Princes Risborough

The church from the south-east

The church in its present general form dates from the 13th century. There was an earlier small church, probably just a small chancel and a nave without aisles, which would have been in roughly the same position as the present nave.[21] The church was enlarged and improved from the 13th to the 15th centuries as described below. By the 19th century it was in bad condition and was extensively restored and partly rebuilt in 1867/68. The tower and spire was rebuilt in 1907/08 and parish rooms added in the 21st century.

The church was enlarged by the addition of the nave arcades and aisles in the early or mid-13th century[22] The arches at the western end of each arcade were added in the late 13th or early 14th century, those on the south being later. The columns are octagonal with plain chamfered bases and moulded capitals. There were originally deep solid responds at the eastern end of each arcade (altered to make a narrower additional arch in the 19th century). There are now seven arches on each side.[23]

The chancel was rebuilt about 1290 and the two-light window in the north wall is of that date (much restored) with a modern quatrefoil above. The two windows in the south wall of the chancel are probably of about 1340. The east window is modern.[24]

In the south aisle the window at the east end is of about 1300.[25] The easternmost window in the south wall is "a fine triplet of lancets",[26] "a very remarkable window"[27] and has attached and detached shafts of Purbeck marble making an open arcade of three bays. This is dated to the early 13th century.[28] The other window in this aisle (on the western side of the door) is of about 1340.[25]

Below the windows in the south aisle are four 14th-century recesses with ogee heads which once probably held tombs.[29]

At the end of the south wall of the south aisle, next to the altar, are a piscina (a shelf on which the sacred vessels were washed after Mass) and a sedile (a stone seat for the priest), both in the decorated gothic style of the 14th century but badly damaged. These were always found on the right side of an altar and show that there was an altar at the end of this aisle in the Middle Ages. This piscina has no drain but there is a stone shelf above it.[30]

In the north aisle are four modern windows from the 19th-century rebuilding of this wall, using some old materials.[31] The 14th-century door on the north side was formerly blocked but now serves as the entrance to the new parish rooms which were built at the start of the 21st century on the north side of the church.

The church originally had a tower with a spire above it, probably built in the 15th century, but this spire fell down in 1803, damaging the church and destroying a peal of bells. A new stone spire was built, octagonal in shape, and described in 1862 as covered with galvanised iron.[32] In 1907/08 a new tower and spire were built from the foundations, designed by John Oldrid Scott.[33]

• 
  The interior of the church looking east
• 
  Three lancet window in the south aisle
• 
  Piscina and sedile in south aisle
• 
  Piscina in south wall of chancel
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  North aisle
• 
  The church from the north west, showing parish rooms
• 
  The church seen from the east

In 1765 the Earl of Buckingham gave the rectory of Princes Risborough to the manor at Nutley Abbey in Long Crendon, to which it is still attached today.

The Roman Catholic Church of St Teresa of the Child Jesus

This domed church, on the corner of the Aylesbury Road and New Road, was designed by Giuseppe Rinvolucri and built in 1937/38. Pevsner & Williamson explain that in plan it is a triangle interpenetrating a hexagon, with an apse in the middle of each side of the triangle.[34]

Inside the church there are two painted ceramic statues, of St Teresa of Lisieux and St Joseph, by Richard Guino. The altar relief is also by him. The Stations of the Cross are timber reliefs (1990/1) by Stephen Foster, which Pevsner & Williamson considered of high quality. An altar rail (1957) by Rosamund Fletcher now serves as a screen to St Teresa's chapel.[35]

The Baptist church, off Bell Street, with its own burial ground, dates from 1804/5. It is built of flint with brick dressings with arched windows and has a hipped slated roof. The interior has galleries on three sides with the original baptistery under one of them.[36]

The history of the Baptists in Princes Risborough began about 1701, when some members of the General Baptist church at Ford (later moved to Cuddington) seceded for doctrinal reasons and established a Particular Baptist meeting there. A meeting house was erected in 1707. (The Particular or Peculiar Baptists were closer to Calvinism than the General Baptists)[37] After the present building had been erected in 1804/5, it was extended and re-arranged in 1814. The galleries were enlarged in 1833 and a vestry was added in 1871.[38]

In the mid-20th century two sides were rendered with pebble-dash and a new entrance and porch added in the front. Extensive additions with additional rooms have been made later, adjoining the original building.

