Description

CHATHAM

TQ7568SE DOCK ROAD
762-1/2/1 (West side)
29/10/52 Medway Heritage Centre
(Formerly Listed as:
DOCK ROAD
(West side)
Church of St Mary the Virgin)

GV II

Church, now visitor centre. 1884-87 chancel, tower 1897, nave
1901-03, by Sir AW Blomfield, incorporating earlier parts.
Snecked rock-faced ragstone and limestone dressings, with
tiled roof.
STYLE: Early English Gothic Revival.
PLAN: chancel with N and S chapels, aisled nave, and separate
SW tower.
EXTERIOR: E gable has angle buttresses and 3 stepped lancets,
string course and small oval light in the top; 2-bay sides
have Y-tracery. Taller nave gable; 5-bay nave has paired
clerestory lancets, the aisles have 2-light windows. W gable
has coped raking aisle roofs with round-arched Norman style
doorways with splayed reveals and zig-zag mouldings, and
double doors with strap hinges; a curved 5-light single-storey
apse with narrow lights, sill band and half conical roof;
beneath the nave gable set back above weathered bands, a
2-light central window with a cinquefoil and flanking single
lights.
3-stage tower has diagonal buttresses, weathered plinth,
string courses and crenellated parapet with corner pinnacles;
S 2-centre arched doorway with double doors beneath a sunken
panel with label mould and narrow flat-headed light, a clock
in a sunken panel, and a 4-centre arched belfry louvred light
with Perpendicular tracery.
S chancel chapel has a coped gable with angle buttresses and a
stepped 3-light lancet.
INTERIOR: not inspected but noted as having matching 3-bay
sedilia and 2-bay piscina with black marble columns and
continuous hoodmould, and chancel screen with cusped ogee
arches, cresting and cross and a low wall and gate. 3 Norman
round arches to the W end, lower to the outer aisle arches,
with decayed zig-zag mouldings. Nave has round piers with
octagonal caps to chamfered arches with hoodmoulds, and a roof
with arch-braced collar trusses and arch-braced purlins.
FITTINGS: C19 stone pulpit with marble columns on moulded base
and top. C19 octagonal font with cinquefoil panels and a

timber spirelet cover. Triptych by Clayton and Bell,
cinquefoil panels with a canopy and picture of the Madonna,
organ 1795 by Samuel Green.
STAINED GLASS: E window 1891 by Kempe.
MEMORIALS: various wall memorials, including a C16 pair of
kneeling figures.
(The Buildings of England: Newman J: West Kent and the Weald:
London: 1976-: 200).

Listing NGR: TQ7574368421

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26558559

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

• 
  For the Record
• 
  Oxfordshire: North and West (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Specifications for Building Conservation: Volume 1: External Structure: Practical Examples v. 2
• 
  Harrow on the Hill: A photographic portrayal of listed buildings and structures (Historic Buildings Picture Guides)
• 
  Staffordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Berkshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)