Church Of St John The Baptist

Church of St John the Baptist

This is a parish church of 12th-century origin, substantially expanded in the 13th century with fenestration from the 14th and 15th centuries. The building is constructed of ragstone with a plain tiled roof. A vestry was added in the 19th and 20th centuries.

The church comprises a chancel, south chapel, nave with south aisle, and a three-stage south-western tower with short shingled spire and weather vane. The tower features a triple offset clasping buttress. Belfry openings are paired lancets, with small lancets elsewhere. A clock dated 1886 is mounted on the west face. A flat pilaster-buttress rises to the north-eastern vice.

The south aisle contains lancet windows, including a restored 14th-century example, along with Decorated 2-light and 15th-century Perpendicular 2-light windows. The south doorway is a reset 12th-century opening with nook shafts, filleted abaci, and roll mould, accompanied by a 15th-century water stoup. The south porch has a wave-moulded outer door, moulded bargeboard, and an ornately moulded roof featuring three short crown posts and tie beams.

The south chapel and chancel are stepped in. The chapel displays a plinth and hammer-dressed blocks to upper courses, with a diagonal buttress. Its Perpendicular south and east windows feature ogee mouldings, and the gable has a moulded bargeboard similar to the south porch. The chancel contains restored ogee-headed windows and a 3-light Y-tracery east window. 14th and 15th-century windows line the north side.

A 19th-century Decorated style vestry with a large squat chimney stack was extended in the late 20th century with parish rooms in brick. The nave features a simple cusped 2-light 13th-century window and three identical 2-light and four-over Perpendicular windows. The west window, dated around 1396, contains 12 lights at the base with upper tracery featuring a central quatrefoil and downward-swept cusped lights designed to incorporate the Trinity and downward-flying seraphim. A simple moulded doorway sits below.

Interior

The interior contains a five-bay arcade, with the 13th-century western three bays differing slightly in date from the eastern portions. Round piers support double-chamfered arches, with the eastern respond featuring a simple abacus. The roof comprises four tall octagonal crown posts set on tie beams with quatrefoil-pierced knee braces. The south aisle has a double-chamfered tower arch without responds, with a collared rafter roof above.

The chancel has no chancel arch and features a hollow-chamfered ogee-headed window and a large depressed hollow-chamfered arch to the south chapel with a head corbel to the east. The roof is of king post and trussed rafter construction, with the easternmost tie beam carved with a head. The south chapel has trussed rafter roofing and retains the outline and mouldings of an earlier opening to the chancel.

Fittings include a 17th-century altar rail with strapwork-enriched rails and ball finials with foliage. Sanctuary dado panelling features strapwork and is dated 1611, with reeded panels and a fretwork top piece. A restored ogee trecusped piscina is present, along with 19th-century choir stalls and light fittings. The screen to the south chapel dates to the 18th century and features barley-sugar balusters on a simple beaded panelled dado with an iron spike top rail. A 15th-century cusped piscina and a font with a square bowl decorated with quatrefoils on roundels and ogee arcading also survive. The font is supported by five round piers.

Stained glass includes fragments of the originally complex iconography of the west windows, and a window depicting St Michael and the Dragon in a north light.

Monuments

The church contains an important series of monuments. A brass of a priest from around 1420 measures 14½ inches. A knight and lady monument dating to around 1520 is set on the south wall, measuring approximately 17 inches.

In the chancel, Richard Knatchbull (1590) is commemorated with a wall monument showing a kneeling knight at a prayer desk, flanked by strapwork pilasters and a coved enriched frieze with urns and an achievement above. Bridget Knatchbull (1625), created by Nicholas Stone in 1626 for £30, features a wall monument with a kneeling lady beneath a draped baldacchino with draped angels pulling back curtains. It includes a fluted frieze and cornice to an open segmental pediment with achievement, cherub heads, and an obelisk. A bracketed plaque appears below.

Sir Norton Knatchbull (died 1636) is commemorated with a standing monument showing a stiffly moulded knight propped on one elbow upon a scroll-ended tomb chest, with double Ionic colonettes supporting a segmental head with original spear-headed rails with twisted and strapwork-finialled principals. Katherine Knatchbull and Sir Wyndham Knatchbull (1740/1 and 1749) share a pedimented wall plaque with scrolled sides, a cartouche below, and an achievement above.

In the south chapel, Margaret Collyns (died 1595) is commemorated with a very small white alabaster tablet by Epiphanius Evesham, featuring a simple inscription, shaped head with arms, laurel wreath, and a winged apron signed "Evesham fecit".

Sir Norton Knatchbull (died 1684) has a white and black wall plaque with a raised and fielded apron, gadrooned base, festooned and scrolled sides, cherub and death's head, arms, gadrooned urns, and a central urn on a plinth above.

Sir John Knatchbull (died 1676) is commemorated with a large white tablet featuring palm-enriched scrolls, floriate side pieces on the apron with cherubs, trumpets, garlands, and death's head brackets. An acanthus frieze runs along the cornice, above which appears a draped baldacchino with putti holding back drapes, a pyramid, flaming urns, and achievements.

Sir Edward Knatchbull (died 1749) has a simple wall plaque with arms and trophies.

Sir Wyndham Knatchbull (died 1763) is commemorated with a simple plaque designed by Robert Adam (who also designed Mersham-le-Hatch for Sir Wyndham) and carved by William Tyler.

The chancel contains a tilting helm of Sir Norton Knatchbull, along with Knatchbull hatchments. Royal Arms dated 1751 appear on the nave north wall, and a lugged charity board dated 1777 is positioned in the south aisle.