All Saints

The S tower arch is C13,

the tower itself is late C14.

The rest of the church was rebuilt in the late C15

The tower was repaired in brick probably in the C17.

The chancel, nave, N and S aisles and S porch are all richly decorated late C15

early C16 work.

The chancel S windows are similar, and the chancel S buttresses have carved grotesques on the coping.

The C19 NE organ chamber is also in a Perpendicular style, and has a triplet of two-light windows with vertical tracery separated by pinnacles supported on carved angels in its N wall.

The N aisle windows, all of four traceried lights, have crocketed labels, and the buttresses have carved figures and beasts.

The NW tower is C14 in origin

it was rebuilt or strengthened in the C17, and the parapet, pinnacles and bell openings were rebuilt in the C19.

The walls are largely C17 brick and stone rubble, and there are massive brick buttresses on the N and W sides.

Late C15 chancel arch of two orders, the outer with continuous double chamfers, the inner possibly partly C14 material reused and having half-round responds and moulded capitals.

The openings from the chancel and N aisle into the C19 NE organ chamber are Perpendicular in style, and there is also a C15 doorway from the chancel to the vestry.

The N tower arch, now partly hidden behind the inserted ringing floor and gallery under the tower, is C13.

they almost certainly belonged to a C13 N arcade that was otherwise rebuilt in the later middle ages.

The N tower arch is C14 and has a continuously chamfered outer order and an inner order on attached shafts

The central two sections of the panelling under the S aisle E window formed a reredos for an altar and has angels supporting shields.

PRINCIPAL FIXTURES: The church has been refurnished a number of times, most recently in the 1950s, when the present chairs and pulpit were installed.

Interesting font with a plain, polygonal bowl and a polygonal stem with delicate, intersecting blind arcading, both of c1200.

It is said to have come from the demolished St John's, Huntingdon and to have been the font in which Oliver Cromwell was baptised

Late C19 or early C20 font cover with an elaborate tracery dome topped by a small cupola.

C14 piscina in the chancel.

Very good C19 choir stalls, the ends with angels playing musical instruments.

Late C19 reredos with figures of saints under a crocketted, ogee arcade.

Some good C19 and C20 glass, including the clerestory windows of 1860 by Clayton and Bell, and the W window of the S aisle (formerly the E window), also by Clayton and Bell.

The excellent late C15 or early C16 chancel roof is low pitched and has moulded main timbers with curved braces to the tie-beams and good carved bosses.

The posts stand on carved corbels, possibly C19, and there are traces of original colour, although most of the colour is c1950.

The nave roof is C19, although it is said to be an exact copy of its medieval predecessor, and has arched braces with open tracery in the spandrels

there are angels on the ends of the intermediate principal rafters.

At least some of the carved figures supporting the wall posts are medieval, however, and there are also three early C16 wall posts with carved figures in the C19 N vestry.

Very few monuments, the most notable of which is the wall tablet to Alice Weaver, d. 1636, with an early use of a scrolled pediment.

HISTORY: There is evidence for a church here in the late 10th century, when it was given to Thorney abbey, and C12 fragments were found during restoration in the 1950s.

By the C13, the church was clearly a substantial structure with at least a N aisle.

A NW tower was built over the W bay of this aisle in the late C14.

The rest of the church was entirely rebuilt in the late C15

A will of 1479 left money for making the desks in the chancel, a badge for the Drewell family on the chancel may be connected with the member of that family buried in the church in 1499,

the R Newell commemorated on the chancel cornice is probably Robert Newell, burgess of Huntingdon, d. 1509.

There was a Lady Chapel in the N aisle, and in the C16, the church had a Corpus Christi guild.

The NW tower was rebuilt or strengthened in the C17, possibly in connection with damage during the Civil War, but this is not certain.

A number of early C16 monuments were removed during this work.

REASONS FOR DESIGNATION The church of All Saints, Huntingdon, is designated at Grade I for the following principal reasons: * Outstanding town parish church, architecturally very ambitious, late C15 and early C16 throughout except for the C14 NW tower. * Excellent late C15 or early C16 chancel roof. * Font of c.1200, said to be that in which Oliver Cromwell was baptised. * Sensitively restored in 1859-61 by George Gilbert Scott. * Some very good C19 and early C20 glass.