Church Of St Mary

Church of St Mary

A parish church that developed over several centuries, with 13th-century north aisle, 14th-century south aisle and porch, 15th-century chancel, north vestry and west tower, and late 15th-century clerestory with alterations to the south arcade. The chancel was restored in 1854, and the entire building underwent comprehensive restoration in 1920–21.

The chancel is constructed of ashlar, while the remainder is squared and coursed rubble stone with lead roofs. The west tower rises in three stages with diagonal buttresses, remains of a moulded plinth, battlemented parapet with carved gargoyles, and two-light openings to the bell-chamber. The west door features a moulded two-centred arch with hoodmould and a two-light traceried window above.

The nave has a battlemented parapet and clerestory with three bays of four-light cusped windows with flat heads. The north aisle has a small lancet to the west and two-light traceried windows flanking a moulded arched doorway. The south aisle has a plain parapet and two three-light windows with flat heads, the left window having uncusped lights. A finely moulded south doorway leads to the porch with a double-chamfered arch. The east window of the south aisle is Decorated with three lights (one blocked by a chancel buttress), featuring ogee tracery and one carved head stop to the hoodmould.

The chancel and vestry display a battlemented parapet with crocketted finials and a moulded corbel table below decorated with carved heads and half-figures. Both have a moulded plinth, sill course and dripmould. Offset buttresses support the chancel, which contains three bays of Perpendicular windows with moulded frames, and a similar five-light window to the east with some ogee tracery. The south doorway has a four-centred arch. A two-storey vestry adjoins, featuring irregular cusped lights and an octagonal stair turret.

Internally, the nave is spanned by a triple-chamfered tower arch. The north arcade consists of double-chamfered arches with outer nailhead moulding on quatrefoil piers with moulded caps. Two arches to the west of the south arcade are chamfered and moulded with a central octagonal pier with concave sides. The arch to the east is moulded with piers featuring unusual vertical mouldings and fleurons to the capitals. The east arch is a cusped ogee form with ornamental fleurons and rises to a rood-loft above.

A fine late 15th-century roof spans the nave with moulded beams, braced tie beams with traceried spandrels, and carved angel corbels. The aisles retain traces of wall paintings. The south aisle's Decorated east bay displays fleurons to the moulded sill course and window surround, with a low arched recess probably serving as the shrine of John Schorne. The east window contains ogee niches in the jambs, that to the right set on a carved head corbel, and a Decorated piscina.

The chancel contains a blind window over a four-centred doorway to the vestry, a moulded ogee piscina with shelf on a four-centred arch, and triple sedilia with ogee-canopied niches. The east wall holds a 19th-century reredos flanked by ogee niches with painted texts.

Fittings include a 15th-century octagonal font of clunch with quatrefoil panels and shields, 15th-century choir stalls with carved misericords, poppyheads and traceried front panels, 16th-century pews, poor-box and chest, and a 16th–17th century altar table. The reredos and east window glass (1854) were gifts of Queen Victoria in memory of John Camden Nield.

Monuments comprise brass plaques to Elizabeth Saunders (1613) and Richard Saunders (1602), a stone tablet to John Virgin, vicar (1694) with crude relief carving, a marble wall tablet to Thomas Saunders and family (1744) with fluted Doric pilasters, entablature and pediment, and a wall tablet to Richard Saunders (1751) in the north aisle with pediment and flanking scrolls.