Church Of St Paul

Church of St Paul, Rusthall Common

Built in 1849–50 by Henry Isaac Stevens of Derby, St Paul is an early example of the serious archaeological approach to Gothic Revival church design that emerged in the 1840s. The church is constructed of local sandstone ashlar with clay tile roofs and exemplifies the shift towards historically informed medieval revival architecture.

The original structure is an unaisled cruciform building comprising a nave, chancel, crossing tower, and transepts. The severe early 13th-century style is immediately apparent in the exterior: the six-bay nave is divided by buttresses with offsets, each bay containing a slender lancet window without cusping. The crossing tower rises in three stages, with the upper belfry stage featuring four narrow lancets of equal height and terminating in a plain parapet. A polygonal stair turret rises from the northeast corner to the base of the belfry stage. The west end of the nave displays a large five-light window combining vertical mullions with intersecting tracery.

A narthex-porch was added across the west end in 1913, featuring a north-south gabled roof and richly moulded north and west entrances with a tall gable over the latter. The north aisle, added in 1864–65 by Stevens and Robinson, is almost as large as the nave and has its own gable. It contains a three-light Geometrical west window, north windows of single and paired lancets, and an east end window with three graded lancets.

Internally, the severe aesthetic continues throughout. The walls remain as bare sandstone ashlar. The south wall of the nave features a remarkable display of deep window reveals extending to ground level with cusped heads framing the window tops. The dominant interior feature is the north arcade, added during the 1860s extension, comprising short dark marble quatrefoil piers on high moulded bases with varied foliage capitals and multiply moulded arches. The nave roof is steeply pitched with collars to the main trusses. The crossing features an impressive roof with intersecting diagonals and a raised centre portion.

A significant collection of 19th-century fixtures survives. The font of 1850 has a foliated octagonal bowl with angle shafts and moulded circular base. The pulpit features open sides with Gothic canopies and marble corner shafts. The pews remain largely intact with shaped and moulded ends. The most ornate feature is the elaborately canopied reredos of 1869, designed by John Norton and carved by William Farmer of Westminster Road (likely of the later firm Farmer and Brindley). The central panel depicts the Supper at Emmaus, with side panels showing the Road to Calvary and the Entombment. Extensive stained glass includes the east window by Ward and Hughes.

To the west of the church stand the former schools, now converted to domestic use, identifiable by multiple gables and Gothic windows. North of the church, on the boundary between churchyard and road, stands a magnificent tall war memorial cross by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, constructed of Hollington stone and bearing names of those fallen in the First World War.

The church was built on the edge of Rusthall Common on land forming part of the Nevill Park estate, begun in 1833 by the Earl of Abergavenny. The choice of a Derbyshire architect is unusual but may be explained by Stevens' concurrent work on Fordcombe Church to the west. Finance was provided by Henry Hardinge, 1st Viscount Hardinge, governor-general of India from 1844, who returned home in 1848. The Hardinge family may have known Stevens through their seat at King's Newton in Derbyshire. Stevens' brother, Nehemiah Edward, practised as a minor architect in Tunbridge Wells and is said to have been involved with work at St Paul's, though original evidence for this is lacking.

Henry Isaac Stevens (1806–73) enjoyed a long and prolific career from the mid-1830s until his death, primarily in ecclesiastical work concentrated in the East Midlands. He began practice in 1834 and from 1859 was in partnership with F J Robinson (1833 or '34–92).