In medieval times, from the 13th to the 15th centuries, Manor House was a building on the south western side of the church surrounded by an earthen rampart and a moat, most of the site being now occupied by the Mount car park (the area was formerly known as the Mount). Only the base of some of the walls remained from the old building and these were partially excavated in 1955 before the car park was constructed.[39] The remains of the building lie under the far side of the car park (farthest from the church) extending from north west to south east, parallel with the fence at the end. The whole building was about 150 feet long with a minimum width of 15 feet. Most of the remains had been pillaged for building material over the centuries and there was only time for a partial excavation in 1955, with the result that the excavator could only reach provisional conclusions about the nature of the building and the uses of the rooms.

Most of the remaining walls were 1 foot high or less and of dry-set flint and chalk. They were only 1 foot to 1 foot 6 inches in width (with offsets) in shallow foundation trenches. The excavator thought that the upper part of the walls were probably made of wychert, a local building material still existing in some buildings particularly at Haddenham and consisting of chalk mud mixed with straw which would set very solid. The roofs may have been partly thatched but part must have been tiled, because a fair number of roofing tiles were found spread over the site. Looking at the building from the church side, the excavator thought that on the left was probably a two-storey building which would have been the accommodation reserved for the lord of the manor. The room on the first floor would have been the "great chamber" serving as bedroom and sitting room. The great hall probably extended in front of this part of the building towards the church, but this was not found or excavated. On the right of this room was probably the kitchen and beyond that more living accommodation, perhaps for the steward, with a smaller hall extending in front of it. This was roughly in the centre of the building. The excavator considered whether this might be the great hall but thought it probably too small. Beyond it to the right was a range of single storey rooms.

The remainder of the area could not be excavated, but trial holes indicated that most of it may have been paved with cobbles.

The only positive evidence of date was a somewhat worn penny of Edward I, struck at the Bristol mint in 1280/1, which might have been lost at any time up to about 1300. The majority of the pottery found was datable to the 14th century.

The indications were that the buildings were first erected in the 13th century, perhaps in the reign of Henry III (1207–72), that they were in use throughout the 14th century (Edward II, the Prince of Wales during the reign of Edward III and Richard II) but went out of use at the end of that century or in the early 15th century.

Another building may have been erected on some part of the site at a later date, because there are documentary references to such a building in the reign of Elizabeth I and its remains are said to have been demolished around 1800, but there is no certain information about this.

The Manor House (formerly Brook House) in 2010

The house now known as the Manor House stands opposite the east end of the church.[40] It was formerly known as Brook or Brooke House and the name was only changed in the late 19th century[41]

The house is first mentioned (as Broke House) in the reign of Elizabeth I in a grant dated 1589, but this was an earlier building, though some parts of it are incorporated in the present house. Arthur Oswald thought that the interior wall parallel to the front outside wall and fireplaces in two of the bedrooms may come from the Elizabethan house. The house was substantially enlarged and rebuilt in the mid-17th century.

Inigo Jones had brought the classical renaissance style to England in the early 17th century. His followers took the new classical style into the country, characterised by its symmetry and proportion and such classical elements as pilasters, while wide eaves took the place of a cornice. Often a bricklayer would also be the principal contractor, controlling the other trades, and he could avoid the necessity to employ a mason for stonework if he could produce the classical elements in brick.[42] So in this house we have brick pilasters, one above the other, with capitals and bases shaped in brickwork.[43] The rebuilding seems to have been carried out in two stages, though without a long gap between them. There is a straight joint in the brickwork to the left of the second pilaster on the north side. In front of this the bricks are laid in English bond, but Flemish bond is used towards the back, indicating that this part was built a little later.

The Manor House (then Brook House) in the 1840s from Lipscomb's History of the County of Buckingham (1847)

The house is built of red brick with two storeys and an attic. The frontage has five windows, widely spaced and separated by brick pilasters in two orders corresponding to the ground and first floors. Originally there was a large central attic window of 'Dutch' type (as can be seen in the woodcut from Lipscomb's History of the County of Buckingham (1847)). This was replaced by three dormer windows in the late 19th century.

