Church of St John the Baptist

The Church of St John the Baptist is a medieval parish church with substantial 17th- and 19th-century alterations. The 13th-century north arcade and early 14th-century south arcade survive from the medieval core. The church received late 15th-century roofs, a clerestory, and west tower. The south aisle was widened in 1631, when the south porch was also built. The south (Sidney) chapel was completely rebuilt in 1820 by J B Rebecca. A major restoration in 1864–5 by George Gilbert Scott saw the north aisle and chancel east wall rebuilt and the south windows replaced.

Materials and Construction

The church is built of coursed sandstone ashlar with tiled roofs.

Plan

The building comprises a chancel with south-east chapel (which has its own south porch), north-east chapel, nave with north and south aisles and south porch, and west tower.

Setting and Exterior

The church stands in a good setting, set back from the street and in close proximity to Penshurst Place.

The 15th-century west tower has three stages with diagonal buttresses showing multiple offsets. It has an embattled parapet and outsized octagonal corner turrets with spirelets, probably dating from the 17th century. The tall three-light west window has vertical tracery. The west door has a pointed head set within a square surround. The bell stage has two-light openings in square surrounds, while the middle stage has single-light openings with very shallowly curved surrounds.

The late 15th-century nave and chancel clerestory features two-light windows in square surrounds, largely hidden externally behind the steeply pitched roofs of the aisles and chapels.

The 17th-century south aisle was rebuilt and widened in 1631. It is roofed separately from the nave and has three-light windows in 13th-century style, installed in 1864–5, replacing windows of 1631 that had straight mullions and transoms. The 17th-century south aisle porch has a round-arched outer opening with small mouldings dying into the jambs. The inner south doorway is hollow chamfered, with a good door possibly dating from the 15th or 16th century.

The south chapel, rebuilt in 1820, rises above the line of the south aisle. It has a 19th-century east window with reticulated tracery. On the south side is a three-light 19th-century window (with one light blocked) with a square head, and its own projecting south porch. This porch has a curved, embattled parapet. The south door has a square surround with foliage carving in the spandrels and a coat of arms above, flanked by inverted torches. The outer door is of good quality with open tracery. The porch is rib-vaulted internally.

The north aisle, rebuilt in 1864–5, has Decorated-style windows. The north chapel was also rebuilt in the 19th century and has a three-light late 13th-century-style window like those in the south aisle, a 19th-century north door, and a polygonal stair turret. The chapel is only two storeys at its east end, where it has two 19th-century Decorated-style east windows—the upper with a pointed head, the lower in a square surround. The chancel has a five-light 19th-century Decorated-style east window.

Interior

There is no chancel arch, but a large timber arch of 1865–6 with openwork tracery spandrels and large angel corbels serves to divide the nave and chancel.

The three-bay 13th-century north arcade has arches of two chamfered orders on round piers with moulded capitals. Between the chancel and the north chapel are two arches of unequal width—one with a hood mould with mid-14th-century headstops, the other almost plain and much taller, with a triangular head, possibly 15th century.

The 14th-century south nave arcade and the arcade to the south-east (Sidney) chapel are continuous, with polygonal piers having moulded capitals and bases. A narrow 13th-century arch on moulded corbels leads from the south aisle into the south chapel. Next to it is a 13th-century lancet that now opens internally from the chapel to the aisle, indicating that the aisle was once narrower than the chapel.

The Sidney chapel has an elegant pointed tunnel vault of 1820, panelled and painted, with carved bosses on the ribs.

The tower arch is very tall and dates from the 15th century, with chunky polygonal responds with moulded capitals. The scar of the former nave roof is visible on the east face of the tower.

The nave has a four-bay crown post roof from the late 15th century. Short, curved braces to the main beams have carved spandrels and rest on carved timber corbels. The south aisle roof dates from 1631 and has an asymmetrical king post and collar design, with the principal rafters below the collar stopped and moulded. The stone corbels on the north side probably survive from an earlier roof in the aisle. The other roofs are 19th century.

Principal Fixtures

The 15th-century polygonal font has quatrefoils on the bowl and tracery on the stem, but has been garishly recoloured in the 19th or 20th century. The stone pulpit dates from about 1865 and is in a hard Italianate style, with mosaic inlay and Roman-style carved heads. The chancel screen of 1895 by Bodley and Garner is in a very elaborate late Perpendicular style with delicate tracery and a coved loft. There is a similar screen in the north aisle.

The church contains some good glass, notably heraldic glass of 1627 in the west window and glass of 1884 in the south clerestory by Holiday, as well as other good 19th- and early 20th-century windows.

Monuments

The church has an excellent collection of monuments. Among the most notable are two 13th-century coffin slabs under the tower, one with a cross superimposed over the figure of a praying woman. Sir Stephen de Penchester (died 1299) is commemorated by a damaged recumbent Purbeck marble figure in chain mail, drawing a sword. There is a brass to Pawle Yden, died 1514. Sir William Sidney, died 1554, has a late Perpendicular tomb chest with little Renaissance detailing, the back plate framed by twisted shafts carrying a deep cornice. Sir William Coventry, died 1686, is commemorated by a massive architectural wall tablet in black and white marble with putti holding up an urn, probably by William Kidwell. Robert, 4th Earl of Leicester, died 1704, by William Stanton and William Woodman, features dancing angels supporting an urn and baby heads in the clouds. Gilbert Spencer, died 1730, has a large tablet in the chancel. Philip, 5th Earl of Leicester, died 1743, has a tomb chest with an obelisk and a good coat of arms. Sophia, Lady De L'Isle, died 1837, by W Theed, is commemorated by a female figure in Grecian draperies on a pedestal. Viscount Hardinge, died 1856, designed by Salvin and carved by Phyffers, has a Gothic tablet with a medallion.

History

There was a church on this site by the early 12th century, and the core of the nave may date from that period. The north aisle was added around 1200, and the south-east chapel is 13th century in origin. Before it was rebuilt in 1820, the south-east chapel appears to have been late 13th century, with the east window having a drooping trefoil in the head. The south aisle and south chapel arcade were built or rebuilt in the 14th century, and the north chapel was also in existence by the mid-14th century. The nave and chancel walls were raised and provided with a clerestory in the 15th century, when the west tower was also built. The south aisle was widened and the south porch built in 1631. Before the Scott restoration, the south aisle windows were of 1631 and had transoms and straight mullions. The unusual corner turrets and pinnacles on the tower may also be 17th century.

The south (Sidney) chapel was rebuilt in 1820 to designs by John Biagio Rebecca (about 1777–1847), a decorative painter and architect who also built Goring Castle in Sussex and worked at Penshurst Place around 1818. The church was heavily restored and partially rebuilt in 1864–5 by George Gilbert Scott, a very well-known mid-19th-century church restorer. He rebuilt and enlarged the north aisle and north chapel, replaced many of the roofs, and replaced the 17th-century south aisle windows with pseudo-medieval windows felt to be more in keeping with the overall style of the church. There was further refurnishing in the late 19th century.