Country Churches

108. St Mary the Virgin, Stratfield Saye

This unusually designed church stands in the grounds of the Duke of Wellington’s estate, and was built by George Pitt in 1758 to replace the existing medieval church. Some of the memorials and fittings were incorporated into the new church. It was built in the form of a Greek cross with a cupola containing 5 bells, at the crossing, and a loggia of 3 arches in classical style at the west end. The Victorians dismissed it as ‘a monster of ecclesiastical ugliness’.

Inside, all the furnishings, from the boxed pews to the pulpit, are painted green in contrast to the white plastered ceiling. The main interest of the church lies in its numerous memorials and tombs. The history of the church from the 13th century centres on four families beginning with the de Sayes who gave their name to the village. Then in the 1320’s the Dabridgecourt family, friends of Queen Isabella, gained the manor. 300 years later, in 1618, John Pitt, Clerk to the Exchequer, purchased the estate. Finally in 1817 the Parliamentary Commissioners presented the estate to Arthur Wellesley the 1st Duke of Wellington as a reward for his great victory over Napoleon at Waterloo.

There are two old Dabridgecourt memorials to be seen. One in Latin and close to the font relates to Eustace Dabridgecourt who died in 1594 ‘a youth of fairest promise and in all ways noble’. Another commemorates George Dabridgecourt, Lord of the Manor, who died in 1558. The inscription reads ‘3 things friendly reader make me lament him who is buried here. The first cause of my grief is filial affection for a father. The next that he died before his full time. The third that he was a good and loyal friend to his country. These things, I think, as is not strange in his son, may avail to move your tears also’.

On the north wall of the chancel a plaque commemorates John Horsman who died on 9 March 1576 having ‘here continued a powerful preacher by space of 41 years.’ He is portrayed above kneeling at a prayer desk. In the south transept is a massive marble monument dated 1640 to Sir William Pitt, Comptroller of the Royal Household and his wife Edith ‘notable for piety, charity and fecundity’. Alongside is a marble relief of the 1st Lord Rivers made by John Flaxman in 1804. Formerly George Pitt MP, he built the present church at a cost of £500.

The rest of the church is full of Wellington memorials. The First Duke is buried in St Paul’s Cathedral but he worshipped regularly in the church till his death in 1852. His funeral hatchment is above the west gallery which also contains the barrel organ donated by him in 1835. All his successors are buried here except Henry Wellesley the 6th Duke. He was killed in action serving with No 2 Commando in September 1943 ‘leading his troops in an heroic attack against German defences in the mountains east of Salerno’. Another military memorial commemorates Lord Richard Wellesley, Captain Grenadier Guards, killed at Ypres in October 1914.

Hanging from the north gallery is the standard of the Royal Horse Guards (The Blues) presented to the regiment by King George V in 1925. Near the pulpit is a memorial to the Revd Gerald Wellesley, nephew of the 1st Duke who was Rector 1836-54. He was then appointed Dean of Windsor and became a trusted adviser and confidante of Queen Victoria until his death in 1882.

The only stained glass in the church is the east window depicting Christ giving a blessing surrounded by numerous angels or cherubs. The pulpit came from the old church but the marble font was given by the villagers as a thanksgiving for the reign of Queen Victoria. The Village War Memorial can be seen in the south transept and a brass plaque under the window on the north nave wall commemorates a villager Corporal George Mates of the 2nd Royal West Kents killed at Abou Klea in the Egyptian Campaign of 1885. A large churchyard full of fine trees stretches back beyond the east end. By no means a beautiful church but one full of historic interest.

John Symonds