Description

This list entry was subject to a Minor Amendment on 07/12/2016

TM 39 SW
6/31

DITCHINGHAM
CHURCH LANE
Church of St. Mary

5-9-60

I
Parish church. C15 with C19 remodelling and additions. Galleted flint with limestone dressings; south wall of nave and north wall of chancel rendered over. Chancel and porch plain-tiled; C20 concrete tiles on nave; aisle and vestry slated. West tower, nave, south porch, chancel, north aisle and vestry. C15 square west tower with diagonal staged buttresses with flushwork panels. Good base course of cusped panels with shields alternating with sacred hearts in crown of thorns, all set in flushwork. String courses at offsets. Polygonal stair turret at north-east corner. Square traceried sound openings with shields. 3-light bell openings. Stepped parapet with crocketted corner pinnacles and carved panels set in flushwork. West doorway with hood and dripmoulds on headstops; doorway flanked by niches containing figures on pedestals. 4-light west window, C15. Renewed traceried sound hole with three shields under a dripmould above. Staged buttresses to south wall of nave (south-west buttress set diagonally) in galleted flint with flushwork panels. Two 3-light C15 windows, much repaired. C15 south porch, restored by H. Rider Haggard in 1896; renewed 2-light east and west windows. Diagonal gable buttresses with flushwork panels; plinth repeats decorative motifs of tower basecourse. Gable wall rendered over. Arch with two continuous chamfers and hoodmould with fleurons. Niche above with fleuron decoration to jambs and cusped head. Square sundial in gable apex. Renewed arch-braced porch roof with wallposts set on old head-corbels; castellated cornice. Traceried 2-leaf south door, C15. Chancel much restored in C19, of knapped flint with 2 and 3-light south windows, priest's door between window openings. C15 3-light east window. Chancel north wall rendered over; 2-light C14 window at north-west corner. North aisle added 1873; three bays with 3-light Perpendicular windows with staged buttresses between bays; 2-light Perpendicular east window. At the aisle west end, a polygonal projection for vestry with steeply-pitched hipped roof and gabled projection to west. 2-light window and doorway in north wall, 2-light window in west gable. Chimney stack with diagonally-set brick shaft on south-west corner of aisle, weathered base with flushwork.
Interior: C15 nave roof, restored C19: principals have arch-braces and wallposts set on head-corbels. Pendants and bosses added at intersections. North arcade C19 of three bays. C15 tower arch with engaged shafts and polygonal capitals; nave walls taper in towards tower. Chancel arch of 1874 with short shafts set on massive corbels. Screen much restored but containing some C15 work. C19 chancel roof, arch-braced with bosses and pendants, all painted 1862-3 by Mrs. W. Scudamore the rector's wife. Brasses to Roger Bozard (d.1505) and to Philip (d.1490) and Margery Bozard. In south-east corner of the chancel, a wall monument to Samuel Pyecroft (d.1709) C17 and C18 ledger slabs in floor of nave and chancel. North-east aisle window a memorial to Sir Henry Rider Haggard (d.1925) who was a church warden while resident in Ditchingham. C19 pulpit, stone, polygonal with traceried panels and stone steps. Font, C15, octagonal with shields and roses in traceried panels around bowl, head corbels below bowl and shafts around stem, all on an octagonal step with quatrefoiled riser.
In North-west wall of Nave, a World War I memorial erected 1920 with panelled black marble and life size bronze effigy of soldier designed by Derwent Wood.

Listing NGR: TM3298292222

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17537511

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Development and Design of Heritage Sensitive Sites: Strategies for Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas
• 
  Dorset (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Berkshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  London 3: North West: North West v. 3 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  The Shredded Chef: 120 Recipes for Building Muscle, Getting Lean, and Staying Healthy
• 
  Cambridgeshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)