Church Of All Saints

The Church of All Saints is a parish church begun in the early 13th century, with significant additions in the mid-14th and early 15th centuries, and Victorian restoration in the late 19th century. It is constructed of rubble stone with dressed stone quoins, and has a stone slate roof with coped gables and cross finials. The church features a west tower, a nave with broad three-bay aisles, a gabled south porch adjoined by a gabled chantry chapel dating from 1305, a chancel with flanking chapels to the north and south, and a late 19th-century clerestory.

The three-stage west tower has string courses, stepped diagonal buttresses, a large west window with Y tracery and an elongated quatrefoil above, and numerous ogee lights on its upper stages. It has a pierced parapet with pointed trefoil decoration, grouped crocketed pinnacles at each corner with spire finials, a curved belfry stair to the south east corner, and an enlarged pinnacle group. A clock face is located on the east side. The 1305 chantry chapel has a three-light Perpendicular window with a drip mould and carved head label stops. The south chancel chapel contains a large five-light intersecting tracery window. The north chancel chapel features a three-light Perpendicular window, a pierced cusped parapet, and the entrance to an internal rood stair.

Inside, the nave roof has collar and tie beam trusses with curved wind bracing between beams and struts to posts. There is a five-bay arcade of pointed arches supported on octagonal pillars, accompanied by a 19th-century clerestory of alternate one- and three-light windows. A fine ironwork screen separates the south aisle from the south chancel chapel, which contains some medieval floor tiles. An early 17th-century wooden communion rail with spiral balusters is also present. The octagonal font, dated 1661, is of local craft and decorated with shields in cartouches and simple leaf and geometrical motifs on the shaft. Stained glass by Clayton & Bell is in the renewed 19th-century east window, and stained glass by Kempe from 1898 is in the south chantry chapel. Numerous floor tombstones from the 17th century and wall monuments including 17th-century stone monuments and 18th and 19th-century marble examples are visible. Several effigies are also present, including the tomb chest of Sir John Joce, who died in 1344, and his wife, who died in 1362; effigies of two priests, one thought to be Robert de Wakering, the church’s founder; and a unique effigy of Wyrhall, Forester of Fee, dated 1457, depicted in hunting costume. A small brass depicting a medieval Forest of Dean miner is also among the fixtures. The church is locally known as the "Cathedral of the Forest" due to the breadth of its aisles.