Plans of and Brief Architectural Notes on Kent Churches - Part IV

PLANS OF, AND BRIEF ARCHITECTURAL NOTES ON, KENT CHURCHES PART IV. TROTTESCLIEFE, SS. PETER AND PAUL, BISHOPSBOURNE, S. MARY, AND ADDITIONAL NOTES ON BEARSTED By F. C. ELLISTON-ERWOOD, F.S.A. TROTTESOLIFEE. SS. PETER AND PAUL (Plan 15) TROTTESOLIFEE (or Trosley) Church is a small simply planned bufiding, consisting of a nave and chancel without any chancel arch, to which has been added on the south-west corner, a late tower. I had always regarded it as an early Norman church without any peeuHar or unusual features and it was, therefore, somewhat of a shock when a sheaf of papers, sketch plans, measurements and photographs was handed to me for study, for therein was propounded the theory that the eastern portion of the building was the earher, to which at a later date had been added the present west part of the church, now the nave. This in itself would not be an impossibility, but the manner in which it was suggested the addition had been made was certainly unusual. A study of the accompanying plan (No. 15) shows that the exterior of the church is devoid of any noteworthy features except the two projecting angles (a' below) in the middle of each of the north and south walls. One of the sketches in the coUection above referred to was something Hke this: FIG. 1 The purport of it was that the eastern part had been first built and later its west wall had been removed, and the two ends of the lateral waUs inserted into a new extension westwards in the manner shown, which was held to account for the position of the various angle projections. Such a method of church extension was unknown to me, so in view of the forthcoming visit of the Society to the church (May, 1949) I determmed to investigate the problem. I made a plan, and in this case I took unusual precautions to ensure the correctness of my measurements, especiaUy regarding the position of " a " and " a'," 99 NOTES ON KENT CHURCHES b I 8 100 NOTES ON KENT CHURCHES and the result was as I suspected, the exterior and interior coins were in a straight line and not as shown in the sketch above. That point being settled, the history of the fabric becomes much easier to read. It is that of a simple early Norman church, merely differing from the more usual plan in the greater length of its chancel, of which there are several examples, notably Darenth (Arch. Cant., LXI (1948), Plan 11). I cannot discern any factors that would differentiate in date between the eastern and western parts of the church. The coins aheady mentioned and those at the east end of the church are all of tufa, and save where obvious repairs have taken place, they are indistinguishable one from the other. The factor that might have helped would have been the character of the western angles, but these have been completely destroyed, and the west wall (in itself a good piece of knapped flint technique) with its coins is modern work. The position of the chancel arch, now removed, may give rise to some doubt. I should have preferred it east of the interior coins but a window of twelfth century date, which to my mind is in situ, precludes its being placed there, so there is no alternative but to place it as on my plan. The notes aheady mentioned recognized the same difficulty, and got over the problem by stating that the window in question had been moved from further east, opposite a similar one on the north, and where now a Decorated window takes its place, but I can see no evidence for this, and I doubt very much whether there would have been in the fourteenth century much soHcitude for a small and no doubt weathered Norman window. The thirteenth century saw the insertion of windows and a doorway in the nave, but the great building period was the fourteenth century, when in addition to other windows and a small piscina, a somewhat massive tower was erected at the south-west angle. In the early church there was no provision for a tower, so when one was needed it was built with its thick walls up against the south-west corner of the nave with the result that the church is entered through some 7 feet of wall. The floor space is very small and now it is divided into halves by a wooden screen to form a small vestry. There does not appear to have been any means of access to the upper part of this tower from within, but on the interior nave wall, above and to the west of the existing door, is a blocked-up opening that suggests a door and an ascent by a ladder inside the church The only other feature of note is a large insertion of recent brickwork that may probably indicate a window (or a chancel door) now