• Home
• Cherwell
  • List of villages
  • Recommended villages to visit in Cherwell
  • Photography dates
• South Oxfordshire
  • List of villages
  • Thames-side villages
  • The Oxfordshire Chilterns
  • Recommended villages to visit in South Oxfordshire
  • Photography dates
• Vale of White Horse
  • List of villages
  • Thames-side villages
  • Recommended villages to visit in Vale of White Horse
  • Photography dates
• West Oxfordshire
  • List of villages
  • Recommended villages to visit in West Oxfordshire
  • Photography dates
• Information
  • Useful links
  • "Midsomer Murders" film locations
  • Link your website to Oxfordshire Villages
  • Weather forecast and traffic
  • Licenses and acknowledgements
  • Contact me

St. mary's Church in Adderbury is a large cruciform building with chancel, north and south transepts, nave, north and south aisles with porches, and a western tower with a spire.  The spire is celebrated, along with Bloxham and King's Sutton, in a local rhyme.  The earliest work dates from the earlier 13th century when a church with transepts and a nave of 5 bays was apparently built: in the east wall of the north transept are remains of 13th-century lancet windows with wall paintings on the splays and on the north wall there are the remains of an arcade. It is probable that there was once a 5-light lancet window in this wall. Similarly in the south transept there are traces of lancets in the east wall and of arcading on the south wall. Of the original 13th-century nave arcade the capitals alone remain. The piers and arches were reconstructed in the 14th century, only the westernmost bay probably retaining its original proportions.

Extensive alterations were made in the late 13th or early 14th century. The tower and spire were added. The nave arcade was reconstructed: the arches of the eastern bays appear to have been enlarged so that there were 4 arches instead of an original 5 arches.  The aisles were so much widened that they are now broader than the nave.

The similarity between the carving of the capitals of the columns that support the 2 arches separating the aisles from the transepts and that executed in other north Oxfordshire churches suggests that the same mason may have been employed. The capitals are carved with the heads and shoulders of women or knights with arms linked.  At this period Decorated windows, of which the original tracery has since been destroyed, were inserted in the walls of the transepts in place of the former lancets. North and south porches were added, the north one sheltering a fine doorway with elaborate mouldings and carved decorations. Over the entrance is carved a shield charged with the emblems of the Crucifixion. A notable addition was the continuous frieze round the exterior walls of the aisles: the one on the north side depicts a lively series of musicians and their instruments interspersed with grotesque figures. This kind of work is also found in other north Oxfordshire churches. 

Later in the 14th century a clerestory was added to the nave and a new roof was constructed. This roof is remarkable for its original moulded arched braces supporting the tie-beams.  At a later date clerestories were added to the transepts and so the easternmost windows of the nave clerestory were turned into interior windows.

The chancel, with a vestry on the north side, is a notable example of Perpendicular architecture. It was built between 1408 and 1419 at the expense of New College, and the building accounts show that the chief mason was Richard Winchcombe, later to be the builder of the Divinity School at Oxford, and that a carpenter named John was responsible for the timber roof.  Taynton freestone was employed for the dressed stonework. The total cost to the college was c. £400. The wooden chancel screen was also made at this time. It is similar to a screen in Winchester Cathedral and may possibly have been made by Winchester craftsmen.  No major alterations were made before the 19th century, but some repairs were done between 1722 and 1727.  The stone work of the spire was repointed by White of Witney in 1766, but part of it fell in 1777 and in 1815 John Cheshire of Over Whitacre (Warws.) rebuilt 17 ft. of it.  Meanwhile the chancel had fallen into a bad state. In 1770 3 of the chancel windows were taken out and the space walled up; apparently the steward of Sir John Cobb, who, as lesseee of the rectory, was responsible for the upkeep of the chancel, refused to do more after a quarrel with the vicar.  Later the tracery was removed from the other 3 chancel windows and between 1787 and 1789 the churchwardens had all the tracery removed from the windows in the body of the church and replaced by plain stone bars.  A contemporary wrote that the way in which the church had been treated furnished a 'deplorable instance of the economy which seeks to avoid the expense of repair by the total destruction of its object.'  Late-18thcentury drawings show the extent of the mutilation: one from the south-east shows a chancel window and all the transept windows in the south and east walls barred, while 2 chancel windows are entirely blocked: one from the north-east shows the northeast window of the chancel blocked and the transept windows without their tracery. 

