Church Of The Holy Rood

The Church of the Holy Rood is a chapel, originally an Anglican parish church, dating to the 13th century with substantial rebuilding in 1736. It is constructed of rubble limestone with ashlar piers and dressings, and has a stone slate roof.

The west end of the chancel is blocked, and the former north porch has been re-set as a west door. There are three bays of a ruined nave arcade, now re-set at a lower level. The north wall of the chapel contains three blocked arches of a former arcade consisting of two chamfered orders resting on a circular column with nailhead ornament on the capital. The chancel arch is also of two orders, supported by bold 13th- to 14th-century corbels depicting a king and queen. The nave piers are hexagonal, featuring a keel profile on the intrados carried round the arches without intervening capitals. A blocked north chancel door is also present. South and east windows are round-headed, dating to the 18th century, and a blocked south door has a bracketed cornice with an inscription recording restoration by John Vilett, knight and lay rector, in 1736. Numerous 18th- and early 19th-century tombstones form the paving in the former nave. The nave, north and south aisles, and the west tower were demolished in 1852.

Inside, the roof is an open timber structure, with trusses remodelled in the 18th century. The walls are plastered and colourwashed. A collection of memorials were re-fixed to the walls in the 19th century, along with some loose slabs. Notable memorials include those of Elenor Huchens (1610), featuring coloured and gilded chalk; Rev. John Neate (died 1719), with a broken pediment and flanking pilasters; Mrs Millicent Neate (died 1764), with marble urns on a pyramid over a sarcophagus; Mary Wayt (died 1724), an aedicule with a broken pediment and a putto below; and William Horne (died 1730), with a Latin inscription within an aedicule and a broken pediment. There is a 19th-century font and pulpit. Of interest are the grave slabs that were formerly laid in the nave, now located externally, including the grave of John Alexander, who died in 1697 aged 117 years.