All Saints' Church, Southampton
| All Saints' Church | |
|---|---|
 All Saints' Church with neighbouring shops (and East Street in between) in 1852 | |
  Shown within Southampton | |
| Former names | All Hallows' Church |
| General information | |
| Status | Destroyed |
| Type | Church |
| Location | Southampton City Centre |
| Address | High Street, Southampton |
| Construction started | Spring 1792 |
| Completed | 1795 |
| Destroyed | 30 November / 1 December 1940 |
| Design and construction | |
| Architect(s) | John Reveley |
All Saints' Church was a church building in Southampton City Centre, located on the corner of the High Street and East Street, a short distance south of the Bargate.[1] The building dated from the 1790s when it replaced an earlier church building, known as All Hallows, the date of origin of which unknown[2] but was believed to date from medieval times.[3] All Saints was heavily damaged in the Southampton Blitz and was subsequently demolished.[3]
History
Henry II granted the land to the monks of St. Denys Priory in the 12th century for the construction of what was to become All Hallows' Church.[1] The parish registers date from 1653.[1] The original church had five bells, but three of them were stolen one night in the 17th century and never found, despite an award being offered by the Mayor of Southampton, John Speed, in the London Gazette.[1] The Great Ejection of 1662 led to a number of people being ejected from All Saints, and these went on to form what would become Above Bar Church and Avenue St Andrew's United Reformed Church.[4]
By 1791 the medieval church of All Hallows had fallen into disrepair,[1] and an act of Parliament (the All Saints Church, Southampton Act of 1791) was passed with provision to demolish the existing structure and rebuild the parish church, and to purchase land for a church yard.[5] The old building, which the Act described as "very ancient, and in a very decayed and ruinous condition",[5] was demolished that year[3] and work begun on its replacement, All Saints, in the Spring of 1792, with the foundation stone being laid on 3 August that year.[2][6] In addition to replacing the previous building, a number of neighbouring houses were demolished to make way for the new church.[2]
The foundation stone was laid by the Provincial Grand Master of the Freemasons, Thomas Dunckerley, and the ceremony was also attended by the poet laureate, Henry Pye, who wrote an ode for the ceremony.[1] The Mayor of Southampton and other dignitaries were also in attendance.[2]
The powers awarded to the church's trustees in the 1791 act for fundraising proved insufficient and another act (the All Saints Church, Southampton Act of 1793) was passed two years later to remedy this. The 1793 legislation's introduction reported that the demolition had been completed and construction of the new building was under way. The 1791 act allowed the trustees to borrow up to £5000, and to collect rates on property and rents in the parish of up to one shilling in each pound. The 1793 act allowed them to raise an additional £4000 among other provisions.[5]
The building was completed in 1795.[3] The first rector of the new church was Richard Mant, who preached a sermon when the building was consecrated in that year.[7] Mant's son, also called Richard, had been born in Southampton in 1776 and went on to become Bishop of Killaloe and Kilfenora, Bishop of Down and Connor and subsequently Bishop of Down, Connor and Dromore.[7]
A further act of Parliament was passed in 1797, after the new building had been constructed and furnished, allowing the trustees to raise up to £4000 more and increasing the percentage they could collect from properties in the parish to one shilling and sixpence in the pound.[5]
The catacombs of the original church remained intact and were incorporated into the new building. This underground cemetery reached slightly beyond the footprint of the actual building, extending under a portion of the High Street itself.[1] In addition to the catacombs, a separate graveyard was established, located south of East Street on Back of the Walls (another Southampton street). This location was technically outside of the All Saints' parish boundary.[8]
In the early 19th century, novelist Jane Austen lived in the parish and regularly attended the church, mentioning it occasionally in her correspondence. In her letters she noted in January 1809 that she and her family had been unable to attend for two consecutive Sundays but despite the third Sunday being "very blowing" they did manage to attend that week.[1] Painter Sir John Everett Millais was baptised in the church.[1]
The Law Commission estimate that the last debt relating to the construction of the building would have been paid by 1840.[5] By 1843 the graveyard was full, and it was closed around 1885. In 1914 the graveyard was formally deconsecrated and the headstones were removed from the site, which became a children's playground in the 1930s and subsequently a multi-storey car park.[8]
