TR 2457 WINGHAM CATERBURY ROAD (north side) 9/327 Church of St.Mary 11.10.63 GV I Parish church. Circa 1200, C13 chancel, C14 tower and C16 nave and aisle. Restored 1874-5, Ferrey, particularly the chancel. Flint in part knapped and coursed with rubble stone and brick repairs and additions. Plain tiled roof. Chancel, transept chapels, nave and south aisle, western tower and south porch. West tower with north-west stair turret and tall angle buttresses offset 4 times, battlements and recessed spire. Two light Decorated belfry windows and moulded west doorway and clockface on south front. South aisle with brick upper stage, large stone blocks below the eaves set in knapped flint wall with 4 re-used C15 windows. Two storey battlemented porch with double hollow chamfered inner and outer doorways. Nave north wall with 4 buttresses and similar knapped flint and re-used C15 fenestration. North and south transepts with window heads infilled with red brick, the north transept retaining C18 wooden Venetian window and large 4 light leaded window. East window of south transept in shallow projection with 3 lights with 3 circles in head enclosing 3 trefoils linked by intersecting tracery, c.1280. Chancel restored C19, new fenestration. blocked double arches in north arcade to lost aisle. Interior; tall double chamfered tower arch on octagonal responds with stylised flower ornament. Nave with 5 bay arcade of chestnut and 1 oak pier, formerly imitating stone pillars but exposed since 1874, and new arch braced to wall plate.Nave roof of 4 crown posts, aisle roof of 6 crown posts. C19 chancel arch. Originally identical arches from chancel to transepts with hollow and roll moulded and chamfered arch and attached shafts. Reveal of south transept east widow with attached marble shafts. Chancel with string course and drip moulds with heads and naturalistic leaf decoration. Fittings; reredos, C15 stone and rare in England , from Troyes. Five scenes of the Passion above and the Last Supper and the Adoration below. Sedilia in chancel with 3 round headed seats and marble colonnettes. Trecusped piscina on eastern wall. Misericord stalls, 3 to south and 4 to north with C19 replacements. C14 showing animals and human faces, Green Man and foliation. Rood Screen, the base only, C15 with 8 ogee traceried panels. Square headed piscina in south aisle and chamfered elliptical wall recess said to be for tomb of a member of the Warham family. Another piscina is now on the outside of the north transept, originally in north aisle. Early C14 stained glass in chancel south window. West window of 1920, a memorial to the last member of the Oxenden family. Monuments;in the nave; Thomas Cinder,d.1716, large grey marble wall tablet with Death's head and Corinthian pilasters with enriched scrolls and open segmental pediment. In the north chapel; Sir Thomas Palmer,d.1625, by Nicholas Stone. Standing black and white wall monument. Full length figures of Sir Thomas and Lady Margaret on tomb chest, with Corinthian columns carrying segmental pediment with a smaller pediment thrusting through it and reclining putti with arcaded background and bracket to entablature. Sir Thomas Palmer,d.1656, erected 1718.Black and white standing wall monument with plinth, Corinthian columns to segmental pediment with putti and portrait bust at top. Streynsham Master,d.1724. White marble double wall plaque, only 1 half inscribed, with winged Death's head at base and tripled Corinthian pilasters supporting tripled broken segmental pediment with cartouche and martial achievements with urn over. In the south (Oxenden) chapel; Charles Tripp,d.1624. Black pedimented wall plaque with side pieces containing 2 angels in oval wreathed recesses, the whole decorated with cherubs heads on wings. The Oxenden Monument, 1682, suggested as by Arnold Quellin. Free standing black and white marble monument with large white marble base inscribed and supported at the corners by black scrolls topped by ox heads, with drapes between them. Tall obelisk with fruit and flower garlands carved all down the sides and topped with a vase. Four putti at the corners, 2 leaning on shields,1 draped, with a skull,a fourth holding a helmet. The chapel was paved and given wrought iron screens at the same time (1681, bequest of Sir George Qxenden), with simple uprights in 4 panels to north with 3 raised sections with ball finials and central cross, the iron work leafed and bifurcated, with double leaf gate and overthrow to south and single leaf gate to old rood stair door. Altogether a major work, certainly in Kent. The church was from 1282 to 1547 a collegiate church attached to Wingham College (which provided in its time 4 Archbishops and 3 bishops). (see A.Hussey, Chronicles of Wingham; see also B.O.E. Kent II, 1983 499-500) Listing NGR: TR2421257475