Church Heritage Record 632264

Medium-sized village church with tower in fair-sized churchyard. Long three-bay chancel and three-bay nave with aisles N and S; vestry against easternmost two bays of chancel and organ chamber against the last bay; W tower abuts nave with stair turret on S side; porch on centre bay of S aisle.

The Archaeology Data Services records no survey, excavation or assessment for the church or churchyard. There is an assessment of Manor Farmhouse, which lies on the W boundary of the churchyard.  A hoard was discovered in the churchyard in 1228. There is likely to be significant archaeological potential throughout the site. It is likely that the entire footprint of the church will be archaeologically sensitive, although below-ground remains in the chancel and possibly other areas may have been disturbed in the 1911 rebuilding. The standing fabric of the tower, W end of the nave and aisles, S aisle, S side of the chancel and arcades should also be considered sensitive. The churchyard will also be archaeologically sensitive throughout.

The church is on the Greensand Ridge, a prominent landscape feature which runs NE-SW across Bedfordshire. The geology produces thin, sandy soils supporting lowland heathland and acid grassland. The churchyard has a number of mature trees including yew (not ancient), holly and Scot’s Pine, which is characteristic of the Greensand Ridge ecology. There are no TPOs but the site is in a conservation area so they are protected. No reported evidence of bats. Lapwing and turtle dove (red status but not protected species) were recorded nearby before 2009. Rooks roost in the taller trees and the belfry. A protected species survey (flora and fauna) would be helpful. Nitrate Vulnerable Zone (groundwater; immediately adjacent to NVZ surface water).

Husborne Crawley was originally two distinct settlements, as suggested by the name and by the spread-out nature of the modern village. The church is at the western pole of the village, known as Church End. This may have been the core of the original village of Husborne as is indicated in a licence of 1219, but the proximity of several buildings immediately nearby referring to Crawley may suggest otherwise. In 1228 a hoard including a gold and silver cross was found in the churchyard, indicating prior Christian presence. It was claimed by the Crown.

The earliest records indicate that the church was attached to the manor of Crawley. It must have been in existence by c1170, when the church is recorded as having been granted to Dunstable Priory (Augustinian canons). A vicar was appointed from 1219 onwards. No trace of the building of that era is visible, except perhaps the font. In 1251, the Prior and canons are recorded as having had the chancel rebuilt and, in 1282 roof work. The earliest extant parts of the church, the south aisle arcade and some of the masonry of its walls, also date from the C13 at a time when the Priory was acquiring manorial land in addition to the church and its glebe. The Priory’s investment in the church was matched by investment in its wider landholding, as it is recorded as having built a grange and agricultural buildings in the second half of the C13. All this was cemented soon after 1368, when the priory obtained the entire manorial property from the Crown.

After the Dissolution, the manor, including the rectory and advowson, went through two ownerships before being acquired by John Thompson in 1579. His magnificent tomb is in the N aisle. The Thompsons were responsible for various works to the church, additions to the ring of bells (since recast) and made a gift of plate. In 1691, the family sold the property to Edmund Williamson (wall monument; also one to Talbot Williamson, see above). In 1791, the property and rights were sold to the Duke of Bedford. He had the manor house demolished - it is not even clear where it stood. However, the manor farmhouse immediately adjacent to the churchyard is presumably the manorial home farm, although as there were three manors of ancient origin in Husborne Crawley, it is possibly a different one.

In 1841, a fire was discovered in the tower after a lightning strike. It was put out with buckets of water carried up the tower stairs. As the bellframe had been partly burnt, the bells were not rung for a number of years. However, the frame was of large enough timbers that it was found to be salvageable and was repaired and put back into working order. The church long had a ring of six and, since 1931, eight.

Repairs were carried out to the church in the 1820s and the seating replaced. By mid-century, there was discussion of restoration and Gilbert Scott, who designed Ridgmont, All Saints, for the neighbouring parish (see below), is said to have prepared plans in the 1860s. But there was no action for half a century. The author of the VCH entry, published in 1912, reported that ‘The exterior of the church has been mended up in Roman cement, which covers most of the stonework details. The chancel walls have been thrust out of the perpendicular by the roof, which is of fairly steep pitch and covered with modern slates.’ However, this description had already been superseded because the chancel, north aisle and south porch had all been demolished and rebuilt the previous year and all roofs entirely replaced. Restoration, then, having come so late to Husborne Crawley, was not especially sensitive despite that fact. The architect was Cecil Greenwood Hare, who had trained in Bodley’s office and took on his practice at Bodley’s death in 1907. The 11th Duke of Bedford was the main sponsor of the church rebuilding.

There are no specific Bedford connections in the fabric or furnishing of the church. The Russell family’s estate church is that at Woburn, St Mary. The Dukes of Bedford remain substantial landowners in the area and retain a share of the patronage of Husborne Crawley (one turn in four).

