The parish church of St Dionysius, begun around 1300 as a chapelry of Great Bowden, was planned to be very much part of the townscape, with a central position in its own square, opening out directly onto the street with no space for a churchyard. It was intended to be sight worthy of its setting, and few would deny the success of this scheme. Its fine tower and broach spire rising to 154 feet dominate the landscape and have done so for 700 years.*

[St Dionysius] Parish Church originally built as a Chapel of St Mary in Arden (qv) during the earlier part of the C13. Architectural features of present church mainly C14 and C15. The town is dominated by the early C14 grey ashlar tower with its fine crocketed brooch spire. Rest of church in coursed sandstone rubble with crenellated parapet. Buttresses. Nave and Chancel with Clerestory windows, Aisles and North and South Porches. Crocketed cross as finial at east end of both Nave and Chancel. South face of tower has large sundial. Inside, galleries of 1836 remain. Fine achievement of Royal Arms of 1660 at West end. Good C15 timber roof was restored, in same style, in 1954. Fragments of medieval wall painting discovered in 1959 at east end of North Aisle. The Church of St Dionysius is a prominent feature of many near and distant views of the town.

*Market Harborough Parish Church – St Dyonisus A Brief History by Geoffrey K. Brandwood and David Johnson.

TO COMMEMORATE THAT GREAT AND DECISIVE BATTLE FOUGHT IN THIS FIELD .
ON THE DAY OF XIV DAY OF JUNE MDCXLV,
COMMANDED BY HIS MAJESTY
KING CHARLES THE FIRST,
AND THE PARLIAMENT FORCES
HE ADED BY THE GENERALS’ FAIRFAX AND CROMWELL.
WHICH TERMINATED FATALLY
FOR THE ROYAL CAUSE, LED TO THE THR ONE,
THE ALTAR, AND THE CONSTITUTION,
AND FOR YEARS PLUNGED THIS NATION
INTO THE HORRORS OF ANARCHY
AND CIVIL WAR:
LEAVING A USEFUL LESSON TO BRITISH KINGS:
NEVER TO EXCEED THE BOUNDS
OF THEIR JUST PREROGATIVE,
AND TO BRITISH SUBJECTS.
NEVER TO SWERVE FROM THE ALLEGIENCE
DUE TO THEIR LEGITIMATE MONARCH.
THIS PILLAR WAS ERECTED
BY JOHN AND MARY FRANCES FITZGERALD.
LORD AND LADY OF THE MANOR OF NASEBY
AD MDCCCXXIII

The decisive battle of the English Civil War was fought in the fields of Naseby, Sulby, Sibbertoft and Clipstone parishes on Saturday 14 June, 1645. The Parliamentarian New Model Army, under the command of Sir Thomas Fairfax, defeated the Royalist army, commanded by King Charles I and Prince Rupert of the Rhine.

Patrols clashed on the evening of 13 June in Naseby village. Early on Saturday 14 June Fairfax marche the New Model Army north from Guilsborough towards Naseby to meet here, at Naseby windmill. The wheeled transport, the baggage and artillery trains, had to stay on the primitive road to avoid getting stuck in the mud. The foot and horse would have chosen their own routes. The regiments were then organised into ‘battalia’, their fighting formation. No one knew if they were going into battle or if they were to continue their pursuit of the Royalist army through Market Harborough and beyond. Would King Charles stand and fight?

By 8.00am King Charles and Rupert had moved the royal army to a ridge between East Farndon and Little Oxendon. From there this position cannot be seen. Similarly the view north from the windmill is limited by the rising ground, so Fairfax and his commander of horse, Oliver Cromwell, had to ride to the edge of the steep hill overlooking Clipston to look for their enemies. **

Both sides wished to fight and Fairfax ordered his army to a position on the ridge to the south of this place. Rupert saw the movement and brought the Royalist to Dust Hill, across the valley to the north.
This area was mostly open ground, but contained by an ancient boundary hedge around Sulby to the west and a rabbit warren (on today’s Lodge Hill) and boggy ground to the east. Lieutenant General of Horse Oliver Cromwell put dragoons behind Sulby Hedges. Their musket fire caused the royalist cavalry on the western flank to charge, forcing many of parliament’s horses to flee. The Royalist foot attacked and almost broke Fairfax’s line but it stubbornly resisted. Cromwells trouper routed the horse opposing them and fell on the left flank of the royalist foot. Despite Rupert’s Bluecoat Regiment ’standing like a wall of brass’ on the slope just to the west of the road to the north, Fairfax’s counter-attacks succeeded in driving the royalists back. Part of the royalist army went on fighting, all the way they had come that morning, in a battle reaching a climax at Wadborough Hill

*From a signboard next to the Windmill Obelisk
**From a signboard next to Cromwell’s position on the day of the battle

The timber portion of this building was erected in 1614 by Robert Smyth. It was set upon posts “to keepe the market people drye in tyme of foule wether”. The brick portion was added in 1868 and the building was restored by public subscription in 1978.*

*from a signboard next to the building

The central panel shows the legend of St. George killing a dragon outside the city of Antioch.

