Church Heritage Record 610307

Short chancel, 2-bay south chapel which extends beyond the chancel, 2-bay nave and south aisle (in effect two conjoined gabled naves, but here called the south aisle to avoid confusion) and small north-west tower.

Nave c 9m (30 ft) x 6m (20ft), chancel 5m (17ft) x 4.50m (15ft).

Archaeological remains from the Neolithic period have been found at several sites in the area, most notably at Chanctonbury Ring, a small Iron Age hill fort within Wiston estate and visible from the church.  It occupies a prominence on the northern edge of the south downs and overlooks a large portion of the Weald below. The name originally referred to the circular prehistoric earthwork dating from c 800-600 BC, but has come to mean the crown of beech trees planted in 1760 by Charles Goring. In the Great Storm of 1987 the trees were decimated, but following archaeological excavations were replanted there by the Goring family. These and earlier excavations within the earthworks have revealed Neolithic, Bronze Age and Iron Age settlement evidence overlain by the remains of two Romano-Celtic temples with associated votive offerings.

There is considerable evidence for Roman activity and several roads cross the area. Roman bricks were re-used in Buncton chapel and elsewhere. Many place names end in the Saxon ton, including Wiston, Buncton, and Washington. Wiston (Wistenetoune) manor and church are recorded in Domesday, and it is not impossible that the nave of the church is pre-Conquest in origin, the proportions in particular being suggestive of this.

The church has a typically complex history and archaeology for a church of this antiquity.  The nave is possibly 11th-century in origin, rectors are recorded from c1230. The church was extended in the 14th century when the tower, south aisle and (chantry?) chapel were perhaps added. The earliest dedication was to St Michael, recorded in 1327.  A chantry of St Mary is recorded between 1357 and c1548, the priest, who was sometimes called the lord’s chaplain, receiving the income from lands in Ashurst in the late 14th century, and sometimes serving Buncton chapel too. The south chapel was called the chapel of Our Lady in the early 16th century, and since it always belonged to the lord of the manor was almost certainly the chapel of the chantry of the same dedication.  The dedication of the whole church has been to St Mary since at least the 19th-century restoration, though the old dedication lingers. 

The church and its monuments may have been damaged during or immediately after the Civil War, as already noted.  Between the 17th and 19th centuries the church was generally in poor repair, and during the rebuilding of the house by Blore in c1840 was used as a lumber room. However, the chancel was partly rebuilt before 1844, so it was clearly brought back into use when the work on the house was complete.

The church was then restored in 1862 by Gordon M Hills (who also restored Washington St Mary nearby, see other churches) for the Gorings.  Nairn (in Pevsner) says he “terribly treated” the building, and indeed this was a very vigorous restoration. As an example, Medieval wall paintings discovered in the 19th century had apparently been destroyed by 1900.  There is however evidence that the lower part of the tower, the nave the chancel and the north and east chapel walls were not entirely rebuilt and preserve some original fabric, and many historic furnishings and fittings survive.

The Sir Richard Shirley monument appears to have been reconstructed and partly recarved in the early 20th century, further research might determine this.  In 1993 the important John de Braose brass of 1426 on its Purbeck marble slab was lifted and restored by Paul Harrison and Bryan Huntley-Egan, aided by a CCC grant. In 2004 a new boiler was installed.

Clearly the church building and site are of high archaeological potential, and the Historic Environment Record should be consulted before any development is contemplated.

This appears at first glance to be a typical estate church, and as already noted one might assume it had been built by the Victorians as such, and situated for maximum visual effect. However it pre-dates the house and the other buildings around it, and the fabric is, on closer inspection, not as homogenous as it first appears, and this gives a first clue to the building’s antiquity. Care is needed, as the Victorian architect has varied his materials and idioms, which may hold clues to what had existed, but on the other hand may not. 

