In 1804 a survey of the Guild Chapel noted that its principal timbers were severely decayed and recommended the replacement of the roof with a new oak structure, consisting of a 'cove ceiling and plain cornice around' (SCLA BRU15/18/52; BRU15/18/76). The restoration that followed this report resulted in the re-facing of the south and east walls of the chancel, which the contemporary antiquarian, Robert Wheler (1814, 53), described as having been 'injudiciously modernized'. However, the work also involved the stripping of plaster in the Chapel interior, which brought to light the sequence of the Holy Cross covering the north and south walls of the chancel, a Doom, or Last Judgement, over the chancel arch , and a series of saints in the alcoves of the nave and on the west wall which had been partitioned to form 'a kind of antechapel ... lately parted off from the nave by a screen which had previously separated the nave from the chancel' (Wheler 1814, 54). Unfortunately, despite the significance of these discoveries, the paintings in the chancel were destroyed and the remaining paintings in the nave whitewashed over (Wheler 1806, 97-98). The work also resulted in the alteration of the pitch of the nave roof, which effectively decapitated the image of Christ sitting on a rainbow over the Doom.
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