All Hallows Breadstreet

All Hallows Breadstreet

On the east side of Bread Street at the corner of Watling Street (O.S. 1875). In Bread Street Ward. The parish extends into Cordwainer Ward.

Earliest mention found in records: "All Hallows Bredstrete," 1227 (Cal. Ch. Rolls, H. III. I. 50).

Other forms: "All Hallows de Bredestrete," 1275 (Ct. H.W. I. 24). "Bredstrate church," 19 Ed. I. (Anc. Deeds, A. 1970). "All Hallows in Watling Street," 1464. (Rolls of Parlt. V. 544a). "Allhallowes in Watling Street," (Leake, 1666).

In 1349 a plot of land for the enlargement of the church was assigned to Nicholas de Rothewell, parson of the church; the plot was 12 ft. long and 27 ft. broad (Cal. P.R. Ed. III. 1348–50, p. 295), and in 1350 another plot 40 ft. in length by 20 ft. in breadth adjoining the church, for a chapel to be built on it (ib. 479).

At one time the church had a stone steeple, struck by lightning 1559 and taken down to save the cost of repair (S. 348–9).

Repaired and beautified 1625. Burnt in the Fire 1666, but rebuilt 1680–4 by Sir C. Wren at a cost of over £3000, and the parish of St. John the Evangelist united to it (Strype, ed. 1720, I. iii. 199).

Taken down 1876–7 by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and parish united to St. Mary le Bow. Warehouses erected on the site. John Milton was baptised in the church 1608, and a tablet has been fastened to the corner house erected on the site recording the fact.

A Rectory, and one of the thirteen peculiars belonging to the Archbishop of Canterbury. Patrons: Prior and Chapter of Christ Church, Canterbury, and granted to the Archbishop in 1365 (Newcourt, I. 244).

Allhallows, Bread Street, a church in Bread Street Ward, at the corner of Bread Street and Watling Street, erected from designs by Sir C. Wren, 1680–1684, for £3348:7:2. It was 72 feet long, 35 wide, and 30 high, and had a tower 86 feet high. The style was semi-classic. Inside was some good carving. Among the rectors have been—William Lyndwood, Bishop of St. David's, and keeper of the Privy Purse to Henry V. (d. 1446); Thomas Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, and benefactor of Pembroke, Clare, and Queen's Colleges, Oxford (d. 1500); Robert Horne, Dean of Durham and Bishop of Winchester (d. 1580); and Edward Fowler, Bishop of Gloucester. Lawrence Saunders, collated to the living by Archbishop Cranmer in 1553, was arrested by order of Bonner, and, after lying in prison for fifteen months, burned for heresy, February 8, 1555. His successor in the rectory was Bonner's chaplain, William Chedsey, who was, however, ejected on the accession of Elizabeth. There is a tablet to Saunders in the vestry. Sir Arthur Haselrigg was married at this church, June 26, 1634.

In Harl. MS., No. 6191 (f. 22), is a warrant (dated October 27, 1552), to pay "Mr. Knox, Preacher in the north,"the sum of £40, and also a letter (dated February 2, 1552–1553) to the Archbishop of Canterbury, "in favour of Mr. Knox, to be presented to the vicaridge or parsonage of Allhallowes in Bread Street, in his disposition by the preferment of Thomas Sampson to the Deanery of Chichester." The old church, in which Milton was baptized, was destroyed in the Great Fire, but the register preserves the entry of the poet's baptism.

The xxth daye of December, 1608, was baptized John the sonne of John Milton, scrivener.

On the external wall of the church, about 6 feet from the ground, was a tablet, with the following inscription, which is now fixed on Bow church:—

Three poets in three distant ages born,
Greece, Italy, and England did adorn;
The first in loftiness of thought surpasst,
The next in majesty in both the last,
The force of Nature could no further go:
To make a third she joined the former two.

John Milton was born in Bread Street on Friday, the 9th day of December, 1608, and was baptized in the parish church of All Hallows, Bread Street, on Tuesday, the 20th day of December 1608.

The great non-conformist divine, John Howe, was buried here in 1705.

Stow gives a list of some of the monuments in the old church.

More to be noted of this church, which had a fair spired steeple of stone. In the year 1559, the 5th of September, about mid-day fell a great tempest of lightning, with a terrible clap of thunder, which struck the said spire about 9 or 10 feet beneath the top; out of the which place fell a stone that slew a dog and overthrew a man that was playing with the dog. The same spire being but little damnified thereby, was shortly after taken down, for sparing the changes of reparation.—Stow's Survey, 1603.

Wren's church has disappeared as entirely as its predecessor. In 1876 the Ecclesiastical Commissioners decided to demolish Allhallows Church, sell the site, and appropriate a portion of the proceeds to the erection of a new Allhallows Church beyond the city, but within the limits of the Metropolis; the rectory of Allhallows, Bread Street, being joined to the united rectory of St. Mary-le-Bow, St. Pancras, Soper Lane, Allhallows, Honey Lane, and St. John the Evangelist.

Accordingly, the ceremony of "deconsecration," as it was called, was performed in Allhallows Church on Thursday, October 19, 1876, by Bishop Piers Claughton, who preached a sermon from Luke ix. 59. The Lord Mayor and Sheriffs attended the service in state. In the course of the service a man stood up and exclaimed, "I protest against this service as a farce;" but he was at once removed from the church by the police. The remains of the dead were removed from their graves, and reinterred in Ilford Cemetery. The materials were sold and the church demolished in the autumn of 1877; and on March 20, 1878, the site, which, the auctioneer said, contained "a ground area of 3270 superficial feet," was sold at the Auction Mart for £32,254. £4000 of this has been appropriated for the augmentation of the endowment of the proposed church of Allhallows, East India Docks. A massive block of warehouses has been built on the site, and a tablet placed on the corner house with the inscription "John Milton, born in Bread Street, 1608; baptized in the church of Allhallows which stood on this spot."

Allhallows, Bread-street, the church of, is situated at the corner of Bread-street and Watling-street, and takes its name from the same dedication as the last, and its situation, which is near to the ancient Bread Market of the city. It was originally a rectory of very ancient foundation, under the patronage of the Prior and Canons of Christ Church, Canterbury, but since the reformation it was conveyed to the Archbishops of Canterbury, of which see, it is one of the thirteen peculiars within the city. The old church was destroyed by the great fire in 1666, and the present edifice was erected from the designs of Sir Christopher Wren, as a church for the united parishes of St. Allhallows, Bread-street, and St. John the Evangelist, the old church of which stood at the north-east corner of Friday-street and Watling-street. The body of the church is plain, with dressings of the Tuscan order. It is seventy-two feet in length, thirty-five in breadth and thirty in height. It is an excellent specimen of the talents of Sir Christopher Wren in substantial and useful church building. Its present rector is the Rev. G.T. Andrewes, one of the six preachers at Canterbury, who was instituted in 1819.