St Nicholas Church, Sutton, is a Grade II* listed parish church in the centre of

Sutton, London Sutton is a town in the London Borough of Sutton in South London, England. It is the administrative headquarters of the Outer London borough, on the lower slopes of the North Downs. It is south-southwest of Charing Cross, one of the fourteen ...

. It was built between 1862 and 1864 in the Gothic style with dressed flint and stone dressings. It was designed by the architect

Edwin Nash Edwin Nash (1812 – 14 May 1884) was an English Victorian ecclesiastical architect active in mid-nineteenth-century Kent, England. Most of his commissions were churches. He worked with architect John Nash Round on St. John the Evangelis ...

Location

St Nicholas - the oldest of the three town centre churches in Sutton - is surrounded by a small ancient graveyard, which is wooded. It also contains some lawned areas with benches. Two well-used public footpaths run through these grounds. It is in ecumenical partnership with other denominations and in a Team Ministry with other Anglican churches.

History

The present building stands on a site that has been used as a church since Saxon times - an earlier, smaller church occupied the site until the nineteenth century, which apart from its

piscina A piscina is a shallow basin placed near the altar of a church, or else in the vestry or sacristy, used for washing the communion vessels. The sacrarium is the drain itself. Lutherans and Anglicans usually refer to the basin, calling it a pisci ...

was replaced by the present church building, which was consecrated in February 1864. The previous church was stone, and dated mostly from the fourteenth or fifteenth centuries. It had a tower, porch and chancel. Its poor condition, as well as the enlargement of its congregation, necessitated its replacement. The church suffered slight damage in an air raid in 1940, during the

London Blitz London is the capital and largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Western Europe, with a population of 14.9 million. London stands on the River Tha ...

. A flying bomb fell near the church and mostly destroyed some of the graves in the churchyard, but the building itself remained largely intact.

Architectural features

Interior of St Nicholas Church - geograph

The church was rebuilt from an earlier one in 1862-4 by

, incorporating monuments from the old building. It is in the Gothic style. It was constructed with dressed flint and stone dressings. Its roof is of red tile. The entrance is bright blue. It has a four-bay nave, chancel, organ chamber and vestry, side aisles, south aisle chapel and west tower. Its tower has a doorway in its west side, four tiers of fenestration and a shingled

broach spire A broach spire is a type of spire (tall pyramidal structure), which usually sits atop a tower or turret of a church. It starts on a square base and is carried up to a tapering octagonal spire by means of triangular faces. File:Leicester Cathedral ...

. There are aisle windows of three lights with circular tracery over in pointed heads, two-light windows to the south aisle chapel and a chancel window of five lights. There are gabled porches to the north and south sides; the south porch has the following inscription on its bargeboard: "How amiable are thy dwellings thou Lord of Hosts". Inside the church are a nave with pointed arches supported on circular columns with foliated capitals; timber roofs; and whitewashed walls. The present structure incorporates a medieval

, and monuments from the old church including the following: monuments to Sarah Glover (1628), to Lady Dorothy Brownlow (1699), to William Earl Talbot (1782) and to Isaac Littlebury (1740).

Burials

* Dorothy Mason, wife of

Sir William Brownlow, 4th Baronet Sir William Brownlow, 4th Baronet (5 November 1665 – 6 March 1701) was an English politician. Origins He was the younger son of Sir Richard Brownlow, 2nd Baronet (died 1668) of Great Humby, Humby in Lincolnshire, by his wife Elizabeth Freke ...

(d. 1700) *

William Talbot, 1st Earl Talbot William Talbot, 1st Earl Talbot, PC (16 May 1710 – 27 April 1782), styled as Lord Talbot from 1737 to 1761, was an English peer and Whig politician. Talbot was a notable figure among opposition Whig politicians during the reign of King Geor ...

(1710–1782)

Notable clergy

Joseph Glover Joseph Glover is an American mathematician and provost of the University of Florida. He was previously provost of the University of Florida from 2008 to 2023 and provost of the University of Arizona from July to August 2024. Education Glover ...

(d. 1638), who died in the crossing to the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and whose wife,

Elizabeth Glover Elizabeth Glover (''née'' Harris; 1602 – June 23, 1643) was an English woman and first American publisher. She established the first printing press in the Thirteen Colonies, located next to the nascent Harvard College in Cambridge, Massachusett ...

, hence introduced the

printing press A printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a printing, print medium (such as paper or cloth), thereby transferring the ink. It marked a dramatic improvement on earlier printing methods in whi ...

to North America, was Rector of St Nicholas from 1624 to 1636.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Nicholas Church Sutton London Sutton, London

Sutton Sutton (''south settlement'' or ''south town'' in Old English) may refer to: Places United Kingdom England In alphabetical order by county: * Sutton, Bedfordshire * Sutton, Berkshire, a List of United Kingdom locations: Stu-Sz#Su, location * S ...

Grade II* listed churches in London Grade II* listed buildings in the London Borough of Sutton Churches completed in 1864 Rebuilt churches in the United Kingdom 19th-century Church of England church buildings Churches bombed by the Luftwaffe in London