Churches of the British Isles

St Anne's Catholic Church & Presbytery is on Devonshire Gardens, Eastern Esplanade, a little north and east of the synagogue. It is one of the oldest and most historic buildings on Cliftonville sea front. The church was built during the Victorian era and has in recent years been undergoing largescale restoration work. During the Second World War the church's tower was used as a lookout across the North Sea, and it still conducts regular religious services for locals.

Christian Science Church stood (or still stands) at 406 Northdown Road, south-east of St Anne's, alongside the junction with Holly Gardens (to the right here). While the buildings that occupied the site in 2009 were large enough to contain a small church congregation, there was no outward sign that a church still met here. All the signage was for free nursery places. While this does not mean the church has closed, conversion into full-time nurseries is common these days.

St Philip's Palm Bay is on Summerfield Road, part of the Palm Bay community of the Northdown Park Estate that occupies the most north-easterly region of Thanet. The estate first appeared in the 1960s and in 1982 it was suggested that it required its own church separate from Holy Trinity Margate. On 25 July 1992 the first turf was cut and W W Martin & Co Ltd realised the plans drawn up by architect Mike Duncan. The church was consecrated on Friday 18 June 1993.

Holy Trinity Margate is on St Mary's Avenue and Northdown Park Road, at the very easternmost end of Margate and Cliftonville, below Palm Bay. It too was built by W W Martin & Co Ltd in the 1950s to replace the lost Holy Trinity Church in Margate. It sat alongside the existing St Mary's Chapel (shown centre-left here) which was incorporated into the new build. The much-loved chapel was built in 1892, while the new church was consecrated in 1959.

Thanet Road Mission Hall, is on the way back into Margate, on the north side of Thanet Road midway between Victoria Road and Dane Park. No information seems to be available on its history, but to judge from its style of construction it was probably put up immediately before the Second World War or in the years afterwards, and probably no later than 1960. Today it houses a nursery school with no sign other than the cruciform window of its previous status.

All photos on this page by P L Kessler.