Ockbrook is a village about five miles E of Derby. The church lies to the S of the village and consists of a wide nave, a N aisle built in 1814, a S aisle added in 1835, a chancel rebuilt by Thomas Pares in 1803, a S porch, and a W tower surmounted by a low spire. Almost certainly in the 12thc there was a chapel possessing rights of baptism, as proved by the surviving Norman font, the key Romanesque feature of this site. The oldest part of the church is the W tower, dating to the 12thc.

The Domesday Survey records that in 1066 the manor of 'Ochebroc' was held by Toki, son of Auti; in 1086 it passed under the lordship of Geoffrey Alselin, and valued £2. From the first decades of the 12thc Ockbrook was held by Ralph Halselin and his descendants; the church was granted to Shelford Priory (Nottinghamshire) by his founder Ralph Halselin.

John Charles Cox (1879), 207, says that the font is 'after the fashion of the one at Somersall Herbert (Derbyshire)'.