[2] The area was settled in both Bronze Age and Roman times but the earliest written mention of the village of Sutton Cheney is in the Domesday Book of 1086 when it was named Sutone.

It was mostly owned by Crowland Abbey with a minor holding in the hands of Hugh de Grandmesnil, a companion of William the Conqueror.

He lived 79 years and died Feb 24 1633' and 'Here lyeth interred the body of Sir William Roberts, who in his life-time, being devoted both to hospitality and charity, among other memorable works erected, out of a pious mind, a hospital for six poor men adjoining the churchyard and endowed it with 30 pounds worth of land yearly for their maintenance for ever.

In addition to workers' cottages, a further range of buildings such as a blacksmith's, bakery, and post office provided the essentials of rural life, together with Almshouses for poor single men.

[10] Within the civil parish, on Ambion Hill, is the Bosworth Battlefield Heritage Centre and Country Park, maintained by Leicestershire County Council as a country park and learning centre to advance public knowledge about the Battle of Bosworth Field.

[15] It gives access through Ambion Wood to the Battlefield Centre and there is also a cafe called Sutton Wharf on the site.

The Leicestershire Round, a 200 mile walk around the county of Leicestershire runs through the civil parish and the village itself, linking it by footpath to the adjacent town and civil parish of Market Bosworth in a walk through farmland and Market Bosworth Country Park.

[22] Many of the kneelers in the church were embroidered by members of the Richard III Society and on 22 March 2015, the funeral cortège of the King paused in Sutton Cheney en route to his burial in Leicester Cathedral.

The six Almshouses founded by Sir William Roberts in 1612 and altered in 1811, as a plaque records, due to "the liberality of Rosamund Kinnersley" are now a private home, having been converted in the late twentieth century.

The famous mathematician Thomas Simpson FRS (1710-1761) of Market Bosworth, Nuneaton, and Woolwich is buried in the graveyard of St James' Church.