removed, and the place patched up with brick. BISHOPSBOURNE, S. MARY (Plan 16) Bishopsboume is a smaH, rather obscure village situated in a vaUey below Barham Downs, and is famous for its literary associations 101 NOTES ON KENT CHURCHES with such diversities as the sainted Hooker and Joseph Conrad rather than with architecture, but both Bourne House and the church are not without interest. Unfortunately the latter has undergone one or two rather drastic restorations with the result that though the fabric is to-day in very good condition, any vestiges of early structures are almost non-existent. It would be too much to expect anything of the pre-conquest church that almost certainly stood here, but of its successor, the twelfth century church, I failed to detect a single stone, and my suggestion for the building of this period, as shown on my plan in a stippled tint, while almost certainly correct, finds no confirmation in existing fragments. But taking it as a foundation, it is clear that the church was considerably enlarged in the thirteenth century by the addition of aisles to the nave and by a widening and extension of the chancel. Architectural features belonging to this time are : The north door in the north aisle with an external Holy Water stock, the nave arcades (though the arches themselves have certainly been rebuilt) and practically the whole of the chancel and its windows, except that in the east. It is highly probable that the arcades each had an extra bay to the west; traces of the arch on the south still remain, though that to the north had entirely disappeared. Fourteenth century work is negHgible, and is confined entirely to the east wall, where a larger window was inserted and buttresses added. The following century was, however, a very busy one, the chief addition being the western tower. Till this time there was no tower and probably this feature was due to the Hawte family, who then held the manor. The whole of the west end of the church was taken down, together with the two western arches, the tower was built in its entirety with four large angle buttresses and then it was united with the body of the church by new waUs on the Hne of the arcades, and new west ends to each aisle, which were thereby reduced to their present dimensions. Further additions belonging to this period were the two chapels to the north and south of the chancel. That to the north, now occupied by the vestry and the organ, still preserves enough of its fittings to be certain that it was intended for a chapel, probably dedicated to St. Nicholas. That to the south may be the chapel of St. Catherine but is now, and for some time has been, known as the Bourne Pew and bears no traces of piscina or altar fittings. This, of course, is not unusual as such things were often removed at reformations or restorations. This is in brief the architectural history of the church, though the Hooker Library and monument, the window near the rood loft doorway (designed in all likelihood to give more light to the rood loft), the glass of several periods, some woodwork in the Bourne Pew, the brasses, plate, beHs and the ancient font lying neglected near the newer and meretricious specimen of 1850, are all worth examination. 102 Btsf^^boume,Kmt, SJTLn^ Scale of Yeefr J l u n l n nl 1o 5 0 \o ^0 -p J* •% [ JVo6a£Ce, owr- J * BG>c£«Ctt«K TwGfcGCe | 1S*C.J^C» )Ct£AisG, Jkvufe$ WMMV 1 lF=Mf l ip I ! HI awe CfvaijtdeL J^ccnt: {T^sent, i i r—i _ _ _, Ji^^i*>fc i i m yftfc » ^ 1_™ ra I w I Tixa tttoGaBCe atfX&rCC o f t&Zy, I ' l&t^fie<£ uv> tdcwceb ttsrumd. « * the navcaixoiCe f Be&tstesuL Cfcurcfc H5 TOJV of n&tt> PIG. 2. but was probably also plastered. Further work resulted in the wall being pierced in one place and the complete thickness of the arch was shown to be 2 ft. 7 in. This was the discovery, further details of which may be seen in the Hne drawing of the arch and which was enough to show that an aisle had existed here before the present one, and which 104 NOTES ON KENT CHURCHES at first I was content to accept as Norman. But there were compfications. I was not in the first place enthely happy about my original suggestion for the twelfth century church. None of its waHs were of the thickness (3 ft.) that is almost invariable, and it was because there was nothing whatever to suggest an earher church, that I was content to compromise with a 2 ft. 9 in. waU. But now we have a waU of 2 ft. 7 in. which is too thin to compromise over. In my original plan, though I showed the north waU of the early church on the Hne of the present arcade I did not date any part of the existing wall as earher than fourteenth