A Brief History of St Peter’s Parish Church There has been a church dedicated to St Peter on this site from the early 800s. The earlier building fell into disrepair in the early 1400s and was rebuilt in the Perpendicular style between about 1452 and 1460 by the Abbot of Winchcombe and the townspeople with the encouragement and support of Ralph Boteler, Lord of Sudeley. He arranged for his father and elder brothers to be reburied in the chapel at the east end of the new St Peter’s, and provided them with carved effigies. They were also portrayed in the stained glass of the side windows; his sisters and presumably his mother were portrayed in the chapel on the north side. The new church was almost certainly the first here to be provided with seating, as the clergy responded to the challenge of the radical reformist movement of the Lollards with more instructive sermons. Embroidered panels from the new vestments acquired at that time have survived and are displayed in a cabinet in the north aisle. Not long after this rebuilding the Church entered a period of great turbulence as part of the English Reformation in the reign of Henry VIII (1509 - 1547). The most dramatic change was the suppression of Winchcombe Abbey in 1539, following which all of the Abbey’s (and the Abbot’s) possessions and income were transferred into lay hands. As the Abbot was also the Rector of St Peter’s, this meant much of the income that had financed St Peter’s dried up and the church was left impoverished for centuries. At the same time a translation of the Bible into English was introduced into all churches, followed shortly afterwards by the first version of the Book of Common Prayer. Relics and pictures encouraging ‘idolatry’ were removed. Change continued in the reign of Henry VIII’s son Edward VI (1547-1553). More info at https://winchcombeparish.org.uk/a-brief-history-of-st-peters-parish-church.php
