The church had a chancel, nave (probably with an aisle on the north side) and a two-stage tower on the west end with a crenelated parapet dating largely to the 13th century.

This church retained some earlier features including a chancel arch possibly of Anglo-Saxon origin.

The chancel remained untouched, likely because the repair liability lay with the Paget family who refused to provide funding.

Clay also contracted Henry Isaac Stevens to design and construct a new nave, south porch and a new tower.

[1] By 1881 an increase in the parish's population necessitated an expansion of the church and it was re-built with funding from the family of Clay and prominent Brewers of Burton.

At the same time the organ was moved from the west end of the nave into the north transept and a new font, of marble in art nouveau style, installed.

[1] The small chancel sits on a tall plinth as the ground at the east falls away sharply to Stapenhill Road.

[2] The east end of the chancel holds a 5-light, intricately detailed stained glass window depicting Christ and a number of saints; it probably dates to 1881.

[2] The lower stage of the tower displays an alabaster slab taken from the tomb of William Dethick (d. 1497) and his wife Margaret that lay in the chancel of the mediaeval church.

[1] The church at Stapenhill might have been a minster by the 11th century as it maintained subsidiary chapels at Drakelow, Heathcote (a lost settlement near modern Stanton) and Newhall.

The Abbey was subject to the 16th-century dissolution of the monasteries and a parliamentary commission of 1650 recommended integrating these properties into St Peter's parish but this was not achieved until 1864.

In 1996 the southern part of Stapenhill, where a new housing estate had been constructed, was separated into a new parish around the Immanuel Church, built in 1963.

[3] Formally the parish is "Stapenhill (including Caldwell)", within the Mercia Deanery inside the Derby and South Derbyshire Archdeaconry.

A former churchwarden brought a complaint against the vicar under the Clergy Discipline Measure in 2018, but the case was dismissed by the Bishop of Derby, after a failed attempt at reconciliation.

In this role the Abbey received the rector's (or greater) tithes principally of corn and the income from the subsidiary chapels.

By 1535 the Abbey's share was worth £10 a year and the vicar received 13s from the glebe, 16s from the lesser tithes and 21s in offerings.

Owen Lloyd, vicar from 1768 to 1813, brought a dispute over the Cauldwell contribution before the House of Lords in 1777 and won the rights to tithes there, worth £40 a year.

His successor attempted to argue the same for Stanton and Newhall in 1815 but lost as the contributions from these chapels were judged to be a pension and not a payment in lieu of tithes.

By 1831 the vicar's income had risen to £373, probably a result of the renting of glebe land for brickmaking, and he was able to pay £93 a year to a curate to preach at Cauldwell.