Church Of St Peter And St Paul

The Church of St Peter and St Paul is a parish church dating back to around 1220, with substantial additions and alterations through the 13th, 14th, 15th, and 18th centuries, and major work in 1837, alongside restorations in 1894 and 1896. The church is cruciform in layout, featuring a south aisle to the nave, a south porch, and a western tower. It is constructed primarily of flint and stone rubble, with brick and tile roofing.

The original nave and chancel date from around 1220, with lancet windows in the chancel and a blocked north door in the nave. The transepts, dating from the 14th century (the north transept being earlier), have Decorated traceried windows with ogee cusped openings and two squints. There is a 14th-century arcade of three bays leading to a narrow south aisle, the exterior wall of which was restored in the 18th century (marked by a plaque dated 1702) and includes two small windows. The roof is tiled, with a continuous ridge, a slightly lower transept roof, and low eaves to the south aisle. The walls are of flint and stone rubble with stone dressings, and the chancel is rendered in cement and features clasped buttresses at the eastern corners.

The tower, dating from 1837, is two-stage and has a parapet with central gablets on each face, flat buttresses with shallow steps, coupled lancet windows to the bell stage, and a larger lancet west window. The tower walls incorporate red brickwork with decorative patterns of flush flint panelling. Windows throughout are a mix of lancets, coupled lights with reticulate tracery, small ogee-cusped windows, and two perpendicular windows in the nave.

Inside, a Gothic cusped tomb recess is found in the north wall of the chancel near the altar, and a similar recess, altered with the insertion of a window, is in the south wall of the south transept. The chancel and south transept have piscinas. The chancel floor is paved with numerous monumental slabs from the late 17th to the early 19th century, and several wall monuments date from the same period. The north wall of the north transept (the Shoddesdon Chapel) contains a small altar tomb, partially embedded in the wall, with inlaid spaces for now-missing brasses. Above the tomb is a late-Gothic stone frame with a decorated head and panelled sides, enclosing three brasses (depicting Robert Thornborough and his two wives) and an inscription brass dated 1522. The north wall of the nave features a painted board displaying the Royal Coat of Arms of George III dating from 1812, while the west end of the aisle contains a Victorian font. The gable of the south porch has diagonal boarding above a brick face.