Church Of St John The Baptist

WITHERIDGE CHURCH STREET (north side), SS 81 SW Witheridge 9/73 Church of St John the 20.2.67 Baptist GV I Anglican parish church. Circa 1500, restored 1841 and 1884. Coursed local rubble, freestone dressings, slated roofs, coped verges, some lead-sheeting roofs. Plan: nave, chancel, north and south aisles, south porch, small south porch to chancel, 1884 north vestry, west tower of 1841. Mostly Perpendicular style, Victorian work of Gothic style. Exterior: lofty 3-stage Perpendicular tower with set-back buttresses rising to the third stage, this rebuilt in 1841, embattleu parapet, large corner pinnacles on square bases, small semi-circular head bell-chamber windows with louvres, labels, similar windows to the ringing-chamber stage, small semi-circular headed 3-light west window, semi-circular heads to the lights, semi-circular head west doorway, blocked with small 2-light windows inserted in 1884. 4-bay south aisle, all 3-light Perpendicular windows with tracery replaced 1841, parapets to the main body of the building replaced also at this time; polygonal stair-turret to the east giving access to the former rood loft, tiny foiled stairlight. South porch with diagonal buttresses, embattled parapet with 3 large pinnacles (C19). 4-bay north aisle is Perpendicular. Simple vestry with chimney dated:- "1884", reused C13 2-light window. Single bay chancel, C13 2-light window reset to the south, large 3-light C19 east window with reticulated tracery. Scratch dial on south wall; priest's door to south with a neo-Perpendicular type porch, probably 1841. Main entrance to interior with a good 4-centred arch head with carved ornamental spandrels, ribbed and studded door. Interior: plastered walls with colourwash, nave and 2 aisles with 4-bay quite tall arcades; the piers of Pevsners B-type with "standard capitals". Squint from the south aisle chancel arch. Ceiled wagon roof in the nave. Perpendicular font, octagonal, richly decorated with quatrefoils. Perpendicular-stone pulpit with figures in narrow panels under ogee canopies. In one panel a Crucifixion. C19 pews with plain bench ends. Some windows with C19 stained glass. Some plain C19 monuments.

Listing NGR: SS8032714568