The west tower with its pyramid roof gives the church some vertical emphasis when viewed from the north, though the presence of the house behind means that the church tends to lose this when viewed from the east. All components have separate gabled roofs, the nave higher than the slightly narrower chancel, and these higher than those of the south nave and lower south chapel. It is immediately apparent that there are in effect two churches here, a parish church of tower, nave and chancel, and a family chapel dominated by memorials. The archaeologist will be most interested in the former, the historian and art historian in the latter.

Beginning with the square west tower, the lowest stage reaches to the nave gable, and is composed of sandstone slabs (the side walls interspersed with some flint rubble), which appears to be largely medieval work. The angle buttresses and quoins are also of sandstone, but these are clearly replaced, at least in part. There is a 4-light pointed window in the west wall with reticulated tracery and label stops, which appears contemporary with the pointed doorway below with its continuous mouldings, square frame and label stops, and all original 14th-century work.

Above this stage everything is a Victorian rebuild. A narrow stage of smoothly knapped flint has a single square opening in the west face, separated from the belfry stage of similarly treated flint by a string-course.  The belfry openings are single lights with double-cusped pointed heads within square frames.

The nave is tall and narrow, dimensions which as noted above suggest a possible Anglo-Saxon origin.  The fabric is of rough flint interspersed with occasional chalk and sandstone rubble and tile fragments.  The west jamb of a blocked doorway between the two main windows, bang in the middle of the wall, confirms that there is still some archaeology here.  Some areas around the windows have been patched with a rather ham-fisted attempt at galleting, producing an odd irregular appearance.

The windows themselves are two Victorian pointed 2-lights following the 14th-century theme of the west and east windows, but there is also a single long pointed lancet in the east bay, set lower down, but in an odd place for a low-side window; is it just to light the pulpit? The east quoins are of chalk, the same material as those of the chancel quoins and the blocked door jamb, and similarly irregular.

The chancel fabric is entirely different, of chalk and flint rubble with occasional tile and sandstone fragments, set in a matrix of yellow lime mortar. This looks Medieval (similar fabric and quoins characterise nearby Buncton chapel), and would suggest that the difference between the 14th-century chancel and earlier nave has survived all rebuilds. Perhaps Mr Hills was a little gentler than was thought, and detailed recording may therefore pay dividends. 

The single window of paired pointed cusped lancets in the south wall also looks original, if much repaired, and there is clear disturbance in the fabric around this. Adjacent to this window is a wall tablet in memory of Dame Christian Fagg, died 1772 and her daughter of the same name who died in 1775. The east wall has been partly rebuilt, but the east window is 14th-century, pointed and of three lights with reticulated tracery and a hoodmould run out to labels, clearly contemporary with the west window. 

The south chapel and aisle have apparently been rebuilt from the ground up, with the possible exception of the east and south walls of the chapel. It is interesting to note the difference in materials, the nave of (very) smooth sandstone ashlar, the chapel of smoothly knapped flint externally, whereby the inner south wall has been faced in stone. Both have buttresses of two weatherings to each bay and angle buttresses to the corners, all Victorian.  The remains of what would appear to be another blocked doorway with a low flat head can be seen in the chapel north wall near the corner with the chancel. It may have issued just next to the internal infant monument of c1400 (see below) on the other side if this is in situ, although this is very tight.

The aisle is plain, punctuated by a pointed 2-light in the east bay and two cusped lancets to the western bay, the west window a 2-light with cusped lights and a quatrefoil in the head.  This is all in 13th-century style, and may not represent what was there before.  A lean-to lead-clad housing in the middle of the wall contains the boiler for the new heating system, nicely and unobtrusively done.

The chapel has a 2-light of paired lancets in the east bay and a lancet in the west, and a 3-light of stepped lancets in the east window, in the style of the early 13th.  Again, this seems unlikely to mirror what was there before the restoration.  There is a fascinating plain wall tablet fixed under the east window, in memory of Daniel Symonds (died 1825) “who liv’d Shepherd to C Goring Esq for 51 years.”

