Parish Church Of St John The Baptist

A large 15th-century parish church located on Church Street in Croydon, built at the expense of the archbishops of Canterbury, whose Old Palace adjoins the site. The building was severely damaged by fire in 1867 but was substantially rebuilt by Sir George Gilbert Scott in 1870 in Perpendicular style, retaining the original South porch with parvise, West Tower and nave walls. The church was extended 18 feet eastwards and provided with a new vestry. The tower was restored in 1892–3, with pinnacles heightened in 1915. Significant internal decoration dates from the 1880s and 1890s, including a tower screen by J Oldrid Scott.

The exterior is constructed of flint with ashlar dressings and a slate roof. The plan comprises a six-bay nave (originally five) with north and south aisles and chapels, a south porch with parvise, a west tower, a north porch, a three-bay chancel and a south-east vestry. The four-stage west tower has buttresses, an octagonal turret, a crenellated parapet and pinnacles. The nave is also crenellated with clerestory windows of three lights with arched heads. The aisles have similar but taller arched windows with transoms, separated by flint and stone buttresses. The chancel features similar windows. The south porch is two storeys with a crenellated parapet, simple lancet windows and an arched doorcase. A smaller gabled north porch dates from around 1870.

The interior of the south porch retains medieval rib vaulting with stone corbel heads and a spiral staircase to the upper floor. The tower contains a lierne vault and an elaborate wooden screen serving as a First World War memorial by J Oldrid Scott, together with a brass floor plaque. The nave has arcade piers with four shafts and four hollows with moulded arches, and a ceiled roof with tiebeams on braces with traceried spandrels. The north side of the clerestory retains circa 1870 green and white glass. Nineteenth-century pews line the nave, whilst the centre of the floor retains red and black tiles with metal grilles. A 19th-century stone and wooden octagonal pulpit by Thompson of Peterborough stands in the nave.

The north aisle contains a late 15th-century tomb recess, a double piscina and an aumbry with piscina basin inserted. A Neo-Classical wall tablet commemorates John Singleton Copley RA, who died in 1815. The south aisle houses a 19th-century Perpendicular-style alabaster font with a very tall Flamboyant wooden Gothic cover. A tomb chest to Hugh Warham, brother of the Archbishop, dating to circa 1536–8, features a canted recess with three ogee-headed niches and quatrefoil decoration to the chest, with carved hatchments above. The tomb of Archbishop Sheldon, builder of the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford, dates to circa 1677 and was carved by Jasper Latham. It is complete except for the arch and depicts a semi-reclining figure with emblems of mortality below and a large cartouche above. St Nicholas Chapel contains the tomb of Archbishop Whitgift, a major local benefactor who founded almshouses in 1596. This is a large alabaster wall tomb with a recumbent effigy in prayer lying on a convex gadrooned sarcophagus decorated with strapwork. An arched background features allegorical figures in the spandrels, putti flanking a central inscription plate, Composite columns topped by obelisks and three enriched shields.

The chancel arch contains brasses to Gabriel Silvester (died 1512) and to William Heron and his wife (died 1562). The organ loft contains a Hill organ with pipes and an oak case decorated by J Oldrid Scott. The chancel features a carved, painted and gilded barrel-vaulted ceiling with standing angel corbels bearing musical instruments, and an elaborate screen of 1895 with iron gates. The floor is of grey marble and Minton tiles. The choir stalls are very elaborate with carved bench ends. The sanctuary has green Minton tiles, a carved wooden screen and an alabaster reredos with much gilding. The east window is by Clayton and Bell. Triple sedilia with ogee arches and a stoup are present, along with a painting of angels over an arched door to the vestry and a wall of circa 1885 depicting the Feeding of the Five Thousand. The vestry has a chamfered ceiling, a stone four-centred arched fireplace and two wall safes.