Outraged public opinion probably caused the first major restoration, which was carried out at an unusually early period. Between 1831 and 1834 J. C. Buckler restored the chancel at the expense of New College. The tracery inserted in the 6 windows was modelled on the Early Perpendicular style; the mutilated stone reredos was repaired and the canopied niches filled with figures; the fine workmanship of the sedilia and piscina was restored after the large Cobb monument, which had been placed in front of them, had been removed. At the same time the nave was repaired. It was not, however, until 1866–70 that the body of the church was thoroughly restored by Sir Gilbert Scott. New tracery was designed for the windows of the transepts, based on examples at Bloxham and on a drawing showing the original windows before their destruction. The musicians' gallery was taken down, the tower arch opened, and the south transept restored.  In 1886 there were further extensive alterations in accordance with the plans of J. O. Scott. The north and south aisles and the north transept were re-roofed, the old timber being used where possible; the pitch was raised to the original gables which still survived. The north and south porches were restored, the floor was re-laid, a new heating system was installed, and the church was re-seated.  The builders were Messrs. Cooper & Co. of Aylesbury.

The tower was restored in 1927; in 1952 the spire, partly rebuilt in 1922, was again repaired by the Souwestone Restoration Co. and in 1956 4 pinnacles were restored and other work was carried out by the same firm. In 1955 a successful experiment in re-roofing the church with aluminium instead of lead was carried out.  Electric lighting was installed in 1944 and improved electric light was installed in the choir in 1955.

Various changes were made in the 18th and 19th centuries in the fittings of the church. Growing population in the 18th century and an increasing desire for comfort led to the erection of private galleries. In 1832 John Plowman of Oxford was employed to put up a large west gallery for the musicians,  and a smaller one beneath it for the school children.  A private gallery in the middle of the church was made for the vicarage but was taken down in 1831.  About this time the wooden Communion table of 1634  was removed from the east end of the chancel to the vestry and was replaced by a stone altar; in 1832 the 17th-century box pews were removed and the nave was re-pewed and a new pulpit, reading desk, and clerk's seat were erected.  In 1870 New College gave the oak stalls on the south side of the chancel; in 1886 the church was again re-seated with oak benches; in 1905 more choir stalls, designed by J. O. Scott, were installed; and in 1956 oak panelling was erected in the north transept. 

At the restoration of 1866 the early-15th-century screen, which had been cut down to the level of the Jacobean pews of the Cobb and Wilmot families, standing on either side of the central aisle, was restored; its original tracery, which had been removed, was replaced. A loft to surmount it was designed by Sir Gilbert Scott and the Cobb pew removed, but the Wilmot pew remained until 1906. 

In 1877 a new organ, made by Messrs. Walker & Sons, London, was bought. The case was designed by G. G. Scott, the room over the vestry was used as an organ-chamber, and an archway was made in the chancel wall. 

The medieval font was replaced in 1831 by one designed by John Plowman and given by the Revd. W. C. Risley. 

There is now no stained glass of earlier date than the 19th century though Rawlinson recorded armorial glass in the south chapel and in a window in the north aisle.  Some armorial glass (1834), formerly in the east window and now in one of the south windows, is by Thomas Willement. Two windows (1870 and 1888) in the transepts are by Ward and Hughes, and one (1905) by Clayton and Bell. The west window (1912) is by Messrs. Powell & Sons. 

A brass inscription set in the floor near the pulpit commemorates Roger Welles, merchant of Adderbury and 'special benefactor' of the church.  There are also two 15th-century brasses to an unidentified knight and lady, and one of 1508 to Jane Smith. There is a memorial to Edmund Birch, informator publicae scholae de Adderbury (d. 1620). There were once two fine monuments. One commemorated John Bustard (d. 1534) and his wife Elizabeth (d. 1517) and Jane (d. 1568), wife of Anthony Bustard. An inscription, once part of that monument, is on the south wall of the south transept.  The other monument was to Alice (d. 1627), relict of William Cobb. Twelve of her children and the family arms were depicted on it. It was removed from the chancel in 1831 and was later restored at the expense of Lord Methuen, her descendant, and set up in Corsham church (Wilts.).  Sir George Cobb, her last lineal descendant, was buried in the chancel in 1762.

The only early silver is a silver-gilt chalice of 1692. 

There is a ring of 8 bells of which all but one date originally from 1789. The sanctus bell dates from 1681. The vicar H. J. Gepp, recorded some interesting customs in connexion with bell-ringing. 

The churchwardens accounts have many references to the clock, which was ordered in 1684. 

Registers are complete from 1598 for baptisms, burials, and marriages.

Historical information about the St. Mary's Church is provided by 'Parishes: Adderbury', in A History of the County of Oxford: Volume 9, Bloxham Hundred, ed. Mary D Lobel and Alan Crossley (London, 1969), pp. 5-44. British History Online http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/oxon/vol9/pp5-44 [accessed 9 February 2023].

St. Mary's Church is a Grade I listed building. For more information about the listing see CHURCH OF ST MARY, Adderbury - 1200012 | Historic England.

The ecclesiastical parish of Ambrosden is now part of the Ray Valley Benefice, and St Mary's also serves as the British Army garrison chapel.

For more information about St. Mary's Church see Parishes: Adderbury | British History Online (british-history.ac.uk).