St Andrew's Church, Cherry Hinton
Cherry Hinton's Grade I parish church, with a 13th-century chancel and the oldest bell in the city.
St Andrew's serves Cherry Hinton, on the south-eastern side of Cambridge. Its Grade I listing covers a building put together from flint, clunch and Barnack stone, and the earliest fabric goes back to the late 12th century.
The building
The chancel, with paired lancet windows of about 1230-50, is the part architectural writers single out as a good specimen of Early English Gothic. The nave came shortly after, with clustered shafts on its piers and deeply moulded arches. The aisles and tower belong to the Perpendicular period. In the early Tudor years the east window was replaced by a five-light Perpendicular design, and the rood screen of about the same date was later altered by the Victorians.
The parish has a Peterhouse connection: in the 1360s Simon Langham, then Bishop of Ely, handed the Cherry Hinton rectory to Peterhouse. The church fell into neglect after the Reformation, and in 1792 the nave clerestory came down. George Gilbert Scott Jr rebuilt and restored it in 1877-80, though one source credits John Oldrid Scott instead.
What to look for
- The bell. Inside the tower, the second bell was cast in the 1300s and ranks as the oldest bell in the city.
- The Serocold tablet. A memorial in the shape of a coffin, for Captain Serocold (died 1794), was carved by John Flaxman.
- Later additions. St John the Evangelist's, a daughter church for the new housing along the stretch linking Hills Road with Cherry Hinton Road, was founded in 1891, and a pyramid-roofed church hall followed in 1982.
Practical notes
The church website lists services, community activities and room hire. Ring the parish office on 01223 242954 before planning a visit inside.