The parish of Brighstone or Brixton, the old variant spellings are almost endless, was originally a chapelry of the adjoining parish of Calbourne.  Even after it had secured a certain degree of independence and the incumbent was termed rector, various disputes arose through the claims of Calbourne, which were not settled until about the middle of the 14th century.

The church of St. Mary, pleasantly situated in an attractive churchyard on the roadside between Mottistone and Shorwell, was first built in the last quarter of the 12th century.  It consists of chancel with south chapel, nave with north and south aisles, south porch and west tower with low spire.  A wholesale “restoration” was effected in 1852, on a scale which was singularly destructive of its old features.  The narrow north aisle, which had been pulled and the arcade built up in the 16th century, was opened out and re-erected. Imitation Norman windows were given to the renewed aisle; these were arranged in couples, a method never, so far as I know, adopted in that style, and calculated to deceive architectural students.  The arcade of three arches of normal width is supported on two circular piers with similar responds.  The arches are pointed, and it presents the general appearance of Transitional Norman work.  A narrow lancet window, to light the pulpit, was mischievously inserted at the east end of this arcade, but of genuine Early English work of the 13th century there is no trace in the body of the church.  The four big lancets in the north wall of the chancel also form part of the deceptive rebuilding of 1852.  To complete the falsification of the true story of the fabric, large decorated windows, imitative of the work of the second half of the 14th century, were inserted throughout the rest of the church in the place of good perpendicular windows of the 15th century.

The lower stage of the tower is 14th century, but here again the destruction of history in stone was further carried out in 1852, for the restorers moved an Early English doorway from the body of the church and rebuilt it in the west wall of the tower.  The low octagonal spire only dates from 1720.

In the 15th century angle buttresses were added to the tower, and the upper stages built or rebuilt.  Towards the end of this century, or in beginning of the 16th century, the south aisle was widened, possibly to find better accommodation for the tenants of Limerstone on the suppression of the small religious house on that manor.  The chancel was also rebuilt about this period, and a chapel added on the south side by the owner of Waytes Court.

In the interior of this much falsified church are several interesting features.  In the west face of the pier nearest the west end of the south arcade is a fair-sized image niche.  At the east end of the south aisle are traces of the stairs to the rood-loft, but this part was “barbarously treated” in 1852.  In the south aisle altar by the side of the stairs, the piscina for the aisle alter of the Holy Ghost is preserved, and above it two 16th century memorial tablets.  The pulpit is a fair specimen of Jacobean work; it is known from the churchwarden accounts to have cost £5.  The font, of late 15th century style, is, I believe, of the restoration date.  A small squint from the tower into the nave, now filled with wooden tracery, was doubtless inserted to enable a ringer to duly sound the Sanctus bell at mass.

The churchwarden accounts begin in 1566.  The list of church goods, which appear year by throughout most of Elizabeth’s reign, begins with “One Sans Bell”.  These entries show that the Sanctus Bell, probably hanging in the steeple, was preserved during this period and very likely used, as elsewhere, as a sermon bell on the exceptional occasions when a sermon was preached.

Allusion has been made I the introduction to three rectors of Brighstone, who subsequently became distinguished bishops.  Ken’s first biographer justly names Brighstone as “a cheerful little village on the sunny side of the Isle of Wight, sheltered from the cold winds by overhanging hills, with a goodly church and a near prospect of the sea”.

Transcribed from “County Churches by J Charles Cox, LL.D., F.S.A. Pub. 1911.