Description

BENTLEY WITH ARKSEY HIGH STREET
SE 50 NE (east side),
Bentley

7/56 Church of St. Peter
II
Church. 1891-94. By John Codd for patron C. E. S. Cooke. Deeply-coursed
dressed sandstone, red tile roofs. 5-bay nave with shallow aisles and south
porch rising as a 3-stage tower with spire, north porch; narrower, lower,
2-bay chancel with north organ chamber and vestry. In Gothic Revival style
with geometric tracery. Chamfered plinth, keel-moulded string courses below
windows and rising over as continuous hoodmoulds. Nave: western bays have
the porches, that to north walled-up and with statue in gable niche and
ashlar roof. Other bays have pointed-arched 3-light windows. West end has
2-light windows between 4 buttresses and quatrefoiled, circular window in
gable. Gable copings with west and east crosses. Tower: full-height angle
buttresses; south door with hoodmould returning as a string course.
2nd stage: string course beneath small 2-light window; cusped, iron
clockfaces. 3rd stage; recessed panel with large, paired belfry openings
having transoms, louvres and hoodmoulds beneath foiled openings with linking
hoodmould; corbel table over; broach spire with tall lucarnes.
Chancel: C20 south addition in front of 2-light windows. North organ chamber
has two small 2-light windows between string course and a foiled gable
opening. Lean-to vestry to east with door at angle with organ chamber.
Buttresses flank a 5-light east window.

Interior: nave has shallow aisles with differing piers of treble-shafted,
cylindrical and octagonal form; double-chamfered, pointed arches with
continuous hoodmould; lancet aisle arches. Roof: moulded tie beams, arch-
braced trusses, coving and cusped arcading down each side.
Chancel: carved oak choir stalls, pulpit with alabaster top rail. Alabaster
reredos with 3 crocketed, gabled panels. Plaque on north wall notes that the
church was erected by Charles Edward Stephen Cooke in memory of his parents
on the feast of St. Peter MDCCCXCI.

Illustrated in Building News, Sept. 3, 1897.

Listing NGR: SE5661205593

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Church of St Peter at Wikipedia
• Wikidata Q26486658

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Churches: An Architectural Guide (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Introductions)
• 
  London 1: The City of London: City of London v. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Surrey (The Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Georgian Style and Design for Contemporary Living
• 
  Herefordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  For the Record