History of St Mark's Church in St John's Wood before fire

Conservation group the St John’s Wood Society said that the “devastation” wreaked by the fire at St Mark’s Church on Thursday night (January 26) was “tragic, and a loss for the entire community”.

READ MORE: 

• Live updates from scene after church destroyed by fire
• Shocking footage shows church in St John’s Wood alight in ‘huge’ fire
• Parishes send prayers as St Mark's Church destroyed by fire

Here, Ham & High looks at the history of the Hamilton Terrace church and why it means so much to the local community.

History

The National Churches Trust describes the church as a “beautiful Grade II listed Victorian church” which “is an architectural and historical treasure”.

St Mark’s Church in Hamilton Terrace was consecrated on June 24, 1847, making it 175 years old at the time of the fire.

The steeple was re-built after the church was hit by a bomb in World War Two (Image: PA Media)

The church was designed in the Gothic style by Thomas Cundy, an architect whose portfolio included seven other churches across west London.

Its spire, which local councillor Geoff Barraclough claimed there are now “major worries about”, was built by the architect’s son, Thomas Cundy III in 1864.

READ MORE: 'Major worries' over church spire after 'catastrophic' blaze

The spire was previously damaged during the Second World War in 1941 when a bomb hit the church. Work on rebuilding the spire was completed in 1955.

After last night’s fire, @StMark_HT is a blackened shell. You can smell the smoke 100m away. Structural engineers are assessing the damage as there are major worries about the spire. pic.twitter.com/noJAEvGzSP

— Geoff Barraclough (@w9maidavale) January 27, 2023

The church is home to a collection of mosaics by the Salviati, a family of glass makers and mosaicists from Venice. The status of the mosaics after the fire is not yet known.

On the church’s website, it describes itself as being “intimately connected with…the genesis of Lewis Carroll’s ‘Alice’ books”. According to the National Church Trust, it also had links to Queen Victoria’s son, Prince Leopold.

The church is part of Affirming Catholicism within the Church of England, a strand of Anglo-Catholicism founded in 1990 by clergy who had been expelled from existing groups for supporting women’s ordination to the priesthood.

St Mark’s today

The Reverend Kate Harrison has been the vicar at the church since 2015. On her Twitter profile she describes herself as “unashamedly inclusive”.

The director of music at the church is Daniel Collins, an alumnus from Magdalen College, Oxford and the Royal College of Music.

The church’s main service is its Sunday Parish Mass at 10.30am. Other services include an informal services at 12pm on a Tuesday, and a weekly Communion service at 7pm on a Thursday.

Before the fire, the church was set to hold a Candlemas service, celebrated 40 days after Christmas, on Sunday (January 29) at 10am.

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