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Saint Peter’s Church Swallowcliffe welcomes you to join and support the work of this Church in maintaining and spreading the Word of God and of his only son Our Saviour Jesus Christ Our Lord. The Church is named after our Patron Saint, the Apostle Simon ‘Peter’, whom Christ called the Rock ( from the Greek : Petros) on which his Church would be built (Matthew 16: 18). St. Peter is represented in Church art as holding the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven.
St. Peter’s Church reaches out to all members of Swallowcliffe and other parishes in the Upper Nadder Benefice to support the Christian mission; praising God through hymns and worship, supporting charities and giving succour to the needy as a place of calm and quiet reflection.
Church Services
1st Sunday in the month: 11:15am Holy Communion (BCP)
2nd Sunday in the month: 11:15 am All Ages Communion at our sister church, St. James’ in the neighbouring village of Ansty
3rd Sunday in the month: 8:00am Holy Communion (BCP)
4th Sunday in the month: 11:15am Matins (a Lay-Led Service)
During the Vacancy of the Team Rector, Communion services will be taken by a retired Ordained Priest drawn from the area. If there is a 5th Sunday in the month, a Benefice service is held somewhere in the Upper Nadder Benefice.
Special services during the year include Plough Sunday, Mothering Sunday, Rogation Sunday, Harvest Festival and Remembrance Sunday. See the Benefice magazine ‘Focus’ for exact dates, and also the Notice Board in the porch. The Patronal Service takes place on the last Sunday of June. A service of Hymns and Pimm’s is also held in June.
Easter Services include Good Friday and Easter Sunday.
Christmas Services include the candle-lit Carol Service held the Sunday before Christmas, and all ages Communion services on Christmas Eve and on Christmas Day.
Baptisms, Weddings and Funerals.
We welcome any family who wish to have their child baptised in our beautiful font.
Swallowcliffe Church makes a beautiful wedding venue.
Residents and former parishioners and their families can elect to have a Funeral or Memorial Service in the church, and remains can be buried (and cremated remains interred) in the churchyard (see Funeral rules and eligibility here).
The Royal Oak (100yards away) will be delighted to host guests before and after such services and can be reserved for private functions (www.royaloakswallowcliffe.com; T: 01747 870211) or if you prefer the Village Hall is available for hire (300yards away), and is fully equipped with a small stove, crockery, glasses and cutlery (contact Mrs Caroline Willis E: crwillis52@gmail.com T: 01747871343)
Additional parking is available, a short walk from the Church, for a small fee – donated to Church funds- from Mr Patrick Willis, Martin House, Swallowcliffe E: pjdawillis@gmail.com T: 01747871343
Contact details: Sacristan: Mrs Penny Smales, E: pennywag@gmail.com
PCC Vice Chairman : Mr Patrick Willis E: pjdawillis@gmail.com T: 01747871343
Officiating Clergy through Rev Judy Anderson; E: andersonj55@btinternet.com
Online Giving
Our Church costs £40 a day to run, come hail rain or shine. All donations, however large or small, are most welcome.
Parishioners and visitors are invited to give either by a cash donation into the slot on the wall beside the hymn books, or directly to the Parish Giving Scheme here: https://www.parishgiving.org.uk/donors/find-your-parish/swallowcliffe-st-peter-swallowcliffe/ (also see the brochures in the Nave).
Have you considered leaving a Legacy to Swallowcliffe?
Legacies really are lifelines for the survival of rural parishes such as ours.
Each year around 5,000 people leave a gift in their will to a Church of England parish. In total, parishes receive around £50 million in legacy gifts each year - gifts to finance mission projects, maintain beautiful church buildings, and grow faithful communities.
For regular church-goers, leaving a gift in your will is your final opportunity to make a lasting gift to God.
It’s also a good way to make a lasting difference to the future of your church and also its community.
You could choose to fund the Church Community?
If you’ve ever been involved in your local church, you will probably favour contributing to the Swallowcliffe Parish Church Council account, so relying on current and future members of the PCC to spend your money wisely but also charitably amongst their currently favoured causes.
…or simply secure the fabric of our Church building and its grounds?
If you’re not habitual church goers, but nevertheless enjoy having a lovely church with two churchyards in your village, you may prefer to pay your legacy into The Friends of St Peter’s Swallowcliffe. It’s an Invested Trust Fund set up to finance any unexpected maintenance tasks or extraordinary essential works that affect the fabric of our church building and its churchyards.
Declaration forms are provided for each of these two ways of leaving us a legacy.
It would be greatly appreciated if you would return any filled-in forms to us.
They are completely non-binding and simply show us your current intention.
Click on the image to open the form.
History
Prior to the spread of Christianity in Wiltshire, the Saxon settlement was one of a number of ‘spring-line’ villages established where water percolating down through the chalk down and greenstone sedimentary rock hits the impermeable clay and emerges as springs. One such Saxon was the so-called Swallowcliffe Princess, c 800AD, who was buried in her bed in an Iron-age Tumulus grave-mound on Swallowcliffe Down. Her remains and rich grave-goods can be seen in the Wessex Galleries of the Salisbury Museum.
The original stone Church in Swallowcliffe was built some time before 1150; it was located in what we call the Old Churchyard , the other side of the stream from the Royal Oak. The land was donated by Theobald ‘and his man, Canute’, a tenant of the Giffards of Fonthill Gifford who held land of the King. It may have replaced a wooden Saxon church located somewhere in the village, possibly in the field below the Manor, where archaeological traces of a pre-existing settlement have been found.
A full history of the Medieval Church can be found in the History, written by the late Commander S. Jenkins of Vine Cottage, which is available for purchase in the Nave.
By the 19th Century the old church was subject to frequent flooding, with the water over two foot deep and covering the pews in mud, a condition exacerbated by the sinking of the church into the soft ground of the churchyard.
In 1843 the Church was rebuilt on the present site, well above the stream, on land donated by the then landowner, the Earl of Pembroke. The architect, Sir Gilbert Scott, was beginning to make a name for himself as a church architect and was renowned for repurposing old stone. It is likely that some of the pillars and arches, in the Norman style, are derived from the original Church.
Notable features of the Church are the effigy of Sir Thomas West in the porch, who died in 1343, the slab which once held a brass effigy of an Abbess from Wilton Abbey placed in the old church at the time of the dissolution of the monasteries, the three church bells, one dating back to 1630, and the stained glass, notably the one in the vestry of the Good Samaritan, whose vibrant colours are in the style of William Morris’s studios.
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