Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Baldock

The Church of St Mary the Virgin stands in the centre of Baldock, a small town in North Hertfordshire. Built of flint rubble with stone dressings, it has a west tower coated in Roman cement topped by a lead spire and a gold cockerel weathervane. The church was begun by the Knights Templar around 1150 and largely rebuilt by the Knights Hospitaller about 180 years later. It is a Grade I listed building and contains fragments of the original 12th-century fabric in the east end of the chancel. The church holds notable silverware including the Byrd Chalice, hallmarked 1569 and named after the rector Josias Byrd who served for 49 years. In June 1647 Byrd gave Charles I a drink from this chalice as the king passed through Baldock under escort. The church also preserves a 17th-century cup and cover paten, and the Rev. John Smith, rector from 1832 to 1870, produced the first complete transcription of Samuel Pepys’s Diary. Inside, the church consists of a chancel, north and south chapels, nave, aisles, west tower and porches, all with embattled parapets. The south chapel, begun in the late 14th century, contains a 13th-century piscina and sedilia, while the south aisle has three 15th-century windows and a restored Victorian porch. The nave’s 14th-century arcades support a 15th-century clerestory with seven windows on each side, and the roof rests on carved corbels. The north chapel holds a 17th-century communion table and a 14th-century piscina, and a 19th-century statue of the Virgin and Child by Sir William Reid Dick.