Church Of St John The Evangelist

Church of St John the Evangelist

A parish church built across several centuries: the 12th, 13th, 14th centuries, and late 15th century. The structure comprises a west tower, nave, north porch, chancel, and south chapel.

The exterior is largely constructed in coursed, squared stone with courses of varying heights, though the nave features better-cut, squarish stone ashlar around openings. All roofs are tiled.

The south façade presents a short, two-stage tower with a plain plinth and moulded string course set shortly above. Diagonally-set corner buttresses appear to the left with two offsets. The bottom stage of the tower is plain. To the right sits a square-set buttress at the nave end, rebuilt with the tower. Above a moulded string and slight offset sits a small Tudor-arched lancet window; twin similar windows with louvres appear above this. A battlemented parapet crowns the tower, topped with heraldic animals at the corners, a lead chute slightly off centre to the left, and a low pyramid roof with a tall iron spike and weathervane.

The nave features a ground-level plinth with two-light windows: one on the left with reticulated tracery and no hoodmould; a similar window on the right with 19th-century tracery. Between these, slightly left of centre, stands a boarded south door with a flat head and moulding extending around a semi-circular tympanum decorated with fish-scale carving. Nook shafts flank either side with volute capitals and a long abacus; the arch carries chevron and billet moulding, with chevron repeated on the hoodmould. A parapet gable crowns this elevation, its apex marked by a cross-gablet with a stone cross.

The south chapel projects to the right, with a plain plinth and diagonally-set corner buttresses. Its left return contains a door with a Tudor arch, built up in brick. A two-light Perpendicular tracery window occupies the south wall, set back behind casement moulding with no hoodmould. The chancel behind carries a parapet gable matching the nave.

The north door is boarded and retains 13th-century hinges with half-moon terminals. The north porch features a stone plinth, patched with brick. Its timber-framed sides are open in the upper part, fitted with three diamond-set bars. The gable displays arch-braces to the gable truss, a tie-beam, and a collar. Scalloped medieval bargeboards complete the porch.

Interior

The nave walls are plastered. The tower archway carries a double-ogee moulding with no capitals. The semi-circular chancel arch is flanked by half-round columns with volute capitals and nook shafts bearing carved head capitals; the abacus extends across the east wall. Chevron and nail head moulding ornament the arch.

The roof structure consists of tie-beam and collar trusses with curved 'V' struts and curved braces to wallposts below, springing from carved-head corbels. The outline of stairs to a 1783 gallery is visible on the tower arch.

The chancel floor contains partly memorial slabs and a semi-circular plastered ceiling with a moulded ridge rib, crenellated wallplate, and gable ties. The south chapel contains a pillar piscina and a flat ceiling.

An octagonal font bowl sits on a clustered column. 19th-century Royal Arms dated 1817 occupy the tower base.

Medieval glass fragments survive in the south chapel south window and north windows, including the Whittington arms in the chancel; early 16th-century glass in the tower window repeats these arms. Brasses dated 1616 and 1543 are mounted in the south chapel. An impressive marble monument to Anne Somerset (died 1764), carved by Symonds of Hereford, features a pyramid above a sarcophagus. A 1620 wall monument in the nave is partly obscured by the north window. A benefactions board hangs over the south door.

Historical Context

The Whittington family owned Pauntley Court during the 14th and 15th centuries. Richard Whittington, Lord Mayor of London in the early 15th century, was a younger son of this family.

The church forms a group with Pauntley Court and related buildings.