Christ Church Melplash Church Melplash Church (Christ Church)

CHRIST CHURCH

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Overview

Heritage Category:
Listed Building
Grade:
II*
List Entry Number:
1287858
Date first listed:
31-Jul-1984
List Entry Name:
Christ Church Melplash Church Melplash Church (Christ Church)
Statutory Address:
CHRIST CHURCH
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Date:
1999-10-13
Reference:
IOE01/00014/01
Rights:
© Mr Ken Venton-Prentice. Source: Historic England Archive

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:
Listed Building
Grade:
II*
List Entry Number:
1287858
Date first listed:
31-Jul-1984
List Entry Name:
Christ Church Melplash Church Melplash Church (Christ Church)
Statutory Address 1:
CHRIST CHURCH
Statutory Address 2:
MELPLASH CHURCH
Statutory Address 3:
MELPLASH CHURCH (CHRIST CHURCH)

The scope of legal protection for listed buildings

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

The scope of legal protection for listed buildings

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

Location

Statutory Address:
CHRIST CHURCH
Statutory Address:
MELPLASH CHURCH
Statutory Address:
MELPLASH CHURCH (CHRIST CHURCH)

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

District:
Dorset (Unitary Authority)
Parish:
Netherbury
National Grid Reference:
SY 48445 97552

Details

SY 49 NE NETHERBURY MELPLASH

7/138 Melplash Church (Christ Church)

GV II*

Church in neo-Romanesque style. 1845-6 by Benjamin Ferrey for James Bandinel, in memory of his father Dr. Bandinel, vicar of Netherbury and Beaminster. Cruciform with apsidal Chancel, North vestry, Central Tower, North and South Transepts, Nave and South Porch. Local rubble walls, with Ham Hall stone dressings. Slate and lead roofs. All the openings have moulded round heads and most of the jambs have attached shafts with scalloped capitals and moulded bases. Chancel : 2 pilaster buttresses to full height of apse and a stepped corbel table under the eaves. Apse has five small single-light windows. Vestry: apsidal east end and a billet- moulded eaves cornice. The east window and north door with nail- head enrichment. North door, plank with a round head. Central tower, one stage above the crossing. Each face with a main arch enclosing two tall windows and flanked by recesses. Round sinkings above. Square tower stair projects in the angle between the south transept and nave. Transepts, north and south walls of 3 stages. South transept has a doorway of 2 enriched orders, with shafted jambs and roll-mould heads. Nave: of 4 bays, windows with heads shaped to a broad trefoil. Pilaster buttresses with inverted, scalloped ogee capitals. West wall is in three stages. South Porch: moulded parapet and small engaged shafts at the angles. Entrance arch is of 3 plain orders with shafted jambs and 2 rolls. Interior: chancel- roof, arch-bracing to a transverse collar on the chord of the apse. Nave roof: high arch-braced collar, springing from short hammer- posts, ashlaring at wall-plate. (Now used as Hall and Badminton Court and screened off.) Crossing with coupled shafts and scallop capitals, in each direction, with spur bases. Fittings: Brasses on the south wall of the south transept 1) date of building and directing that all seats to be free. 2) Containing quotations from Chronicles, ch. 29, vv. lO, 14, 18. Font: Cl9, stone, similar to the Cl2 font at Whitchurch Canonicorum. Source: R.C.H.M. Dorset I, p 172 (2). Dorset County Chronicle, 22nd May, 1845.

Listing NGR: SY4844597552

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:
401211
Legacy System:
LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Inventory of Dorset I West, (1952), 172
Dorset County Chronicle in 22 May, (1845)

Legal

This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.

Ordnance survey map of Christ Church Melplash Church Melplash Church (Christ Church)

Map

This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale. This copy shows the entry on 09-Jun-2026 at 05:46:57.

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© Crown copyright [and database rights] 2026. OS AC0000815036. Use of this mapping is subject to Terms and Conditions.

End of official list entry

All text content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0 , except where otherwise stated. Any supplied maps are © Crown Copyright [and database rights] 2026 OS AC0000815036 and may not be reproduced without permission.

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