century. The question is, therefore, " Can this newly discovered fragment be the remains of a church earher than the Norman ? " " Can a pre-conquest date be estabHshed ? " The respond and its abacus are of the calcareous Tufa of the Medway Valley, a material always accepted, in Kent at least, as an evidence of early Norman building. Canon Livett's paper on the use of this stone (Arch. Cant., XX (1893), p. 137 ff.) gives several instances of its use in Roman and early Norman times but does not specifically mention its use in the pre-conquest period, nor can I call to mind any early church of the pre-Norman period where it is employed. But I see no reason why it should not have been used in an intervening period, especially in a county where it is plentiful. Canon Livett, while not admitting that the material was quarried in pre-Norman times, allows that there may have been instances of tufa taken from destroyed Romano-British buildings. The coin stones themselves are of an irregular size and shape but they do not appear to be in " long and short " technique, nor do I think they are " through " stones, i.e. extend in one piece through the whole thickness of the wall, though of this there is no certainty as the opening up of this amount of waU would be dangerous to the rest of the fabric. This evidence then must be considered neutral. The abacus itself is in a very rotten state but its chamfered edge is quite clear and being on the east face only may possibly be considered early; I cannot deduce anything from the white plaster that covers the reveal and arch soffit, save that it appears to be contemporary. The four stones of the springing of the arch that remain in situ are of ragstone and of large size, though not even approximately equal, and the joints between them are not radial. Further it is now certain that the lower stone is a " through stone " though those above it are in the usual medieval technique of an ashlar facing with rubble filHng. Now most of these features are to be found in pre-conquest buddings, and some, such as the " through stone," are not found elsewhere. One feature not mentioned is, however, puzzling. The span of the arch I calculate as approximately 10 ft., but the distance between the faces of the responds is about 2 in. more than this. This is unusual; 105 NOTES ON KENT CHURCHES in fact, the opposite is generally the case, as at Lydd (Arch. Cant., XXXVII (1925), Fig. 1, at p. 177) where the arch span is a little more than the clearance between the piers. I cannot offer any explanation for this, nor as far as I know can it be used for dating purposes. The span of the arch as given above—10 ft.—is rather wide for a pre-conquest arch, but it is found at Wing in Buckinghamshire, also a basifican church. m PIG. 3. Suggested plan of the Pre-Conquest Church (in tint) at Bearsted, superimposed on part of the plan of the present Church. (This is a diagram only, and not to the same scale as plan 13.) Summing up this evidence it seems that while there is nothing that miHtates against a pre-conquest date for this church (and a Saxon church is mentioned in Textus Rojfensis), save the rarity of the aisled basiHcan type in this country, the thin walls, the "through stone" and the type of masonry are definitely early, and after much defiberation I have come to the conclusion that the arch must be regarded as Saxon. As to the plan of the church, it cannot be other than basiHcan. A single aisle will not do at aU, and if we have an aisle to the north we must put one to the south, again as at Lydd or Wing. The south wall of Bearsted must be the representative of an earUer arcaded wall, and 106 NOTES ON KENT CHURCHES it may not be mere coincidence that the reconstructed church that I now present (Fig. 3), based on that of Wing, suggests an early respond (corresponding to that just discovered) and at least one of the piers in those parts of the south wall that I had aheady indicated as earUer than the remainder. The apsidal plan of the eastern arm is enthely without authority; it is inserted as a suggestion only, but there are analogies. Further, allowing for an arcade of three 10 ft. wide arches and 3 ft. piers (again on the analogy of Wing), the chancel arch of the old church corresponds with that of its successor, which may or may not be fortuitous. Note. In Part I of these Notes (Volume LIX, 1947) it was said that all plans are reproduced to a scale of 16 feet to 1 inch. By no fault of the Author, and only to economize in costs, the plans of Bishopsboume and Trosley are not reproduced to this scale though they are, of course, accurate to the scale printed on them.—EDITOR. 107