Church of All Saints

Church of All Saints

Parish church on the west side of Marlow Road at Bisham. The building originates from the mid-12th century, of which only the tower survives. The main structure was restored by Benjamin Ferrey in 1849, with the north aisle and chancel extended eastwards in 1877. Minor restorations to the tower were carried out in 1903 and 1905.

The church is constructed in part chalk and part flint with Bath stone dressings, with tile gabled roofs separate over the nave and aisles. The plan consists of a three-bay aisled nave with a west tower, south porch, chancel and south chapel.

The Tower

The tower divides into three stages separated by chamfered string courses. The lowest stage projects forward of the walls above. The west wall contains a 19th-century doorway with a small 12th-century round-headed window above it, featuring widely splayed inner jambs but restored externally. A similar window appears on the north wall at the same level, unrestored and with chamfered orders. The ringing stage is lit from north, south and west by single 19th-century pointed lights. The bell chamber retains original coupled round-headed lights on all four sides, carved with crude chevron ornament and labels formed by a string course running around the walls at arch springing level. Above this stands a brick embattled parapet and pyramidal tile roof.

The Aisles and Chancel

The remaining parts of the church have a projecting plinth, moulded cill string course and two-stage buttresses. All windows are 19th-century except the late 16th-century Hoby window in the east wall of the south chapel.

The north aisle spans six bays with three buttresses and one diagonal buttress at each end. The left end bay contains a lancet; the second bay has a three-light window with flowing tracery in a pedimented projection dated 1878, topped with a stone cross and a relieving arch near ground level with an inscription above reading "Vault of the Williams Family of Temple House, Berkshire". Three bays to the right contain a two-light cusped traceried window, while the end bay has a two-light similar window with a 19th-century door and pointed arch beneath.

The south aisle comprises five bays with four buttresses and one diagonal buttress at each end. The left end bay contains a small 19th-century pointed arched doorway; a gabled entrance porch occupies the second bay. One lancet appears in the bay to the right of the porch, and a two-light cusped traceried window in the next bay. A sundial is positioned at high level in the second bay from the right end.

The east end presents three gables, one bay each, with stone crosses at the apexes. The centre chancel projects with a three-light window of reticulated tracery. A similar window appears on the north aisle and on the south aisle. The Hoby window consists of six lights with three-centred heads; above it stands a 19th-century trefoiled window.

Interior

The nave features a 19th-century arch-braced collar roof. The four-bay north and south aisles have similar roofs. Two-bay 19th-century arcades in the style of the 14th century open into the north aisle and south chapel. Both nave arcades are three bays, with the north arcade similar to that of the chancel. A semicircular tower arch of two moulded orders connects the spaces. The east wall of the south chapel contains the early 17th-century Hoby window of six lights with two shields in each and an inscription dated 1609, recording its installation in memory of Sir Philip and Sir Thomas Hoby.

Monuments

The south wall of the chapel displays a fine 16th-century monument erected by Dame Elizabeth Hoby in memory of her brothers. It comprises an alabaster altar tomb built into the wall in an arched recess, with recumbent figures of the two brothers. Small Doric pilasters support an entablature and divide each end into two bays and the front into three.

To the right stands a 16th-century coloured marble monument to Elizabeth Lady Hoby. Under a canopy formed by an entablature supported by Corinthian columns at either end, enclosing a semicircular arched recess, are the kneeling figures of Lady Hoby and her children, the whole rising from a panelled plinth.

In the centre of the chapel is a marble monument to Margaret Cary, wife of Sir Edward Hoby, arranged in three stages. The lower two form a base from which rises an obelisk between four swans.

In the north-east corner of the north chancel aisle stands an early 16th-century tomb of Purbeck marble erected in memory of Mrs. Wheatley, daughter of Mr. Thomas Williams of Temple House, Berkshire, who died in 1850.