St Michael le Strand Burleigh Street used
to stand on the north-eastern corner of Burleigh Street (on the left here) and
the Strand itself. The church was opened for worship in 1833 to
cater for the increasing population in the area as the Strand became
fully built up. It gained its own parish in 1849. The increasing
population had started to decrease again by 1905, so the church was
closed, and demolished in 1907. The Strand Palace Hotel now occupies
the site.
Corpus Christi Catholic Church is hidden
away at 1-5 Maiden Lane, immediately north of the Strand. Within
the diocese of Westminster, the church was designed by F H Pownall
in the early French Gothic style, and was completed in 1873. The
designer had trouble with height and space due to the cramped position
of the site, and the floor of the church had to be sunk three feet below
street level. The church still performs alternate Sunday masses in
Latin.
St Paul's Church Covent Garden has its
main entrance off Bedford Street in the Covent Garden district of
the Strand. Also commonly known as the Actor's Church thanks to its
long connection with the theatre community of nearby Drury Lane, the
church was built by Inigo Jones in 1631-1633. It gained its own parish
in 1645. Soon afterwards, the first known victim of the Great Plague,
Margaret Ponteous, was buried in the churchyard on 12 April 1665.
This more familiar view is from the other end of
the church which overlooks Covent Garden. Punch's Puppet Show was
first performed here and witnessed by Samuel Pepys in 1662. Thomas
Hardwick began a major restoration in 1662, but shortly afterwards
the church was destroyed by fire, on 17 September 1795. Rebuilding
took place and it re-opened on 1 August 1798. In 2002, the church
hosted the first of two weddings for famous pop singers Gwen Stefani
and Gavin Rossdale.
St Martins-in-the-Fields sits on Charing
Cross Road, overlooking Trafalgar Square and the National Gallery,
while the rear of the building abuts the Strand. The site was
occupied by the Romans, but there is no official reference to a church
until 1222, when the fields here appear to have been used by the monks
of Westminster. In around 1542, Henry VIII built a new church and
extended the parish boundaries to keep plague victims from being
carried through his palace.
The original church was enlarged in 1607 by the
son of James I, and pulled down in 1721 to be replaced by the current
building in Portland stone. This was designed by James Gibbs and
completed in 1726. In the nineteenth century, whilst planning Trafalgar
Square, John Nash created Church Path and the range of buildings to the
north. In January 2006 work began on a massive restoration project for
the church, and this was completed in 2009.
Whitehall Palace Chapel stood in what is
now Old Scotland Yard, on the eastern side of Whitehall, close to
Trafalgar Square. There is some evidence that courtiers of James VI
of Scotland who followed him to London in 1603 worshipped in a
chapel in the precincts of the old Palace of Whitehall (shown here,
by Hendrick Danckerts, c.1675). The site became known as 'Scotland
Yard' and subsequently housed the original offices of the
Metropolitan Police.
Crown Court Scottish National Church was
established in Covent Garden in 1711, giving ordinary Scots in London
their own dedicated place of worship. In the palace, James II ordered
Christopher Wren to build a new chapel, finished in 1687, but Whitehall
Palace was destroyed by fire in 1698. William III was asthmatic and
disliked staying at Whitehall because of its damp riverside location so
the palace was not rebuilt. Instead, Whitehall became the seat of civil
government.
Orange Street Congregational Church sits
on the northern side of the street, immediately south of Leicester
Square. It was founded in 1693 as Orange Street Chapel by Huguenot
refugees who fled from France at the time of the Revocation of the
Edict of Nantes. The area was built up in the 1670s, probably by
Colonel Thomas Panton, the speculator responsible for nearby Panton
Street. The rest of Orange Street was built in the 1690s,
partly over the duke of Monmouth's stables.
These stables seem to have been called the
'Orange Mews', referring to the colour of Monmouth's coat-of-arms.
In 1776, in need of repair, the chapel passed into the hands of the
Church of England, and then the Congregationalists in 1787.
Adjoining the chapel was Sir Isaac Newton's house, which was built
in 1710 and condemned in 1913, along with the church itself. In
1925, the council allowed the present temporary chapel to be
erected, and it re-opened in 1929.
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