The church of All Saints in Great Barford is situated to the south of the main village close to the River Great Ouse. Parking is available on the roadside to the east of the church.
View Bedfordshire Parish Churches in a larger map
The church consists of a nave and chancel with north and south aisles, a west tower and vestry to the north of the chancel. The chancel is around 26 feet by 16 with the nave being 60 feet by 21 feet. The aisles add 13 feet to the north and 11 to the south. The tower is around 14 feet by 13 feet and some 60 feet tall.
The church was heavily restored and enlarged in the mid C19. The two aisles date from this work along with much other rebuilding leaving the west tower remaining from the original church. The tower is of limestone whilst the rest of the church is built from brown cobbles.
The south aisle has three windows to the south and windows to the east and west.
The east window of the aisle is of two cinquefoiled lights with a quatrefoil design above under a pointed arch. The west window is of similar design.
The three south facing windows around the door, two to the east and one to the west are all the same, being of three cinquefoil lights with trefoil designs under a square head.
The south doorway dates from the 1860’s with twin colonettes on each side and carved corbels guarding the doorway.
The south aisle, chancel, tower and south side of the nave are all embattled whilst the north aisle and north side of the nave are not.
The clerestory above has simple quatrefoil windows on both sides.
The tower dates from C15 and is of five stages and unusually has diagonal buttressing on all four corners with the eastern buttresses merging into the main body of the church.
These buttresses terminate in tall crocketed pinnacles with a small octagonal lead covered spire on the roof with a weathervane on top.
There is an internal stair in the south-west corner of the tower.
The belfry openings are of three lights with intersecting tracery above.
Each side of the tower has a gargoyle holding the waterspout.
The west window is of three cinquefoiled lights with perpendicular tracery above under a two-centred head.
The west door is under a square headed arch with quatrefoil designs in the spandrels.
The hood mould terminates in floral design corbels. Above the west window and below the clock is an empty statue niche with a trefoil head under an ogee arch.
The north side of the church has a small modern building in the angle between the north aisle and the tower. The north windows are all identical to those on the south but with a fourth window replacing the door.
The vestry to the north side of the chancel was built around the same time as the main alterations to the church in C19. On the east wall of the vestry is the coat of arms of the Franklin family ancestral owners of one of the manors of Barford.
The east window of the church is of three cinquefoiled lights with perpendicular tracery above under a pointed arch.
The glass in this window dates from 1864 having been placed in memory of the Arnold family who had donated much to the church in the 1860’s.
The south side of the chancel has two windows surrounding the priest’s door. Both the windows are of two cinque-foiled lights under pointed arches with perpendicular tracery above with a hood mould. The door is also under a pointed arch.
Page last changed 22/04/2020.