The History of a London Parish
Rebecca Preston and Andrew Saint
Brown Dog Books, 2024.
Most of this book is about the history of this area of London, rather than the history of St Giles church. At over 400 pages long, written by a historian and an architect/historian it is deeply researched and well written. Topics include hospitals, education, housing, industry, law and religion.
St Giles church began as a chapel to a leper hospital in about 1117, set in fields on the outskirts of London. As London expanded, St Giles church parish council was the main governing body for the area and the main provider of health and education services. Church and state were harder to differentiate than today.
For example, St Giles ran a Charity School, at which the teacher’s abiilty to lead church singing was a main requirement:
“In 1806, for instance, a new master is sought; he is to live on the premises and must ‘understand Psalmody’.” Page 230.
Over time the state gradually took responsibility for hospitals, education, pensions etc, and so the role of the church as the provider of these services declined, and became more of a charity supplier to fill the gaps left by the state.
The book sets out how the buildings in the parish changed over hundreds of years.
Church buildings came and went. Churches closed due to lack of attendance or were knocked down in road widening schemes. New churches were built for different denominations and nationalities due to changes in immigration. Church buildings come and go, if a church building closes, that is not necessarily a disaster, the faith goes on.
There are some lovely historic buildings in the parish. For example, James Smith & Sons who have been making and selling umbrellas from the same shop on 53 New Oxford Street since 1867 (page 285). Also, the grand sculpture on Africa House, Kingsway built in 1922 (page 336).
There are also some terrible examples of buildings. The below photos from pages 356-7 shows the grand building of the YMCA on Great Russell Street of 1908 (left hand page) which was then knocked down and replaced by a concrete monstrosity in 1976 (right hand page) – now closed.
Today we assume that the fact that most churches aren’t full of worshipers every Sunday means that religious belief has declined. This is not necessarily the case. 200 years ago there was a drive to ensure that there were enough seats in churches to accommodate the entire population:
“the first response of Church and Tory Government to the perceived crisis in the cities and the unruliness of their growing populations had been to build more churches, in the belief that they were the best response to deprivation and unrest; if there were seats enough to hold everyone, it was hoped, behaviour would improve. Parishes all over the country scrambled to secure grants offered for new government-subsidised churches under a national Act of 1818.” Page 187.
Church attendance was not compulsory and if enough churches were built to seat the entire population, there will always have been plenty of empty seats.
London churches have also had the challenge of depopulation. Slums were cleared and replaced by offices with people commuting in. Page 332 reports that in 1851, 37,407 people lived in the parish, by 1911 it had fallen to about 14,000. If people commute into London, Monday to Friday and go home at the weekend, it is difficult to get a full congregation in the London church on a Sunday. However, the current vicar, the Revd Tom Sander, tells me that the Bible Society’s research into recent increases in churchgoing – which it terms ‘the Quiet Revival’ – is a reality in St Giles-in-the-Fields church today. In particular, with young men, with no previous church background, just turning up at church, recognising the need for something of depth and reality in their lives.
Adrian Vincent
October 2025