Description

TL 6370 FORDHAM CHURCH STREET
(south side)

12/97 Parish Church
of St Peter's
19.8.59
I

Parish church noted for its very fine late C13 and early C14
first floor chapel and undercroft serving also as a north porch
entrance, restored in 1864. Nave arcades, transitional late C12
and early C13, survive from original church with re-used stone
in south aisle wall. North and south aisles rebuilt, early C14
with some Norman material and window in north aisle; tower late
C14 with C15 embattlements. Vestry and chancel C13 rebuilt in
C15. Church restored in 1846. Frescoes in style of William
Morris designed by C P Leonard and executed in 1905 by Edith and
Minnie Townsend. Tower frescoes by C P Leonard. Flint,
originally plastered with barnack and limestone dressings. Lead
roofs, low pitched to aisles and have, gabled chancel. Nave
gable with coped, cross-stepped parapet and east gable wall of
chancel both with cross finials. West tower with moulded plinth
and later embattled parapet has angle buttresses of four stages,
buttresses to north west included in belfry stair turret term-
inating above tower and lit by quatrefoils. Belfry windows of
two cinquefoil lights in two-centred arches. Clerestory of five
'bays' with embattled parapet has moulded four-centred arches to
each window with pairs of cinquefoil lights. Aisle parapet
embattled, three aisle windows with three cinquefoil lights and
quartrefoil in spandrel, and one C15 or C16 window in east 'bay'
similar to vestry window, both in four-centred arches. Late C13
vestry door reset with shafted jambs, bell capitals and moulded
bases, and deeply moulded two-centred arch. Chancel east window
C19 restored. North Chapel, two storeys three 'bays' with
vaulted undercroft. Angle buttresses of three stages. Plain
tile roof with gable parapets rebuilt in C19. Stair turret with
external two-centred arched entrance in western bay. Entrance
to undercroft two-centred arch of three chamfered orders.
Single conquefoil lights at ground floor and decorated tracery
to first floor three light windows in two-centred archs. Church
interior: Tower arch C15 with moulded outer and inner orders,
chancel arch with attached half piers. Nave arcade of five bays
of two chamfered orders to two-centred arches with moulded
capitals and bases to octagonal piers. Nave roof of ten bays
with carved bosses at tie beam intersections and at alternate
bays. Chapels flanking chancel C19. Fine C15 roof to chancel,
richly ornamented principal timbers and arch braced queen posts.
Carved angels in each bay and across each tie beam. Restored
C13 double piscenae and sidilia with deeply moulded two-centred
arches and shafts with moulded capitals and bases. C15 choir
stalls with misericords. Pews with angels etc carved as poppy
heads. Font C15 with lightly carved panels of blind arches.
Brass lecturn, 1881 copy of C15 lecturn at Isleham. Reredos
1886. Pulpit 1918, limestone, with carved wood and brass
balusters to stair. Old glass in Lady chapel and in north
aisle. Brass to William Chesewright d.1521 in south aisle.
Late C19 and modern glass by Heaton Butler and Co., Clayton and
Bell, Hardman, Constable of Cambridge, and poets window by Mrs
Dawson Waugh.

Pevnser. Buildings of England, p.385
Bell J, supp. Ivatt. History of Fordham, 1873, 1923

Listing NGR: TL6334870722

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17527677

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

• 
  Cornwall (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  Cambridgeshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Churches: An Architectural Guide (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Introductions)
• 
  The Victorian House Manual (2nd Edition): How They Were Built, Improvements & Refurbishment, Solutions to All Common Defects - Includes Relevant ... ... Properties (Haynes Manual) (Haynes Manuals)
• 
  Gloucestershire 1: The Cotswolds: Cotswolds Pt. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)