A new organ was installed in the church in 1861. The organ was manufactured by Bevington and Son and consisted of three tiers: a great with 11 stops, a swell with ten stops, and a choir organ with five stops.[6]
July 1872 saw a substantial refurbishment programme take place, with the original ceiling of the main sanctuary being completely replaced. The original plaster ceiling was removed with the new one constructed from wood, resulting in a weight reduction of 25 tons. The scheme cost £1,900.[9]
The church was damaged beyond repair in a German bombing raid in December 1940. In August 1944, the human remains housed in the catacombs were transferred to Hollybrook Cemetery in Southampton where they were reburied in a single communal grave. In all, the remains of 403 people were transferred, some fairly well preserved in their oak coffins with leaden shells, but others had disintegrated completely.[1] The church building was subsequently demolished and replaced by shops and a multi-storey car park.[1]
The parish registers were successfully retrieved from the ruin and despite being charred and damaged by candle wax and molten tar, the results of a fire that followed the bombing, they have been restored.[1]
Despite the debts related to the costs for the construction of the building having been settled in the early-mid 19th century, and the church ceasing to exist 100 years later, the three acts of Parliament allowing trustees of the church to levy rates on properties in the parish for the purpose of settling those debts remained in force and untouched until the Law Commission proposed their repeal in July 2014, with a view to presenting recommendations to Parliament in 2015.[5]
Exterior
The building was designed by John Reveley. The frontage measured 60 feet 6 inches (18.44 m) wide and had four columns which measured 4 feet (1.2 m) in diameter by 36 feet (11 m) high. The columns were topped with Grecian pilasters and supported a pediment.[2] The lower part of the three spaces between the four pillars were filled with wide arches, with the entrance doors topped with fanlights below them. The building had staircases on each side, lit by semi-circular headed windows between the outer columns and the pilaster.[2]
There was an entablature around the building supported by similar pilasters to those atop the columns. The south side of the building, which faced East Street, had two rows of eight windows; each window was 6 feet (1.8 m) wide, with the upper windows 13 feet (4.0 m) high and the bottom row 6 feet (1.8 m) high. Because the north side adjoined the neighbouring buildings it had no windows.[2]
Interior
Inside the church, the arched ceiling of the main sanctuary was unsupported by internal pillars and spanned the whole length and width of the church, measuring 90 feet (27 m) by 60 feet (18 m).[1][9]
Notable burials
The local newspaper, the Southern Daily Echo, claims one of the Chancellors of the Exchequer that served under Charles II was buried in the catacombs, but does not specify which chancellor this was.[1] Rear-Admiral Philip De Carteret, a renowned Royal Navy officer and explorer who participated in two circumnavigation expeditions in 1764-66 and 1766-69 was also buried in the catacombs.[10] Another naval officer, Captain Sir Thomas Carew, was interred in the catacombs on 2 May 1840.[11]
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Gale, Jez (12 August 2013). "Centuries-old 'City of Dead' under church". Daily Echo. Retrieved 14 October 2015.
- ^ a b c d e f g Skelton, Elizabeth (1823). The Southampton guide or An account of the ancient and present state of that town.
- ^ a b c d "All Saints Church And High Street - PortCities Southampton". www.plimsoll.org. Retrieved 14 October 2015.
- ^ "Church Archives". Avenue St Andrew's. Retrieved 2015-11-10.
- ^ a b c d e f Statute Law Repeals: Consultation Paper: Churches (PDF). The Law Commission. 2014.
- ^ a b Woodward, Bernard Bolingbroke; Wilks, Theodore Chambers (1861). A general history of Hampshire, by B.B. Woodward, T.C. Wilks and C. Lockhart. p. 287.
- ^ a b Darling, James (1854). Cyclopaedia Bibliographica: A Library Manual of Theological and General Literature : and Guide to Books for Authors, Preachers, Students, and Literary Men : Analytical, Bibliographical, and Biographical. J. Darling.
- ^ a b "Find A Grave: All Saints Churchyard". www.findagrave.com. Retrieved 22 October 2015.
- ^ a b "Building News and Engineering Journal : Free Download & Streaming". Internet Archive. Retrieved 2015-11-09.
- ^ Payne, James Bertrand. Armorial of Jersey. Рипол Классик. p. 98. ISBN 9785881622664.
- ^ Urban, Sylvanus (pseudonym of Edward Cave) (1840). Gentleman's Magazine, and Historical Chronicle. William Pickering; John Bowyer Nichols and Son.
