Church Of St Mary

The Church of St Mary is a medieval parish church, largely incorporating 19th-century rebuilding. It is constructed of flint with limestone dressings, with the north side of the walls largely rendered over. The nave and chancel have plain tiles, while the aisle and porch have lead roofs.

The church comprises a west tower, nave, chancel, south aisle, and south porch. The square, unbuttressed west tower dates to the 14th century and has two-light Y-tracery bell openings. The tracery has been repaired and replaced in wood on the north and south sides. A square, staged brick stair turret, likely from the 18th century, is set into the south side of the tower. The west window, also from the 14th century, is two-light with headstops to the hoodmould, with a tall, narrow opening above featuring one-piece jambs. A round opening in the north side of the tower has been filled with a pierced wooden panel. The tower features a stepped parapet with flushwork panels and diagonally-set corner pinnacles, now lacking their tops.

The south porch, dating to the 15th century, has shields in the arch spandrels and a niche above, with staged diagonal buttresses framing the gable. The east and west windows of the south aisle are two-light with cusped Y-tracery. A stoup is located to the east of the archway. The south aisle has four three-light windows from the 15th century, with segmental arched heads and hoodmoulds on headstops, with staged buttresses dividing the bays and staged diagonal buttresses at the south-east and south-west corners. At the west end of the nave is a red brick chimney with an octagonal gault brick shaft and moulded cap. A square-headed priest’s door has red brick jambs. A renewed three-light Perpendicular east window is found in the aisle, and a two-light cusped Y-tracery window is present in the south wall of the chancel. The south-east corner of the chancel and the east wall have been rebuilt in red brick, with a 19th-century three-light east window. The north wall of the chancel has a two-light Y-tracery window and a three-light 15th-century window with tracery infilled with rendered brick. The north side of the nave has tall, narrow two-light windows of the early Perpendicular period, the easternmost windows being wider and renewed. A 14th-century north doorway is present with a hoodmould on headstops.

The interior features plastered nave and chancel ceilings and a moulded wooden cornice in the nave. The north wall of the nave has two bays of blank arcading, now cut by the two centre windows; between the arches is a 13th-century shaft with a carved bishop’s head and staff. The south arcade consists of four bays with hollow-chamfered arches and octagonal piers from the 19th century, with the two western bays featuring a continuous hollow chamfer. The aisle roof is arch-braced with a roll-moulded purlin and bosses at the intersections. A chapel at the east end of the aisle has a reset ogee arched niche head across the south-east corner. An opening from the chapel to the chancel has a double hollow-chamfered arch on polygonal responds. A low sedilia is situated in an arched recess, and a piscina is found in the south-east corner, with a cusped head and broach-stops to the jambs. The south-east window is shafted internally with a hoodmould on stiff-leaf stops. A good 16th-century monument, possibly to John Hammond, features a narrow pediment and entablature on Doric colonnettes. The church retains pine box pews, and the font is 15th-century, octagonal, with engaged shafts around the stem and alternating shields and roses around the bowl.