St Mary the Virgin

The church itself was well restored in the mid 19th century. Note the forest of poppy headed pews some decorated with animals playing musical instruments. The stained glass is slightly later and commences with the east window by Swaine & Bourne, 1882, put up by the Grant family.

More interesting are the windows commissioned by Phillip Agnew, the owner of Punch Magazine, who lived at Littlecourt House, now sadly demolished, on the outskirts of the village and designed for him by Walter Cave in 1905. In the south nave window you will find, unusually for a church, a large allegorical figure of Flora standing amongst a sea of roses. This is to the memory of Agnew’s daughter and was installed in 1927. Further towards the rear of the nave are windows to the memory of Agnew’s sons and grandsons as military knights; St Bars and St Galahad, and St Gareth and St Villars. These memorials to young men lost in the wars are particularly fine examples of that genre. 

You will also find in the village Joymead, a garden that Agnew had designed in memory of his daughter, complete with a cloister on its west side designed by W Talbot Brown, in memory of his son.