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Anne's Church
Location: St Anne's Church, City of Westminster, London, United Kingdom
St Anne's Church:
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| St Anne's Church |
Saint Anne's Church in the Soho section of London was consecrated on 21 March 1686 by Bishop Henry Compton as the parish church of the new Church of England Parish of St Anne (known after 1945 as the Parish of St Anne with St Thomas and St Peter) which had been created out of parts of the parish of St Martin-in-the-Fields. The church and parish still survive today, as part of the Deanery of Westminster (St Margaret) within the Diocese of London in the Church of England. Parts of its churchyard around the tower and west end are now the public park of Saint Anne's Gardens, accessed from the Shaftesbury Avenue end of Wardour Street, whilst the church itself is accessed via a gate at the Shaftesbury Avenue end of Dean Street (it does not front onto the street).
History of St Anne's Church:
The parish was dedicated to Saint Anne because Compton had been tutor to Princess Anne before she became Queen. Construction commenced in 1677 on a plot in what was then the countryside of Soho Fields, with William Talman and/or Christopher Wren as architect(s). The church was designed as an 80 feet (24 m) long and 64 feet (20 m) wide basilican church, with a 70 feet (21 m) high west end tower.
In 1699 a tuition-free parish school was founded for boys and in 1704 it started to admit girls. The church received an organ in 1699 from the Dowager-Queen's Chapel in St James's Palace[1] and from 1700 the church's first organist was William Croft (composer of the "St Anne" tune to O God, Our Help in Ages Past). The church's tower was only completed in 1718, with the addition of a timber spire by local carpenter John Meard. Edmund Andros was buried in the church's churchyard in 1714, in 1724/5 the church saw the marriage of Edward Harley, 3rd Earl of Oxford and Earl Mortimer, and in 1743 Prince William Henry (younger brother of George III) was baptised here.The puritan Thomas Manton ministered from the pulpit of St Paul's until the Great Ejection. On 23 September 1662 Simon Patrick, later bishop of Ely, was preferred to the rectory of St. Paul’s where he served during the plague.
The first known victim of the 1665–1666 outbreak of the Plague in England, Margaret Ponteous, was buried in the churchyard on 12 April 1665.....Wikipedia >>
