A monks’ chapel on the village green
In 1415 Henry V gave the Carthusian priory of Sheen, his new foundation in Surrey, an estate at East Hendred, together with the right to a weekly market and two fairs there. The monks built a small chapel on the village green, dedicated to Jesus of Bethlehem, so that a priest could serve their tenants. Historic England and the Victoria County History date the chapel to the early 15th century; the East Hendred Heritage Trust gives the date as 1453. A timber-framed house for the priest was added against its north side later in the 15th century. The market never flourished and had disappeared by the Dissolution.
From chapel to bakehouse
After the Reformation the chapel fell out of religious use. It takes its present name from the Champ family, who held it in the early 18th century, when the upper part was used as a pigeon-house and the lower part as a bakehouse and wash-house. In the late 19th or early 20th century its owner, George Dunn, had it cleared and repaired. For many years it served as a village hall.
The building
The chapel is a small rectangular building of rough ashlar with a steep tiled roof. There is a three-light traceried window at the east end and square-headed windows with cusped lights in the side walls. Inside, a 15th-century oak screen crosses the building, and the western part is floored over to make an upper room that connected with the priest’s house. The roof has arched braces and curved wind-braces. The priest’s house has a half-timbered gable with carved bargeboards; it was extended in about 1690. The whole group is listed at Grade I.
Visiting
The chapel is now the Hendred Museum, run entirely by volunteers of the East Hendred Heritage Trust. It shows a changing selection of the trust’s collection of village objects, pictures, documents and photographs, and the village’s 19th-century fire engine is kept separately. The trust publishes its 2026 opening as Saturday and Sunday afternoons, 2.30pm to 4.30pm, from Easter Sunday to the end of October, with visits at other times on request. Admission is free, with donations welcome. The chapel stands in Chapel Square off the High Street; park considerately in the village.
Nearby
Hendred House, home of the Eyston family, is just to the south, and the parish church of St Augustine is a short walk away. Scutchamer Knob lies on the Ridgeway above the village.