The oldest parts of the Church of England parish church of Saint John the Evangelist are 13th-century.[3][4] They include the chancel and the Early English west doorway.[3] The nave has aisles with four-bayarcades.[3] The south aisle was added first, late in the 13th century.[3] The north aisle was added slightly later, and the south door is early 14th-century.[3] Also 14th-century are the sedilia and piscina in the chancel.[4] The west tower was added in the middle of the 14th century, with its eastern buttresses intruding into the north and south aisles.[5] In the 15th century a Perpendicular Gothic porch was added to the south doorway. Also Perpendicular Gothic are the nave's clerestory and roof,[6] which are late 15th- or early 16th-century.[4] The church is a Grade II* listed building.[4]
The west tower has a ring of six bells. The oldest are the third and fourth bells, which were cast by an unknown bellfounder in 1619.[7] Henry I Bagley of Chacombe, Northamptonshire[8] cast the treble bell in 1680.[7] The other two bells were cast in 1797,[7] but by two different founders. John Briant of Hertford[8] cast the second bell, but Thomas I Mears of the Whitechapel Bell Foundry cast the tenor.[7] The church has also a Sanctus bell, which was cast in 1708 by one of the Chandler[7] family of bellfounders of Drayton Parslow.[8]Sir Edward Smythe (1602–1682), a retired judge who bought the manor of Whitchurch in about 1669, is buried in the church.[9]
The Priory Hotel (15th and 16th century)
Economic and social history
The Old House (15th, 17th and 20th centuries)
The village used to have a market, which was chartered in 1245. A street of the village is still called Market Hill, and the village still celebrates the granting of its market charter with a May feast each year.[citation needed]
Many of the village's cottages and houses are historic. None is a Grade I listed building but two are Grade II* Listed.[10][11] The Priory in the High Street and The Old House in Church Headland Lane are 15th-century timber-framed houses, each with first-floor jettying.[10][11] The Priory was altered in the 16th, 19th and 20th centuries, has brick nogging, was a hotel (and restaurant "La Boiserie") and is now a private house.[10] The Old House was altered in the 17th century and the front was remodelled around 1940.[6][11]
Nikolaus Pevsner also noted two houses in Oving Road:[6] School House, which is 16th-century, timber-framed and has a jettied first floor;[12] and Whitchurch House, which is early 17th-century and has an early 18th-century façade.[13]
Rex Whistler's painting The Vale of Aylesbury was created in Whitchurch, where a house is now named after him.[14]
As well as the Priory Hotel (see above) the village now has one public house: The White Swan, at the end of the high street nearest Aylesbury.
Whitchurch Combined School is a community primary school for boys and girls aged 4–11.[17] The school has about 200 pupils. Its catchment area includes the parishes of Whitchurch, Hardwick, Oving, Pitchcott and Weedon. It also includes part of Watermead and the Berryfields and Weedon Hill Major Development Areas (MDAs) in Aylesbury, although new schools are planned for the MDAs.
