window to that in the north aisle. A 14th-century south doorway has jambs and a two-centred arch of two chamfered orders. The fine early 16th-century two western bays of the south aisle roof are richly moulded and carved, with principals bearing pendants and curved braces and spandrels carved with De Vere boars and mullets. Other beams display foliage and vine carvings.

A 19th and 20th-century octagonal font features bosses to quatrefoiled panels and a moulded base, with a stem containing trefoiled panels that may date to the 15th century.

A tomb recess in the south wall is said to be the cenotaph of the condottiere Sir John Hawkwood, who died in 1394 and was buried in Florence Cathedral, where a fresco by Paolo Uccello commemorates him. The recess has a cinquefoiled, sub-cusped and crocketed canopy with spandrels carved with a hawk, boar, pelican and hunting figures, side pinnacles, and a crenellated cornice with cinquefoil panels on the face of the wall below. Five square cusped panels, each bearing a blank shield, ornament the front of the base. A piscina is cut into the south east window cill with a quatrefoil drain.

The west tower's 14th-century tower arch is two-centred with three orders and semi-octagonal attached shafts bearing moulded capitals and bases. A 14th-century reset door to the stair turret has moulded jambs and two-centred arch. East wall buttresses carry through into the nave.