St John the Baptist, Inglesham
St John the Baptist, Inglesham
St John the Baptist is a Grade I redundant church at Inglesham, Wiltshire, in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust since 1981. It stands above water meadows near the confluence of the Thames, the Coln and the Thames and Severn Canal.
- Location
- Inglesham, Wiltshire
- Country
- England
- County
- Wiltshire
- City / town
- Inglesham
- Address
- Inglesham, Wiltshire, SN6 7RD
- Postcode
- SN6 7RD
- Built
- Anglo-Saxon origins; most fabric c.1205; repaired 1888-89
- Architect
- J T Micklethwaite (1888-89 repairs)
- Denomination
- Churches Conservation Trust
- Dedication
- John the Baptist
- Grade
- I
- Style
- Anglo-Saxon and Gothic
- Materials
- Rendered rubble stone; stone roofs
- Grid reference
- SU 205 984
- Opening hours
- Open daily.
- Access
- Usually open daily. The path across the meadows from the Thames Path can be wet.
Overview
Wikipedia and the listing record Anglo-Saxon origins, with most of the present structure built around 1205. The small church has no tower: a thirteenth-century double bellcote sits on the west gable. Walls are rendered rubble stone with stone roofs. The interior retains wall paintings from the thirteenth to the nineteenth centuries, in places up to seven layers thick, including fifteenth-century angels above the chancel arch and an early fourteenth-century Doom on the east wall of the north aisle. An Anglo-Saxon carving of the Mother and Child is set in the south wall.
In the 1880s William Morris of Kelmscott campaigned with the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings against an unsympathetic restoration. J. T. Micklethwaite oversaw conservative repairs in 1888-89. The church was declared redundant in April 1980 and vested in the Redundant Churches Fund in October 1981. Fixtures include fifteenth-century screens, Commonwealth-era box pews, a Jacobean pulpit of about 1630 and a fifteenth-century font.