Chilton Candover is a small village of a few houses and a farm on the B3046 linking Basingstoke and New Alresford in the Basingstoke and Deane district of Hampshire, some 9 miles NE of Winchester. The ruined church of St Nicholas stands alongside a farmyard reached by a track running N off the road through the village. The church was demolished in 1876, leaving only a crypt, which was excavated in 1927 according to a plaque on the S wall. It is entered from the W, via a flight of modern steps. The medieval fabric consists of a plain chancel arch, a short square chancel and an apse with a plain apse arch. The entrance area has been rebuilt in brick, and the roof covered with lead sheeting but the tops of two round-headed lancets are visible among vegetation that covers the S wall.

In 1086 Chilton Candover was held by Richer from the Bishop of Winchester. This Richer is presumed to be Richer de Andely, since the de Andely family held the manor from the mid-12thc. until the 15thc., their name changing to Daundley. The advowson of the church remained with successive Lords of the Manor throughout the period. No church is mentioned in the Domesday Survey, but evidence from the fabric dates it to the 12thc. at the latest.

The church appears on the OS map surveyed in 1872, marked as 'disused'. It is said to have been pulled down in 1876 (VCH; List Description), and no image of it has been found by this author. The crypt was discovered on the site in 1927, the 1911 VCH description recording that 'nothing now remains but the graves and tombstones' on the site. The discovery was made by the Rector, Rev. E. P. Gough, on the basis of childhood memories of an elderly parishioner who remembered entering the crypt 'when a boy through a hole in the ground and kicking skulls about'. Early notices of the discovery (Shields Daily News) give little detail, but in later descriptions published when a service was held on the site in 1935 (New Milton Advertiser) more detail is included, like the old man's name (Mr. Spiers), and the story he was told by his father of the existence of a golden calf buried nearby, suggesting to some that the crypt was an ancient Mithraic site. No golden calf has yet been discovered.

In 1911 the VCH reported that nothing remained on the site but the graves and tombstones, the church having been pulled down in 1876. The arcading on the font bowl is of an unusual type, almost like a row of vertical flat leaves carved in relief. Thus the segmental head of each arch projects slightly from the face of the bowl, A similar treatment may be seen on the font at Barton Stacey, 10 miles to the W.