Church Of St Lawrence

Church of St Lawrence

This is a parish church of Norman foundation, comprising an 11th-century tower, 12th-century nave and chancel (extended in the 13th century), with 14th and 15th-century windows and fittings. The south transept, south aisle, south porch and much of the church underwent general restoration by William Butterfield between 1864 and 1866. The building is constructed of flint and rubble, partly plastered, with ashlar and roughly dressed quoins and dressings, and plain tile roofs.

The church consists of a nave, south aisle and transept, chancel, north tower and south porch. The west front displays the nave and south aisle, with the south aisle showing coursed flint with ashlar quoins and bands. A gabled roof is topped with a 19th-century wrought iron gable cross. The west door is now blocked; its arch is of single order with dogtooth ornament, and the tympanum features re-used diapered and dog-toothed blocks. The west window is in the 19th-century curvilinear style with a drip mould, while the south-west window comprises 19th-century paired lancets.

The south porch is a single storey timber-framed structure on a flint plinth, with the gable end open to expose the framing and a wrought iron gable cross. Inside is a 19th-century double plank door with large iron hinges. The south aisle features two ashlar bands and three lancet windows. The south transept has a single ashlar band, ashlar quoins and two offset buttresses, with a triple lancet window to the south and a single lancet on the east wall.

The south-east chapel (now the organ chamber) has ashlar quoins and is covered by a catslide extension from the chancel roof. It contains a paired lancet window and a trefoiled wall niche commemorating Mary Agues Bolton, died 1928. The chancel's south wall displays exposed Norman quoins half-way along its length, two 19th-century lancet windows and two trefoiled wall niches for children of Alfred and Mary Lyall (died 1844) and Lucy Verena Holland (died 1866). The east wall is partly rendered in plaster painted to resemble flint, with two diagonal offset buttresses in brick and flint, and a 13th-century triple lancet east window. Between and forward of these buttresses is a mid-19th-century cast iron railing on a stone plinth, encircling an unmarked horizontal grave slab. The north wall displays exposed Norman nave quoins and a single lancet to the east.

The north wall of the chancel contains a 14th-century Decorated window of two lights with a sexfoil in the head to the west, and a central blocked 15th-century doorway with a four-centred arch, double hollow chamfer and drip mould. A trefoiled niche on the north-east buttress commemorates Sackree.

The tower is a three-stage structure of flint with roughly dressed quoins and an eastern semi-circular apse with a tiled roof and two 19th-century windows. Single lights appear in the tower's second stage, with a large belfry opening above. The north wall has single lights to the first and second stages and a large belfry opening, with a 19th-century board door in the original semi-circular arched opening. The west wall has a single light to each stage, and a projecting chimney or garderobe corbelled out to the right.

The nave's north wall contains a 15th-century three-light window with a hollow chamfered surround and four-centred drip mould to the east, and a 19th-century single round-headed window to the west.

Interior

The interior comprises a four-bay nave with a 19th-century arcade to the south aisle and south transept. The arcade has three square-section piers and one round pier with plain chamfered arches. The roof consists of plastered barrel trusses with three crown posts; the trusses are higher and exposed to the east, emphasising the transept and crossing. The tower intrudes into the east end of the nave with a hollow chamfered doorway and plank door to the tower, and a blocked doorway to the rood loft.

The south aisle has a masonry screen to the transepts with two lancets and a trefoil over, and a square-headed and shouldered arch to the nave pier. The south transept has a barrel truss roof and a chamfered arch through to the south-east chapel (now organ room). The chancel features a hollow chamfered reveal to the mullion and a four-light transomed Perpendicular window with tracery, opening to the south-east organ room. Attached shafts in a chamfered surround frame the east triple lancet window. The barrel truss roof is plastered with exposed lattice-framing at the east end.

Fittings in the chancel include a cusped piscina and trefoiled sedile. Vestigial remains of a 19th-century reredos stand on the chancel east wall. The full-height wood chancel screen, designed by Butterfield, has three open bays; it is solid with spandrels painted with a crucifixion and two central gates with open wrought iron tracery. An octagonal font, also by Butterfield, dates to the period of restoration. A 12th-century stone relief of Archbishop Becket on the chancel south wall stands under a canopy with colonettes.

Monuments

The south aisle contains several monuments. Thomas Knight (died 1794), signed by Shout of Holborn, London, is commemorated by a wall plaque featuring a broken Ionic pillar on a plinth over a sarcophagus with claw feet. To the west is another work by Shout, a white tablet wall plaque with pillars, to Harriet Knatchbull (died 1791). Above this is a foliated and scrolled cartouche wall plaque to Thomas Carter (died 1707), with cherubs on either side and trumpets above.

The north wall bears a similar draped cartouche with garlands of fruit and flowers and cherubs supporting a shield, commemorating John Christmas (died 1712). To the west is a wall plaque to Edward Knight (died 1852), Jane Austen's brother, designed by S. Manning, featuring an angled draped sarcophagus with an obelisk above. Further east is a black plaque in a white marble surround, chamfered and lugged, with a scrolled pediment and achievement above, to Richard Munn, M.A., Vicar of Godmersham (died 1682).

Windows by Gibbs dating to 1866–67 appear in the south-west and east windows; those to the west are in memory of Edward Knight and his wife Elizabeth.