St Leonard, Hythe
St Leonard, Hythe
St Leonard is a Grade I parish church on Oak Walk, Hythe, Kent, in the Diocese of Canterbury. Historic England dates the building from about 1100.
- Location
- Hythe, Kent
- Country
- England
- County
- Kent
- City / town
- Hythe
- Address
- Oak Walk, Hythe, Kent, CT21 5DN
- Postcode
- CT21 5DN
- Built
- c.1100; ambulatory c.1220; tower and south transept 1751; restorations 1874-75 and 1880s
- Architect
- George Edmund Street (nave roof 1874-75); J L Pearson (1880s alterations)
- Denomination
- Church of England
- Dedication
- Leonard
- Diocese
- Canterbury
- Parish
- Hythe
- Grade
- I
- Style
- Norman and Early English, with C18 tower
- Materials
- Kentish ragstone with Caen stone window dressings
- Grid reference
- TR 161 349
- Opening hours
- Open everyday.
- Access
- Level access to the main areas. Accessible toilets nearby
Overview
The listing describes Kentish ragstone with Caen stone window dressings. The interior has a four-bay nave and north and south aisles with thirteenth- and fourteenth-century pillars, a clerestory, chancel arch, and north and south transepts. The west tower was added in 1751 and the south transept is also eighteenth-century. An ambulatory of about 1220 houses a stacked collection of some 1,200 skulls and 8,000 thigh bones of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, thought to have been exhumed from the graveyard to make space, including for later plague burials.
The Kent HER notes a thirteenth-century rebuilding of the Norman chancel on a larger scale, a nave roof by Street as part of the restoration of 1874-75, and alterations by J. L. Pearson in the 1880s. The south aisle was widened about 1300. The church remains the parish church of Hythe and is usually open daily.