ALTON'S All Saints Church has been confirmed by the Secretary of State for the Department for Culture, Media and Sport as a Grade II Listed Building. The listing of the High Victorian parish church in Butts Road was confirmed as a building of architectural and historic interest under the Planning (Listed Building and Conservation Areas) Act 1990. Built of polygonal Selborne malmstone with Bathstone ashlar dressings and sporting steeply pitched clay plain tile roofs with terracotta ridge tiles, All Saints was designed in 1873/4 by Frederick Charles Dyer of London in Early English style. The nave, north and south transepts and chancel were built at a cost of £3,163 13s, raised by public subscription. William Dyer gave the site, valued at £150, along with stone from his Selborne quarry for the building of the church. Work commenced on Easter Monday and the foundation stone was laid on July 18, 1873 by Sir Roundell Palmer, First Earl of Selborne, while he was Lord Chancellor. The work was completed and the church dedicated on December 23, 1874 by Bishop Harold Browne. The vestry was added in 1878 on the north side of the nave and the south west tower and spire followed in 1881. The interior is of plastered walls with boarded arch braced roof supported on stone corbels to the nave. There are seven stained glass windows, six dated 1874 and the other 1890. The church boasts original wooden pews with a trefoil design in the bench ends, an 1874 octagonal Caen stone font, a hexagonal wooden pulpit dated 1892, a wrought iron chancel screen on a stone base dated 1894, an 1885 organ and elaborately carved choir stalls. The building is described by the Secretary of State as "a well executed and unaltered Early English style High Victorian parish church of good quality stonework with impressive tower capped with broach spire, which is a local landmark, and with complete interior fittings." Commenting on the listing, vicar of All Saints Father Paul Barlow said that the listing recognises "the distinctive exterior of the building and its place in the townscape". In paying tribute to East Hampshire District Council and to all those people in the church, both current and in the past, who have worked so hard to get the church listed, Father Barlow said that he hoped All Saints would benefit from listed building status exemption from paying VAT on repair work. "It might help with the need to raise a substantial amount of money towards the re- roofing of the nave," said the vicar who believed the work would cost in the region of £70k. The need to raise yet more money comes hard on the heals of a major funding raising appeal to replace the church bells, spearheaded by Derek and Rosemary Shutler who have raised in excess of £40k for the project. Ordered but yet to be cast, the new bells are due to be installed by spring 2006.
