Churches of the British Isles

During the Commonwealth period the New Chapel was used as a stables and a jail, unconsecrated until after the Restoration. By the early 1800s it had fallen into disrepair and was demolished. Christ Church Broadway was built on the site, designed by early Gothic revival architect, Ambrose Poynter. Consecrated in 1843, on 17 April 1941 it was gutted by incendiaries. Its ruins were demolished in 1954 and just part of the churchyard was retained as the present park.

Westminster Chapel is on the southern side of Buckingham Gate, opposite Petty France. It is home to an Evangelical church which has been based in Central London since 1840. The present building was opened on 6 July 1865, founded by Congregationalists. It was pastored by the late Dr D Martyn Lloyd-Jones in 1939-1968. During this period the church resigned from the Congregational Union in favour of the Fellowship of Independent Evangelical Churches.

The Cathedral Church of Westminster is on the southern side of Victoria Street between Ambrosden Avenue and Morpeth Terrace. The site originally was known as Bulinga Fen, forming part of Westminster's marshes. It was reclaimed by the Benedictine monks who built Westminster Abbey, and subsequently used as a market and fairground. After the Reformation the land was largely waste ground used for occasional events, before playing host to a prison between 1651-1880.

The site was acquired by the Catholic Church in 1884. The foundation stone for the cathedral, which was to serve as the most senior Catholic church in Britain, was laid in 1895 and the building was designed in the Early Christian Byzantine style by the Victorian architect, John Francis Bentley. The work was completed in 1903 and the cathedral dedicated to the 'Most Precious Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ'. The amazing interior of the cathedral remains incomplete to this day.

St Andrew Ashley Place stood between Ashley Place and Victoria Street, close to the corner of Carlisle Place. The silver office block which is seen here occupies the site today, probably built in the sixties, on the southern side of Victoria Street a stone's throw from Victoria Railway Station. The church was built in 1856 and gained its own parish in 1876. Closed in 1946 (probably due to bomb damage), it was demolished and its parish united to St Peter, Eaton Square in 1953.

Five photos on this page by P L Kessler.