Church Of St Mary

The Church of St Mary was built in 1879 at the expense of Sir John Kelk of Tidworth House, designed by architect John Johnson. It became the parish church but is now a redundant building. This church is a spectacular example of Geometrical Gothic design, comprising a three-bay nave with aisles, a large south porch, a chancel with unequal north and south chapels to the west, vestries north of the chapels and in the eastern bay of the nave, and a western bell turret. The construction uses coursed rock-faced stone with ashlar dressings, topped with a steep tiled roof. The roof has small, gabled vents with trefoils, a low eaves line across the aisles, and separate gabled treatment for other sections. Buttresses, angled at corners with stepped gables, feature on the elevations, alongside bands linking sills and hood-moulds. Aisle and vestry windows are lancet windows of two and three lights, with cusped heads. The east gable features a quatrefoil above three stepped lancets with attached columns, while similar lancets flank the chancel. The west end has coupled tall lancets below trefoils, and the vestry east gable has a cinquefoil window. Notably, a tall, slender bell turret rises from a massive stepped buttress on the west gable, featuring a cylindrical form with gabled buttresses flanking four openings and culminating in a spire. The porch has an arched opening with recessed orders of three attached columns, an interior arcade of six leading to a south door, and recessed orders of two columns. Inside, the church is tall and orderly, with clustered marble columns, moulded bands and bases, and stiff-leaf capitals. Pilasters in the aisles mark the springing points for half-arches. Decorative corbels, painted panels on the chancel ceiling, a tiled nave floor, and a mosaic chancel floor contribute to a rich interior, complemented by a circular stone pulpit, a brass eagle lectern, and six brass candle-stands in the nave. A square font stands on two steps before a niche in the massive west-end buttress.