St Dunstan-in-the-East Steeple - Idol Lane, London, UK
N 51° 30.581 W 000° 04.964
30U E 702432 N 5710541
The church, that was originally built around 1100, has a tower with spire designed by Christopher Wren. Both are intact but only the walls remain of the rest of the church.
Waymark Code: WMN783
Location: London, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 01/10/2015
Views: 4
The Speel website tells us about St Dunstan-in-the-East and the steeple (spire) built by Christopher Wren after the Great Fire of London:
The tower and ruins of St Dunstan in the East, all that survived the World War II bombing, are on the site of ‘a fayre and large Church of an auncient building, and within a large Churchyarde’ described by the antiquarian John Stow, writing around 1600. He mentions monuments from the 14th and 15th centuries, including a certain William Islip, Parson 1382, presumably a relative of Simon Islip, Archbishop of Canterbury who held the patronage of the church from 1365, various merchants, grocers, skinners and drapers, including Sir Bartholomew James, Draper, Mayor 1479, ‘buried under a fayre Monument, with his Ladie’,and William Hariot Draper, Mayor 1481, ‘buried in a fayre Chappell by him builded, 1517’, and Sir John Hawkins, Elizabethan naval hero. A later rebuild exposed massive foundations of larger monastic buildings, a floor of glazed and ornamented tiles, and a ‘perfect piscina, carved out of one block of Purbeck marble’. Whatever was left of the old church was lost in the Great Fire, and Christopher Wren erected a new church on the site, aided by a large contribution (£4000) from Lady Dionys Williamson, of Hales Hall, Norfolk, a benefactor also towards St Paul’s. The tower and open spire, which survive, were completed in 1698, a hundred years after Stow described the old church. The spire 'in a modern Gothic style... with four neat smaller spires, and the fifth or principal erected on four gothic arches', delicate as it looks with its fourribs arching up to bear the spire over open space is a remarkable thing. However, it is remarkably robust, and a hurricane in 1703 led Wren, on hearing that church spires across London had been severely damaged, to immediately remark that he felt sure St Dunstan’s would be safe.
The City of London website gives a brief history of the church:
The Church of St Dunstan was originally built around 1100 and is a Grade I listed building. A new south aisle was added in 1391 and was repaired in 1631. It was severely damaged in 1666 by the Great Fire of London. Rather than being completely built it was patched up. A steeple and tower was added in 1695-1701 by Sir Christopher Wren.
The Church was again severely damaged in the Blitz of 1941. Wren’s tower and steeple survived the bombing. During the re-organisation of the Anglican Church after World war II it was decided not to rebuild St. Dunstan’s.
In 1967 the City of London decided to turn the remains into a public garden, which opened in 1970.
The church is Grade I listed with the entry at the English Heritage website telling us:
Tower, 1698, by Wren. Large, Portland stone structure in gothic style. 3 main stages, Diagonal buttresses rising to octagonal turrets with large finials. Smaller finials between. Stone spire supported on open diagonal arches. Enriched doorways to west and south. North side now obscured by low building. East side rendered where formerly within church. Fine gates and railings to both doorways. Body of church, 1817-18, by David Laing. Destroyed except for walls in World War II. Gothic style with buttresses, traceried windows pinnacles etc. Yellow brick faced externally in Portland stone. North-east vestry. East wall reduced to sill level in centre.