Old Bradwell was described in 1927 as a scattered village with the church at its southern end and the Manor Farm a little to the north (VCH). Nowadays most of the village has been absorbed by the building of Milton Keynes, but the church stands on the edge of the residential area in North Loughton Valley Park, a long green area following the line of the Loughton Brook. The church consists of a nave with a S aisle and N porch, a chancel and a saddleback W tower with a modern annexe on the N side of it. The oldest parts are late -12thc or early-13thc, and the church was heavily restored in 1868 and by E.Swinfen Harris in 1903. Construction is of limestone rubble with ashlar facings. The only Romanesque sculpture is in the S arcade.

The Domesday Survey records 3 holdings in Bradwell. In 1086 William held 2 hides and 3 virgates from Miles Crispin; Walter Hackett held 1½ hides from Walter Giffard; and William fitzAnsculf held 3 virgates himself, which his father had unjustly taken from William of Cholsey according to the men of the Hundred. Not of these holdings mention a church or a priest.

The church belonged to Miles Crispin’s manor. By 1151-54 the tenant of part of the estate was William de Bayeux while the remainder was held first by the family of Bradwell, and by the late 12thc by the Barrys. The earliest mention of the advowson of the church dates from the 12thc, when it was shared between the Bayeux and Bradwell family. These two bestowed it on Newport or Tickford Priory around the middle of that century.

While the flat-leaf forms of pier 1 appear as early as 1170 elsewhere, and the plain responds might seem to be earlier still, the gothic trefoils and stiff leaf of pier 2 indicate a date after 1200 for the arcade, as does the arch form. Pevsner (1960 and 1994) offer c.1200 for the arcade, and the EH list description prefers early 13thc.