Inside the house the staircase and some of the panelling and fireplaces in the hall and drawing room date from the 17th-century re-building. The oak staircase opens at the back of the hall through a 17th-century arch and ascends two storeys round a square well. Arthur Oswald describes it as of Jacobean type but likely to have been made by a country joiner at the time of the Commonwealth or Charles II. Pevsner & Williamson, who call it "spectacular", describe it as made in the mid-17th century but in the strapwork tradition.

Detail showing the 17th-century brick pilasters and the (later) front door

Detail of the capital of the pilaster (17th century brickwork)

Arthur Oswald thought that the entrance doorway and sash windows were probably 18th-century alterations made in Georgian times, but Pevsner and Williamson think they might be part of Lord Rothschild's alterations in 1886.

By the mid-19th century the house was very dilapidated and part was being used for storing grain. Lord Rothschild bought it in the 1880s and arranged for it to be renovated and put into repair. This work started in 1886, but there is no record of exactly what was done. It was probably after the completion of this work that the name was changed to the Manor House. In 1926 later members of the Rothschild family gave the house to the National Trust and it was then further modernised under the direction of the Society for the Preservation of Ancient Buildings. It is usually let to a tenant and some rooms can be seen by prior appointment.

Several books[44] say that Sir Peter Lely lived in Princes Risborough at Brook House and that he bought the house in 1671. This is not likely to be true. Lely was a wealthy and fashionable London painter (court painter from 1661), very busy, with a house at Covent Garden, where he had an impressive collection of pictures. Samuel Pepys, after visiting him in 1667, wrote that he was a "mighty proud man.....and full of state." It is highly improbable that such a man would have chosen or indeed would have been able to live in a small village in the Chilterns, 40 miles from London. He had more work in London than he could easily manage. His wife died in childbirth in 1674 and was buried at St Pauls, Covent Garden, where Lely himself was buried after his death in 1680. His estate comprised his house in Covent Garden and investment properties in Surrey and Lincolnshire. No biography of the painter mentions a house at Princes Risborough.[45]

This story came from a misunderstanding of a transaction in 1671, when he was recorded as purchasing a "fee farm rent" issuing out of the Manor of Princes Risborough. This was a perpetual rentcharge or ground rent secured on the rents and profits of the manor (not the Manor House, which was then Brook House). In other words, it was like a financial instrument securing an annual income. He would have bought it as an investment and would have received the income at stated intervals. It is very unlikely that he ever went near Princes Risborough himself.[46]

The history of the railways at Princes Risborough is both complicated and interesting.[64]

At the start of the Railway Age the nearest station was Maidenhead on the main Great Western line. The service from Paddington to Maidenhead started in 1838 and reached Bristol in 1841. In 1846 the Wycombe Railway Company was incorporated and built a single track broad gauge line to connect Maidenhead to High Wycombe via Cookham and Bourne End. This opened on 1 August 1854 and the line was then continued north to Princes Risborough and Thame en route for Oxford.

From 1862 it became possible to travel from Princes Risborough to London in a train which started at Thame (later Oxford, when the line was completed) and went on to London Paddington through Princes Risborough, High Wycombe, Bourne End and Maidenhead. Although the line was built by the Wycombe Railway Company, the service was operated by the Great Western Railway. At that date the journey to London from Risborough took about 2 hours 40 minutes.

Another branch line from Princes Risborough to Aylesbury, which the Wycombe Railway Company had started to build in 1861, opened for traffic on 1 October 1863. Thereafter passengers from either Oxford or Aylesbury could reach Paddington via Princes Risborough, Wycombe and Maidenhead, but the majority of the through trains ran between Paddington and Oxford. In 1867 the Great Western Railway took over the Wycombe Railway Company. All lines were converted to standard gauge between 1868 and 1870. In 1872 a new line, built by the Watlington and Princes Risborough Railway Company, opened between Princes Risborough and Watlington. There were three trains in each direction daily. This line was taken over by the Great Western in 1883. The Metropolitan Railway opened a main line from Baker Street to Aylesbury in 1892, providing an alternative route between London and Princes Risborough via Aylesbury.