The memorial character of the chapel is immediately obvious, as there is a large niche with a cusped ogee head, crocketed pinnacles, and panelled base with coat of arms under the western window. This contains a grave slab with weathered floriate cross, either a copy of a medieval slab or a re-used original, with a faded inscription at the back of the recess in memory of the Rev John Goring and his wife Isabella, late 19th-century.  There is also a niche at the west corner with a small gabled canopy.

The interior, accessible only through the west tower doorway, will be a welcome surprise to those with Nairn’s thundering admonition (“the blindest kind of mid-Victorian”) ringing in their ears.  While this is undoubtedly the product of a comprehensive restoration, anyone who can disengage the indignant architectural historian in their head for a few moments might find it restful and dignified, with details of quality. In addition to this there are some superb medieval and post-medieval furnishings and fittings, in particular a very fine collection of monuments in the south chapel of the Braose, Shirley and Goring families.

The walls of the tower, nave and chancel are plastered, whereby there is considerable flaking and moistness, most seriously near the child’s monument in the north wall of the chapel which is also plastered; the rebuilt south walls of the chapel and aisle and west wall of the latter have been left as exposed stone. This also tends to support the observations made above, and it may be that the irregular medieval work was visually distasteful to the Victorians who plastered over it. 

Starting at the west end, the wooden screen under the tower with round-headed door is dated 1635. It has a Renaissance architectural frame around the doorway and has attractive fielded panels and carving. It has painted Royal Arms on the panelling over the doorway. Looking up there is a domed ribbed ceiling.

The tower arch sets us a puzzle.  The jambs are of three orders of colonettes and have octagonal moulded capitals, all of smooth white limestone, with hollow mouldings, appropriate for the 14th century.  However, the depressed pointed arch head is of Sussex sandstone and also appears 14th-century; glancing over one’s shoulder one might note that the chapel arch has the reverse arrangement, whereby the arch head with hoodmould is clearly Victorian. It would appear that the sandstone is the medieval work, as this distinctive yellow sandstone only appears in these two arches and the arcade bases, whereas the white limestone is used in the south aisle. 

Looking east, the pointed and moulded smooth sandstone arches of the aisle arcade are carried on two columns with capitals carved with foliage, the responds treated in the same way, which means that the arcade was completely rebuilt; however the column bases of sandstone may be original 14th-century work, and as noted above the jambs to the chapel arch appears to be of one build with its medieval bases, although the south capital is partly replaced.  The chancel arch, the arch from the chancel to the chapel and the reveals to most of the windows are clearly Victorian in smooth sandstone, the latter with black granite colonettes to the rere-arches. The exceptions are the east windows and the south window of the chancel, which also looks original from the inside.

The excellent roofs catch the eye, taken down to moulded corbels. The nave has a pointed barrel vault with collars and king-posts which have longitudinal braces along the ridge-post, the wall-plates embellished with dogtooth. The chancel roof is a very high quality hammer-beam roof with tracery in the spandrels and brattished wall-plates. The south aisle has an arch-braced pointed tunnel vault.  The chapel has similar but simpler.

The nave has an attractive patchwork floor of stone flags with a red carpet down the central alley, the chancel floor is now mostly hidden under the same carpet. The south aisle is laid with irregular stone flags, though in all these spaces much of the floor is taken up by pew platforms. The chapel has quarry tiles with bands of encaustic tiles into which the ledger slabs and medieval brass have been set.

The church is fully pewed, with the exception of the south chapel which was doubtless meant to be kept clear, allowing the ledger slabs and de Braose brass to be seen. The pews are very simple, though attractive as a set.   There are high-backed squire’s family pews at the west end of the south aisle.

The choir stalls have high backs with brattished rails and ogee ends with poppyhead finials, retaining some medieval woodwork probably dating to the 15th century; these might be further investigated. Piscina with continuous mouldings and restored ogee head in the south chancel wall, and cusped niche on the north side of the east wall.