Crawley Old Town: TWENTY FOUR PICTURES: St Johns Church

St John the Baptist's Church is the oldest building in the town centre, dating from the 13th century, although many alterations have been made since, and only one wall remains of the ancient building.

When Crawley first started to develop as a village in the 13th century, it was in the parish of Slaugham. As the new village was distant from the parish church at Slaugham (St Mary's), several miles south, a stone church was built as a chapel of ease. It is known to have existed before 1267, when it was passed on in a will, and it was still the daughter church of Slaugham in 1291; but by the early 15th century it was referred to as a "free" church and a "permanent chantry". The parish of Crawley was therefore established separate from Slaugham at some point, probably by the end of the 14th century, and St John the Baptist's was regarded as its parish church by the 1540's.

The first additions to the structure came in the 15th century, when a tall tower was added at the western end, the windows in the nave were enlarged and a rood screen was installed between the chancel and the nave. The nave roof was also rebuilt at this time, and the earliest surviving memorial carvings and stones in the church are also 15th-century.

By the 16th century, Crawley's development into a thriving market village meant that its parish was much more important than that of Slaugham, and the connection between their two churches was legally severed. At least 150 people regularly attended the church, but its income was modest and priests frequently moved on to richer parishes and the building fell into disrepair in the 17th and 18th centuries.

Major changes took place in the 19th century. The tower partially rebuilt and heightened by 1814, although the original stone was reused. Some more work took place in 1845, but the greatest changes happened in 1879 and 1880. A new north aisle was added, a porch was built on the north side and the chancel was completely rebuilt.

The church is built of Sussex limestone. The chancel roof is tiled, but the rest of the church is roofed with slabs of local stone. The south wall of the nave is original, although it has some 15th-century alterations; the nave ceiling is also from this era, and features wind bracing and tie beams. The tower, rebuilt in the 19th century, is in three stages and features mediaeval carvings. The pulpit is 17th-century; the altar rails are from that century or early in the 18th. There is some stained glass in the 19th-century north aisle and the east end of the chancel. The oldest internal fixture is the marble font, which is 13th-century.