In 1899 the Great Central Railway arranged to join with the Great Western to construct a new route to London and built Marylebone station as its terminus. A new line, built by the Great Western Railway, ran from Paddington via Gerrards Cross and Beaconsfield to High Wycombe and thence to Princes Risborough. The single track line between High Wycombe and Princes Risborough was upgraded to a double track. Because of the gradient the new Up line followed a different route (with a short tunnel at Saunderton) from the existing single track, which became the Down line (with a few changes because of the gradient or for other reasons). The Great Central built a new line from Marylebone to join this railway at South Ruislip (then called Northolt Junction). These direct routes between Princes Risborough and London were working from 2 April 1906, though at first the trains still ran on to Oxford beyond Risborough. The line to Bicester followed later in 1910. The journey time to London was reduced to between an hour and an hour and a half.

For the next 40 years and more Princes Risborough was a busy junction with two large signal boxes and trains coming in from London Marylebone, London Paddington via Beaconsfield, London Paddington via Maidenhead (a few trains still used this route until 1970), Bicester and the North, Aylesbury, Oxford and Watlington. In the 1930s, 29 men were employed at the station. The railways were nationalised in 1948 and in the 1950s these lines started to close. The Watlington line, due to decline in numbers, withdrew passenger services on 1 June 1957, though the line from Princes Risborough was retained so that goods trains could serve the cement works and wood yard in Chinnor. On 20 December 1989, the final goods train travelled the line, road transport having taken over from the railway. The railway was then declared ‘non-operational’. The line through Bourne End to Maidenhead closed in 1970.[65]

Diesel trains replaced steam locomotives on the main line in 1961. The Down platform at Princes Risborough and the passenger bridge were demolished and there was only a single track through the station from 1968 until 1998. At the same time Marylebone Station was being threatened with closure and for several years almost all trains ran to and from Paddington.

Upon privatisation in 1996 the line through Risborough was taken over by Chiltern Railways, who funded an extensive series of upgrades. In 1998 they re-built the Down platform and constructed a new footbridge at their own expense, restoring full working with a much more frequent service. On 5 September 2011 the Chiltern Mainline project went live. This was a £250 million investment and the largest privately led investment in passenger railway infrastructure since before the second world war.[66] This has reduced the time taken by trains between London and Risborough; in the December 2011 timetable trains can take as little as 31 minutes (the majority taking 35 to 40 minutes).

Maintenance of the branch from Chinnor to the junction with the Thame branch near Princes Risborough was given to the Chinnor and Princes Risborough Railway Association from January 1990.[67] In July 1994, the Association was granted a Transport and Works Order under section 6 of the Transport and Works Act 1992.[68] This allowed the line to be run as a heritage railway, staffed and maintained by volunteers. Following the T&W Order, the line began carrying passengers in August 1994, and was extended to start of Thame railway by 1996.[69] In 2013, the Association began a project to restore the Princes Risborough North signal box, which had been a Grade II listed building since its closure in 1991.[70] This culminated in August 2018 with the re-opening of Platform 4 at Princes Risborough station, connecting Princes Risborough to Chinnor with a limited service at weekends as part of the heritage railway's operations.

Princes Risborough is served primarily by the 300 Arriva Shires & Essex service which alternates between High Wycombe and Aylesbury on a quarter-hourly basis (Mondays to Saturdays) and hourly on Sundays and Bank Holidays. Other services include Redline Buses' 321 service between High Wycombe and Aylesbury (with some services terminating in Risborough) which operates weekdays every two hours; Redline's 320 service which serves as a rail link between Princes Risborough railway station and Chinnor during peak hours; Arriva's 120 and 121 which serve twice a day between Thame and Risborough and Z&S's 113 which serves between Risborough and Oakley on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Princes Risborough is also served by the Risborough Area Community Bus (RACB) which serves the villages surrounding Risborough including Longwick, Monks Risborough, Speen, Bledlow, Bledlow Ridge and Little Kimble.[71]