Cookies

We use essential cookies to make our site work. We'd also like to set analytics cookies that help us make improvements by measuring how you use the site. These will be set only if you accept.

For more detailed information about the cookies we use, see our cookies page.

Essential Cookies

Essential cookies enable core functionality such as security, network management, and accessibility. For example, the selections you make here about which cookies to accept are stored in a cookie.

You may disable these by changing your browser settings, but this may affect how the website functions.

Analytics Cookies

We'd like to set Google Analytics cookies to help us improve our website by collecting and reporting information on how you use it. The cookies collect information in a way that does not directly identify you.

Third Party Cookies

Third party cookies are ones planted by other websites while using this site. This may occur (for example) where a Twitter or Facebook feed is embedded with a page. Selecting to turn these off will hide such content.

The Church

Deep in the woodlands of the Meon Valley, the Church of our Lady of Warnford stands in peaceful isolation. The building is Early English in style with a tower and single cell nave and chancel, as befitting a small parish.

It has a long history, with a church first founded here by St. Wilfred the Bishop (in the 7th C) during his exile from Northumbria. This earliest church, probably built of  wood or wattle and daub, was replaced in the later Saxon period by a simple stone church. The church as it currently stands dates from the 12th C, rebuilt in phases by Adam de Port, who held the manor of Warnford at that time.

The Church before the 1905 Renovation

Notice that the nave had a plaster ceiling below the roof beams, at a level which cut two or three feet off the apex of the east window.

The exterior and interior before 1905 The exterior and interior before 1905

This can be compared to the church now

The church in 2017. This can be compared with the church before 1905 above The church in 2017. This can be compared with the church before 1905 above

More photos of the church exterior and interior before 1905 and during the major renovations of 1905

  • Church north side well before 1905 renovation. Notice the higher walls and shallower roof and lack of ivy. This is the earliest photo of the Church.
  • Church shortly before 1905 from the north through the trees. Note the extensive ivy.
  • Church north side, shortly before 1904.
  • The nave before 1905. Note the Squires pew where the organ now is. It was screened from the gaze of the congregation and from draughts by curtains. The upholstery of the cushions was in blue and yellow - the squire’s racing colours.
  • Nave before 1905.
  • Thomas Neale Tomb
  • Nave during 1905 renovations
  • Church from south during 1905 renovations. Note ivy infestations

Photos of the church after 1905

  • The church in snowdrop time mid to late 20thC
  • Warnford Church from North, 1936.
  • The church in the 20th C
  • In 1930
  • The church north side after 1905
  • The nave looking east 1905 to 1937
  • The nave looking east 1905 to 1937
  • Warnford Church 1907
  • Tower before 1951 renovation
  • The Church in 1975
  • Nave looking west
  • Font
  • The childrens corner
  • Royal Coat of Arms of George IV (from 1801 to 1816). Flanked by two funeral hatchings, one is for Luke Dillon (right), from 1825. The other is for Elizabeth Lancaster (left) the wife of Richard Lancaster, rector from 1802 to 1853.
  • Thomas Neale tomb.
  • Warnford Village The Church