St Mary's Church, Chesham

Built on the site of a Bronze Age stone circle of puddingstones, parts of the church building date to the 12th century.

Initially the advowson (the right to appoint the vicar) was held jointly by a pair of prominent local families, but in the wake of the 12th century civil wars of the reign of King Stephen (1135–1154), the advowsons were granted to the monks of Woburn Abbey and to the Abbey of Saint Mary de Pratis in Leicester, each of whom appointed their own vicars to the parish.

[5] The first recorded mention of Chesham dates from 970 in the will of Lady Ælfgifu (identified with the former consort of King Eadwig of England), bequeathing Cæstæleshamme, "the water meadow at the pile of stones",[note 2] to Abingdon Abbey.

[6][7] The Domesday Book of 1086 lists Cestreham as containing four mills and comprising three adjacent estates, the most important of which were held by Odo of Bayeux and Queen Edith, the widow of Edward the Confessor.

[note 3] As with much of England, Chesham suffered serious religious unrest in the 16th and 17th centuries, and in 1532 Lollard radical Thomas Harding was burnt at the stake in the town for heresy.

[17][note 5] In 1257 Hugh de Vere was granted the right to hold an annual three-day fair and a weekly market in Chesham by Henry III.

[21] The arcades consist of five bays with octagonal piers and arches with half-pyramid shaped springers, a design described by Nikolaus Pevsner in 1960 as "baffling".

[35] By the 18th century the problems had become severe enough that the west arch of the south transept was blocked up in an effort the strengthen the structure,[35] and a hollow pillar which housed the stairway to the rood loft was filled in.

[35] George Gilbert Scott, who had recently designed the monumental London buildings of the Foreign Office and St. Pancras Station, was chosen to lead the project.

[33] The tower was strengthened,[33] the building's exterior facing of flint and limestone was restored,[33] and the chancel, which had been remodelled in the late 17th century,[32] was restored to its original shape and given a new east window in the Decorated Gothic style,[33] containing Ward and Hughes glass depicting Faith, Hope and Charity, donated by the Duke of Bedford.

[36] New wooden pews were installed together with a Gothic style pulpit,[33] and a font of Mansfield Woodhouse stone donated by the Lowndes family.

[24] Scott's alterations proved successful in stabilising the tower and in serving the needs of the church, and the church remained little changed for the next 130 years;[40] the most notable alterations during this period were the replacement of the glass in the chancel's two leper windows with stained glass images of Pre-Raphaelite knights by Edward Burne-Jones as a memorial to a young officer killed during the Boer War,[27][41][note 10] and the painting of a mural over the chancel arch by John Ward depicting the events of Holy Week in modern dress and set in the Chilterns.

[40] The west gallery was restored to house the 1852 organ, together with a kitchen and toilet facility, and the north transept was converted into a vestry with a room above it.

[46] Following the civil wars of the reign of King Stephen (1135–1154) England underwent a major upsurge in religious activity and saw a significant growth of monasteries.

[47] The advowson of Chesham Leicester was sold, and from then on had a succession of owners, eventually coming into the ownership of prominent local landowners the Skottowe family,[47] who purchased it from Sir Francis Whichcote, MP for Cambridgeshire.

[51] In Potter's 1999 remodelling of the church the pipes of the organ were moved to the new west gallery and electronically enhanced, and the console installed at the eastern end of the north aisle.

[39] Sculpted by John Bolt the Elder of London, the tomb features ornately carved strapwork above a sarcophagus, flanked by black coupled columns supporting small obelisks, and topped by a double-curved roof.

[38] Richard Bowle (c. 1549 – 13 December 1626), who had recorded and audited the restoration project of 1606,[28] is commemorated by a black marble monument on the north side of the chancel, noting his "faithful service of divers great lords", and that "part of" him "lyeth here".

This takes the form of a stone sculpture of a mourning woman kneeling over a sarcophagus, and was described by Pevsner as "[an] interpretation of remarkable tenderness".

[54] Adolphus Aylward, the vicar from 1847 to 1872 and overseer of the parish restructuring, is commemorated by a brass plaque on the south-west pillar of the tower, and by a Clayton and Bell window in the north-west chancel.

[38] Aylward's daughter Julia had died in 1862 aged 15 and is buried in the churchyard;[50] her grave was planted with snowdrops at her mother's request, which still bloom each spring.

[50] Julia Aylward is also commemorated by a piece of Burlison and Grylls glass in the lancet window at the west end of the north aisle.

A memorial to Lollard martyr Thomas Harding stands in the churchyard near the south chancel,[42] erected in 1907 by the Protestant Alliance.

Foxe's Book of Martyrs describes the execution thus: In 1532, Thomas Harding, who with his wife, had been accused of heresy, was brought before the Bishop of Lincoln, and condemned for denying the real presence in the Sacrament.

He was then chained to a stake, erected for the purpose, at Chesham in the Dell, near Botely; and when they had set fire to the fagots, one of the spectators dashed out his brains with a billet.