Ss. Andrew and Mary, Watton at Stone.
Monkey trees and elephants’ heads.
The walk from the station up Church Lane leads past rolling rapeseed and poppy filled fields. The church sits high above the growing village surrounded by specimen trees as if in a park; two thirty metre redwoods look down on the tower, and magnolia and monkey puzzle nuzzle the chancel. From the east it looks like a small walled town, all battlements and towers and ups and downs with two porches and separate stair turrets for the rood loft, the porch and the western tower. All is Perpendicular flint of the fifteenth century, the only additions being the north chapel of 1550 in the same style and some Victorian elaborations made during the restoration, such as the florid priest’s door with its ogee canopy and many of the crenellations. From the road you look down from roof height to the two western doors that lead into the tower and its stair turret. The two story north porch was the show front for parishioners walking up from the village, and there was money for a fine south porch too, though the west door is mostly used by today. The highly coloured glass in the east window is the first thing you notice, a rare work by Charles Clutterbuck of 1849, superbly strong stuff in a style based on late mediaeval German art. This glass is outstanding and shows that Clutterbuck worked best with a large canvas. He was originally an artist specialising in miniatures, but by the 1830s became one of the earliest craftsmen to work in glass as a protégé of Charles Winston, a pioneer in producing better windows for the gothic revival. Many of his remaining works are like those in the south wall of the chancel, with small scenes set in medallions with a foliate background, but the east window is a tour de force of pictorial glass in excellent condition. His work was unfavourably judged by the ecclesiologists of his time, who preferred a more gothic style, and it’s a great shame that few of his windows remain, most having either been replaced or lost their enamelling due to poor firing. Another pictorial window by Clutterbuck that used to be in the north chapel was given to the nearby village of Datchworth, and is worth going to see.
Monkey trees and elephants’ heads.
The walk from the station up Church Lane leads past rolling rapeseed and poppy filled fields. The church sits high above the growing village surrounded by specimen trees as if in a park; two thirty metre redwoods look down on the tower, and magnolia and monkey puzzle nuzzle the chancel. From the east it looks like a small walled town, all battlements and towers and ups and downs with two porches and separate stair turrets for the rood loft, the porch and the western tower. All is Perpendicular flint of the fifteenth century, the only additions being the north chapel of 1550 in the same style and some Victorian elaborations made during the restoration, such as the florid priest’s door with its ogee canopy and many of the crenellations. From the road you look down from roof height to the two western doors that lead into the tower and its stair turret. The two story north porch was the show front for parishioners walking up from the village, and there was money for a fine south porch too, though the west door is mostly used by today. The highly coloured glass in the east window is the first thing you notice, a rare work by Charles Clutterbuck of 1849, superbly strong stuff in a style based on late mediaeval German art. This glass is outstanding and shows that Clutterbuck worked best with a large canvas. He was originally an artist specialising in miniatures, but by the 1830s became one of the earliest craftsmen to work in glass as a protégé of Charles Winston, a pioneer in producing better windows for the gothic revival. Many of his remaining works are like those in the south wall of the chancel, with small scenes set in medallions with a foliate background, but the east window is a tour de force of pictorial glass in excellent condition. His work was unfavourably judged by the ecclesiologists of his time, who preferred a more gothic style, and it’s a great shame that few of his windows remain, most having either been replaced or lost their enamelling due to poor firing. Another pictorial window by Clutterbuck that used to be in the north chapel was given to the nearby village of Datchworth, and is worth going to see.
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This 1851 restoration was greatly funded by the Abel Smith family, who took over the north chapel as their own, moving out some of the monuments of the previous patrons, the Botelers. The roof of the chapel has a ribbed plaster Jacobean tunnel vault to which Abel Smith added corbels of his elephant’s head crest. The family is still rich and powerful enough to inspire plenty of internet conspiracy theories. The A-“bell”-S rebus is on the tower screen and in glass in the upper north porch, alongside a bar in a barrel rebus of the rector, the Rev. Barrington. There are two sets of the royal arms that hung in churches by law, one showing the arms of George III, one with those of Victoria. The earlier set bears the arms of between 1760 and 1801, but are in a frame that looks early Seventeenth century, so have presumably been overpainted many times; the modern lion is certainly odd. The later set is dated 1851, and must commemorate the reconsecration of the church after the restoration, as in addition to the Queen’s arms there are flags painted behind bearing the arms of the sees of Rochester and Canterbury. During the middle ages the church was in the diocese of Lincoln, but when this was split up in 1845, Rochester took over for a few years until the abbey of St.Albans became a cathedral in 1877, taking Watton at Stone into its fold.
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 Details of the mid C19th east window by Clutterbuck
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There is a good collection of memorials in the church, in a wide range of materials and styles, including some excellent brasses. That to Sir Philip Peletoot of 1361 is in the floor of the north chapel, and shows him wearing a mixture of plate armour, mail, and leather studded with metal rings, with a cusped canopy over his head. This is engraved in the simple assured lines of that date, as is that to rector John Briggenhall who died c.1375, and whose brass is in the chancel. Oddly for a cleric of this time, the rector’s feet rest on a lion. Amongst the other brasses, one more stands out, that of a fifteenth century civilian in a fur robe, of interest as he is believed to be the unknown master mason who worked here. There is one other engraved memorial here, but it is not a brass. Uncommon in the south and imported from the midlands is the big incised slab of alabaster showing John Boteler and his two wives, made in his lifetime after the death of his first wife, who died in 1471, as other dates were left blank. This is artistically a very poor piece, the drawing childish compared with that of a hundred years earlier; maybe the result of a local working with an unknown material. Close to this rustic work in the north chapel are two metropolitan pieces, a complete foil in class and style.
 Early C18th effigies of Philip Boteler and wife.
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 One of the elephants on the roof of the north chapel.
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 1791 Rumbold memorial
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There are plenty of plaques to the Smith family on the walls, same materials, same time, same style, but amongst these two Rumbold memorials stand out for the superiority of their design, cool slick neo-classicism by Bacon. That to Captain W.R. Rumbold of 1786 has a wide handled urn with oak leaves draped over the handles on a black background, whilst Sir Thomas Rumbold’s of 1791 has a roundel of a mourning woman and an urn on each side in shallow relief. Monuments to the early Georgian Botelers were moved to the aisles in 1851, including one of c.1712 to Philip Boteler and his wife, who kneel facing us, their feet seemingly entrapped within the wall. He is dressed up in best coat and full bottomed wig, with his shroud draped insouciantly around him, whilst she is veiled in Roman widow’s weeds. The pagan attitudes inherent in their effigies and the importance openly given to family and money in the epitaphs are at odds with the Christian hopes added in the post script. They must have seemed doubly shocking to the pious Victorians who restored the church, and who lie in the great vault constructed under the north chapel.
This church up on its hill is locked, but there’s a friendly new vicar living down the lane nearby who hopes to open more often; go and remind her or ring 01920 830035.
All rights reserved for this entire site. Copyright reserved to stiffleaf for all text and images, which may not be reproduced without my permission.
This church up on its hill is locked, but there’s a friendly new vicar living down the lane nearby who hopes to open more often; go and remind her or ring 01920 830035.
All rights reserved for this entire site. Copyright reserved to stiffleaf for all text and images, which may not be reproduced without my permission.
