Church Of St Mary

Church of St Mary, Selling

This parish church dates from around 1190, with significant additions and remodelling in around 1300 and the 15th century. It was substantially restored between 1841 and 1846 by R.C. Hussey. The building is constructed of flint, partly rendered, with plain tiled roofs.

The church comprises a chancel with north and south chapels, a nave and aisles, a central tower, transepts, and south and west porches. The western doorway is housed within a 19th-century porch and features large wrought iron doors. The 12th-century doorway beneath has a pointed arch with three orders and surround, all decorated with complex beaded and hollowed mouldings. It has attached columns with shaft-rings and capitals derived from acanthus designs. The west window, dating to around 1300, contains three stepped trefoil-cusped lights with a hollow chamfered surround.

The south aisle is buttressed with a string course and battlements. Its doorway, set in a 14th-century porch, has triple moulded orders. The aisles feature Perpendicular fenestration of the 15th century. The south chapel contains lancet windows and a 19th-century octagonal vice. The chancel is built of knapped and coursed flints with clasping buttresses, north and south lancets, and a stepped five-light east window with cinquecusped heads. The north chapel has lancets, and the north aisle has 15th-century windows with a small projecting vice. The central tower is rendered in two stages with string courses, battlements, and clock faces on all four elevations.

Interior

The interior contains a four-bay nave arcade with double chamfered arches on tall octagonal piers with moulded bases and capitals. The roof has four crown posts. There are blocked doorways to the north and north-west. The north and south aisles have chamfered arches on corbel tables leading through to the transepts.

The transepts, crossing, and east end date from around 1190. The tower is carried on tall square piers with moulded abaci with crocketed corners. The north and south arches were underbuilt in the 15th century with attached shafts. The east and west arches were remodelled around 1300, with the nave arcade mouldings carried across the crossing pier. The east arch has a double rebated and chamfered profile. One crossing pier shows some suggestion of vaulting springing in its re-entrants. Buttressing has been added to the north-east pier, blocking an archway through to the north chapel.

The chancel contains two bay arcades continued by a third blind arch in the sanctuary. It has pointed arches on round piers with crocketed capitals on square moulded abaci; the south-eastern arch is a 19th-century rebuild. The north arcade has spurred bases and acanthus-derived capitals by the same craftsman responsible for similar work at Bapchild and Stockbury, and several other churches south and west of Sittingbourne. Lancets in all three eastern limbs are carried on a string course. Crown post roofs span the north and south chapels. A fine moulded arch connects the south chapel to the south transept.

Fittings and Monuments

The church contains 19th-century reredos and brass altar rails, plain floor tiles throughout, and a rood stair in the north aisle at the north transept. Brasses include various inscriptions and remnant figures of the Norwood family in the chancel, an 18-inch figure of a man in the nave (undated), and remnants of a large brass in the south transept showing three mourners (six inches high, undated).

Monuments include the south chapel (known as Hilton chapel), which contains a white marble wall plaque to William Chambers (died 1724, monument dated 1758) with coloured marble surround, broken pediments, and achievement of arms. Two large naval standards are displayed: the Union Jack flown on HMS Minotaur at Trafalgar in 1805, and the Spanish Ensign captured from the battleship Neptune at the same engagement. Commander Stephen Hilton was master's mate on the Minotaur.

Wall paintings in the chancel include painted masonry lines and flower designs. The south chapel lancet reveals contain mid-14th-century outlined saints: St Paul, St Peter, St Bartholomew, and St John the Evangelist.

The chancel east window has five lights with coloured borders and grisaille backgrounds, each light containing a figure of a saint with the Virgin at the centre, and heraldic shields below each figure. The arms of Gilbert de Clare and others date the windows to 1299–1307. The west window dates to 1850 and is by T. Willement.