Below is his wife Sabra who has just borne three boys, one of whom is being carried off by a lion. This romantic addition to the legend was current in the sixteenth century.

St. George is the patron saint of England and of the Royal Order of the Garter. He was also venerated by warrior kings like Henry VIII.

Above St. George are reclining male nudes: a popular motif of renaissance art. God appears in blessing above them.

At the top and the bottom are the initials of Henry and Anne Boleyn: ‘H’ and ‘A’.

Down either side is a frieze of military trophies, appropriate to the general martial theme.

Several different carvers have worked on the stall. The central round panel and the figure of God above it are much finer than the rest of the work. *

*From a signboard next to the artwork

The floor at the east end of King’s College Chapel has been lowered to enable Rubens painting, the ‘Adoration of the Magi’ to be displayed beneath the great East Window.

This powerful masterpiece was painted by Sir Peter Paul Rubens in 1634 for the convent of the White Nuns at Louvain in Belgium, and was subsequently acquired by the Marquess of Lansdown when the Convent was suppressed in 1783. It came into the possession of the Grosvenor family and, in 1959, was sold at auction (for a the world record price). It was presented to the College in 1961 by the purchaser, Major A E Allnatt, who wished that it should again be an altar-piece in a great church.*

*From a guide to King’s College Chapel, Cambridge

The memorial chapel on the south side, was once the chantry chapel of John Argentein. Provost 1501-1507, who was physician to Edward IV and the young Edward V and his brother, the murdered princes in the Tower. His brass lies before the altar, and in this chapel there is also a record of the Provosts of King’s through the centuries. The chapel was converted into a war memorial in 1920-1921 and renamed All Souls Memorial Chapel. A tablet recalls college members who died in the two world wars, among them the poet Rupert Brooke.*

*From a guide to King’s College Chapel, Cambridge

King’s College Chapel is arguably the most magnificent example of late medieval English architecture in the entire country. Guidebooks run out of superlatives to describe the richness of its interior decoration and the sumptuous flowing lines of the structural elements.

The Chapel was founded by Henry VI in 1441 as part of his grand scheme for creating at King’s a college to take graduates of Eton, founded the previous year. The chapel was intended to form one side of a grand court but the residential ranges planned for the other three sides of the court were never completed.

Henry compelled landowners in the town to sell him plots along the river, and he proceded to pull down residences, shops, and even a parish church to make room for his creation. Henry intended his chapel to be without equal.

He employed his royal architect, Reginald of Ely, to draw up plans for a church along the lines of a cathedral choir, and Henry himself laid the foundation stone of the new chapel on 25 July 1446.
Building continued until 1461, through the opening hostilities of the Wars of the Roses. But when Henry VI was taken prisoner by thefuture Edward IV, workmen packed up their tools and went home. It is said that a half-cut stone left by the workmen was eventually used as the foundation stone for the Gibb’s building in 1724.

The extent of this early building phase is clearly noticeable. The builders used white Tadcaster limestone, and the upper limit of this stone can be traced, particularly in the butresses. Very little building was done under Edward IV, but Richard II’s short reign saw the first 5 bays of the chapel completed and put into daily use.

Henry VII provided the necessary funds to turn the half-finished chapel into a complete building. The chest which carried Henry’s initial gift of money is preserved in the Chapel Exhibition in the northern side chapel. The main structure was finished in 1515, and Henry VIII funded the interior woodwork and screen.

The magnificent – there is no other word to describe it – fan vaulting was completed in just 3 years, between 1512-1515 by master mason John Wastell.

The chapel surprisingly escaped major damage during the Civil War, despite the fact that Cromwell’s troops used it for a training ground in inclement weather. It is possible that Cromwell himself, being a Cambridge student, gave orders to spare the chapel. Most of the stained glass was removed during WWII, and the Chapel again escaped damage.

King’s College was founded in 1441 by Henry VI, who had founded Eton College (qv) in 1440 and subsequently linked the school to King’s in order to supply college scholars. King’s College chapel was begun in 1446. Following Henry’s deposition in 1461, the college’s income was much reduced, and the only building of his great scheme to be built was the chapel, which took about a century to complete. The initial court, Old Court, was built north of the chapel (this area, since 1829, part of the Old Schools precinct owned by the University), with the intention that it should be superseded by the great scheme, of which the chapel would have been the north side of the resultant court. Building was slow and piecemeal throughout the following centuries, Front Court not being finished until the early C19. The site remains (1998) in college use.