some of the earlier structure was damaged. It was repaired in 1608. The present church has flint walls with stone dressings and stepped buttresses, a plinth, and corbelled tracer lights in the nave. The west tower was rebuilt in 1890 and has diagonal buttresses with an elaborate arrangement of steps (some with gabled ornamentation), and at the top is a timber turret, surmounted by a broach spire. A small mural monument at the south-east of the chancel is to Nicholas Holdip, "pastor of the parish" in 1606, and his wife Alicia (Gilbert). The north aisle wall contains another mural tablet dedicated to "Robert Hunt of Hall Place in this Parish", 1671, with the arms, Azure a bend between two water bougets or with three leopards' heads gules on the bend. The crest is a talbot sitting chained to a halberd. There are four bells; the treble and second by Joseph Carter, 1601, the third by Henry Knight, 1615, and the tenor by Joseph Carter, 1607. The church celebrated the coronation of King George V by adding a clock to the building. It became a Grade II* listed building on 31 July 1963. Memorials In Elizabethan times, the poet and writer George Wither (1588–1667) was born in Bentworth and baptised in St Mary's church. In Victorian times, the author George Cecil Ives lived at the post-1832 Bentworth Hall with his mother Emma Gordon-Ives. A memorial to the Ives family is in the churchyard close to the school and has a stone slab for George Ives that reads "George Cecil Ives MA, author, 1867–1950, Late of Bentworth Hall." The stone slab for his mother reads "The Honourable Emma, wife of J.R. Ives, Daughter of Viscount Maynard Lord Lieutenant of Essex, died March 14, 1896 aged 84." The Hankin Family Tomb in the churchyard, was Grade II listed in 2005. It was made in 1816 of Portland stone and is a "rectangular chest tomb on a moulded base, with a two-part cover consisting of a low hipped top slab and lower moulded cornice." The panels at the sides contain various inscriptions including the one on the south panel which reads: "Sacred to the memory of John Hankin who departed this life January 12, 1816, aged 55 years", and the one on the north side which reads: "Sacred to the memory of Elizabeth, widow of John Hankin, who departed this life September 13, 1831,