The terrier completed in 1971 suggests that the dedication is to St James (unclear which one) having originally been to St Mary Magdalene. No record of a rededication has been supplied.

The church is reached from the lych gate on the SW corner of the churchyard. The first impression is dominated by the W tower, which so struck Pevsner in 1968: ‘Has any other church such green greensand as the W tower of Husborne Crawley, where it appears mixed with the usual brownish sandstone?’ The tower is C15, of three stages with four-step buttresses at the SE and SW corners and an octagonal stair turret in the angle formed by the S side of the tower and the W wall of the S aisle. The first stage is big, with an arched door on the W side in a moulded recess with a blocky hoodmould (renewed) and a generous three-light Perpendicular window. The second stage is unadorned except for the clockface to the W and a lancet to the E. The top stage has paired two-light bell-openings, more Decorated than Perpendicular but authentic (evidence of an 1814 watercolour reproduced in Pickford, Bedfordshire Churches, see references below), gargoyles and a battlemented parapet.

The Tower is the most intact survival from the medieval church. The rest was substantially rebuilt in 1911 by Cecil Hare, largely at the expense of the Duke of Bedford. A framed set of photographs in the N aisle documents the project. It shows just how extensive the work was: almost all of the masonry of the chancel and N aisle were completely taken down and rebuilt, broadly on the original footprint; all the roofs, except perhaps the tower, were new. However, much of the S aisle and the thick corner in the SE angle with the chancel are largely of the C13 or C14. The stones of the S aisle walls are thinner than those elsewhere (the rebuilt masonry on the north side and in the chancel has preserved the contrast – perhaps the old stones were reused).

Aside from these survivals, the exterior presents a late example of thoroughgoing church restoration which so many parish churches had seen in the century before. S and N aisles have deep ashlar parapets concealing gutters. They are each of three bays, the outer bays of which have big Perp-style three-light windows with cusped heads and segmental hoodmoulds over. The centre bay of each aisle is occupied by a door. That on the N side is slightly off centre and is perhaps reset masonry from the medieval building. That on the S has a C14 pointed-arch moulded surround and, to the right, a quatrefoil-shaped stoup hollowed out of a block of stone under a four centred arched recess. Sheltering this is a porch with a gabled roof, the ridge almost as high as the top of the parapet. To E and W there are two-light Perp-style windows.

Against the easternmost two bays on the N side of the chancel is a vestry with a flat roof, a two light square headed window to the E and a four light square headed window and pointed arched door to the N. Between the vestry and the N aisle, set back but standing taller, is the organ chamber; this has a flat roof and a two-light square headed window.

The principal entrance is via the door in the S aisle. The interior is not very light. The immediate impression is of width: this is largely because of the relative shortness of the nave and aisles, being only three bays. The S aisle has a C13/14 arcade of twice-chamfered pointed arches on short wide octagonal shafts and moulded capitals of different profiles. The piers rest on blocky pads with chamfered corners. The N aisle has the same basic elements but they are of the C15 and the arches are taller, the chamfers wider, the capitals more distinctly modelled, the piers slenderer and taller. Their bases are elegantly moulded. At the E end of the S aisle is an altar; above it the wall is windowless but it has a C14 ogee-headed niche surrounded by relief-carved foliage. On the S wall is a medieval piscina. At the E end of the N aisle, there is a large alabaster tomb to John Thompson (see below). The nave and aisle walls have a number of monuments. The N door is not used.

The chancel arch is of 1911: a simple pointed arch with a chamfer, almost round and with no corbels. Here the shortness of the nave is again emphasised, this time by the length of the chancel, which is very nearly as long as the nave. It is plainly plastered. There are two steps to the chancel and another to the sanctuary. There are two visible survivals of the medieval building: at the E end of the S wall are a piscina and aumbry from the medieval church, reset; at the W end of the S wall is a narrow door, with another smaller one above, both with four-centred arched heads. These would have served the rood loft. The mid C20 plan (see above) suggests that the stairwell survives in the thickness of the wall. Midway along this wall is a door, apparently not used. Opposite, a door on the N side of the chancel leads to the vestry and the rear of the organ chamber.

Nave and chancel have timber vaulted ceilings lined in cedar boards. These show oak arch braces, resting on plain corbels, with arched rafters between.

The font is situated at the W end of the nave under the tower arch. The arch is of the C15. The tower was screened in the 1930s with oak panelling and, above it, plain leaded lights and then above that more timber screening and a big internal window giving borrowed light from the large W window in the bellringing chamber. The bottom stage of the tower is used for storage and is untidy. A pointed arched door leads to a stone spiral stair giving access to the bellringing stage (in good order, well-used), the clock chamber, the belfry and the tower roof.