Church Of All Saints (Church Of England)

Church of All Saints

This is a parish church of the Church of England, built in 1882-3 by the architects Carpenter & Ingelow. The site was given by Sir Nathaniel Mayer de Rothschild. A porch with vestry was added to the west end in 1907-8 by William Huckvale, replacing an intended tower. At the same time, six buttresses were added to the south side and the east wall was reconstructed (a tablet in the porch records this work).

The church is constructed of flint with knapped uncoursed facing and Bath stone dressings, topped with steep machine-made red tile roofs. It is a tall five-bay church in Decorated style, without a structurally separate chancel, set back from the road in an older graveyard. A continuous north aisle runs the full length under the roof, and a low twin-gabled porch-with-vestry stands at the west end.

The south side features three large three-light windows with reticulated tracery in its western part, and a small two-light similar window to the east bay, all with hoodmoulds. A small pointed south door with chamfered jambs, plank door, hoodmould, and a gabled tiled bellcote and bell bracket out below eaves level. The south side of the west porch has an elaborate Decorated entrance with moulded arches and jamb shafts, leading via two steps to double doors with decorative hinge plates. Diagonal buttresses flank the east end, which features a fine five-light pointed east window with reticulated tracery and a cross as finial to the gable parapet. The west gable is topped with a wheel-cross finial above a three-light segmental-headed traceried west window with a separate quatrefoil in circle over it. Two-light traceried pointed windows light each gable of the lower west block. A moulded string course runs at sill level of the east window. The added buttresses each have a chamfered plinth and moulded base. The east end of the north aisle is set back and has a three-light traceried 19th-century window, but other aisle windows are reused medieval features, including the round head of a small Romanesque window set in the north wall next the north door.

The spacious interior features a continuous boarded waggon roof with moulded battens, tie-beam and king-post trusses with semi-circular bracing to the collar and small braces below on stone corbels. The trusses were rebuilt in 1907 after movement in the south wall. The chancel is marked off from the three-bay nave by a heavy 15th-century tie-beam with massive cusped curved braces and traceried spandrels, brought from Weston Turville old rectory in 1883 when it was being demolished on the advice of Sir Gilbert Scott. Similar cusping appears on arched wind-braces to the two eastern bays of the north aisle, the framing of which also comes from the same source. The tall five-bay north arcade has arches and capitals of 1883 carried on elaborate shafted 15th-century clunch piers and bases from the parish church at Tring, then under repair by the same architects.

Many features from the medieval and later periods, originally built into the old church of All Saints at Long Marston, were incorporated into the new church. The old nave and chancel were carefully demolished in 1883. Features transferred include: a 14th-century octagonal stone font with a cut-back bowl; a 14th-century trefoil piscina with shelf in the south wall of the chancel; a 15th-century trefoil piscina in the east part of the north aisle; an early 17th-century hexagonal pulpit with two tiers of carved panels; a 15th-century traceried oak screen with central opening enclosing the east end of the north aisle; 18th-century former altar rails now at the chancel steps; a 17th-century oak altar table in the north aisle; two 17th-century oak chests; a bell dated 1800 in the bellcote; a framed and painted benefactions board over the south door; and an organ bought from Tring church in 1863.

Medieval architectural fragments incorporated into the church include: a 13th-century recess in the north wall of the chancel with pointed arch and dog-tooth ornament; a 14th-century arch and moulded label to the south door; a wide segmental pointed arched recess in the east part of the north aisle with 12th-century architectural fragments built in; a north doorway possibly of the 14th century; two-light lancet north windows, parts of which date to around 1230; a wide round-arched recess in the north aisle of late 12th-century work with roll moulding between bands of dog-tooth to the arch, carried on small shafts with scalloped capitals and square abaci, and with a drain in the base; two 14th-century north windows with trefoil lights and quatrefoil over (one window has a square recess in the splay); and a similar but smaller window in the west wall of the north aisle, much renewed.

The tabernacled stone reredos was installed in 1884, brought from St Andrew's, Wells Street, London. Five painted figures were installed in 1933, designed by Sir Albert Richardson. The chancel floor is laid with Minton encaustic tiles. A free-standing polygonal two-coloured brick chimney was built in 1935 by Richardson. The altar cross, candlesticks, and two houseling benches were designed by Sir Ninian Comper in 1945.