St Thomas the Martyr's Church, Oxford

St Thomas the Martyr’s Church stands beside Oxford railway station in the Osney district, between Becket Street and Hollybush Row. Founded in the 12th century and dedicated to Thomas Becket, the building still shows parts of its original design. Substantial changes were made in the 17th and 19th centuries, yet traces of the medieval structure remain. The church played a key part in the Oxford Movement, hosting daily services and ritualist practices such as altar candles and Eucharistic vestments. Leaders like Edward Bouverie Pusey and John Mason Neale preached here, and the early Tractarians were closely linked to St Thomas’s. In 1847 the vicar Thomas Chamberlain founded a sisterhood to help the poor of the slum parish. Inside, the nave has 15th-century windows and buttresses, while the chancel ceiling, decorated by C. E. Kempe, features gold stars on a blue ground. The south porch bears the arms of Dr Robert Burton, who enlarged the church in the 17th century. A 1705 candelabrum hangs in the chancel, and the tower displays the royal arms of William IV. The churchyard holds Combe House, once a school, and the remains of the 1886 Sisterhood buildings.