The Church Building

This is a very large church dating almost entirely from the 14th Century.  The nave with north and south aisles, chancel to the east and a western tower were proabably completed in the 1330s and the vestry, and north and south chapels, completed later.  The north chapel of 1397 is now a priest's vestry.  The south chapel of 1444 is now the Lady Chapel.  A late 14th century porch protects a doorway which is thought to have been attached to a previous church due to its 12th century style.  The battlemarked parapets are later embellishments.

In the mid or late 15th century, a new oak screen was built between the nave and the chancel, it was lowered in the 19th century and a cross and canopy added to its top. The church accommodated 1100 persons with the benefit of galleries in the aisles, tower and Lady Chapel up to 1849, when they were removed.  It now seats 400.

The internal walls are plastered and decorated white with stone quoins and columns.  The nave roof is plastered with white decoration and exposed rafter, collars and tie beam construction.

The floor of the chancel is tiled and the vestry boarded.  The Lady Chapel is finished with wood blocks and the nave is boarded where pews are situated.

Some of the oak pews, constructed in 1849 and 1877, have been removed recently giving a large free area in front of the rood screen.  A new French oak finished pipe organ, designed in the traditional English style by Kenneth Tickell, was installed in 2002.

There is a peal of eight bells hung in a cast iron frame on steel girders in the sixty-five feet tower.  The walls are four feet thick of flint, stone and Roman brick with huge buttresses at the corners and gargoyles below the battlemented roof parapet.

The walls of the church are finished mainly with random flint and Barnack stone quoins.  The vestry, however, is constructed in Kentish rag stone and the arcade internally is constructed in clunch from Bedfordshire.

A converted stable building provides a hall (40x20 feet) with kitchen, office accommodation and lavatories.  There is also car parking outside the hall. 

Interment of ashes takes place in the large churchyard.  Gravestones have been laid down in the form of paths but tombs have been left in position.