St Michael's Wood Street was a church and parish of medieval origin in Cripplegate Ward in the City of London, and is first mentioned in 1225 as ''St. Michael de Wudestrate''. It stood on the west side of Wood Street, initially with a frontage on Huggin Lane but later on Wood Street itself.

The Medieval church

After King

James IV of Scotland James IV (17 March 1473 – 9 September 1513) was King of Scotland from 11 June 1488 until his death at the Battle of Flodden in 1513. He inherited the throne at the age of fifteen on the death of his father, James III, at the Battle of Sauchi ...

was killed at the

Battle of Flodden The Battle of Flodden, Flodden Field, or occasionally Branxton, (Brainston Moor) was a battle fought on 9 September 1513 during the War of the League of Cambrai between the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland, resulting in an English ...

in 1513, it is said that his head was brought to London and later buried in the crypt of this church.

John Stow John Stow (''also'' Stowe; 1524/25 – 5 April 1605) was an English historian and antiquarian. He wrote a series of chronicles of English history, published from 1565 onwards under such titles as ''The Summarie of Englyshe Chronicles'', ''The C ...

admired the building, and called it a "proper thing."

Rebuilding

The church was destroyed in the

Great Fire of London The Great Fire of London was a major conflagration that swept through central London from Sunday 2 September to Thursday 6 September 1666, gutting the medieval City of London inside the old Roman city wall, while also extending past the ...

, and after some pressure it was rebuilt by Sir

Christopher Wren Sir Christopher Wren PRS FRS (; – ) was one of the most highly acclaimed English architects in history, as well as an anatomist, astronomer, geometer, and mathematician-physicist. He was accorded responsibility for rebuilding 52 churches ...

in 1673. The main facade toward Wood Street was described by Godwin as "a pleasing and well-proportioned ''morceau'' of Italian architecture", with four Ionic columns above a

stylobate In classical Greek architecture, a stylobate ( el, στυλοβάτης) is the top step of the crepidoma, the stepped platform upon which colonnades of temple columns are placed (it is the floor of the temple). The platform was built on a level ...

, supporting an entablature and pediment. The west side, towards Huggin Lane, was much plainer. The tower was originally 90 ft high; Henry Thomas, writing in 1828, noted that the tower seemed to have survived from the previous building, and that it had recently received a spire, increasing the overall height to 120 feet.

George Godwin George Godwin FRS (28 January 1813 – 27 January 1888) was an influential British architect, journalist, and editor of ''The Builder'' magazine. Life He was one of nine children of the architect George Godwin senior (1780–1863) and trained a ...

described the interior of the church as "a large and well-lighted parallelogram with a coved ceiling, but ... not ecclesiastical in any respect in its general appearance". The building was restored in 1831, at which time the tower was opened up into the interior of the church. There was a gallery at the west end and a reredos at the east end, with paintingsof Moses and Aaron. The organ was built by Thomas Elliot in 1800: the most noted organist was Dr

Henry Hiles Henry Hiles (31 December 1826 – 20 October 1904) was an English composer, organist, writer, and music educator. Life He was born in Shrewsbury, Hiles was the youngest of six sons. His eldest brother, John Hiles, was known as an arranger of organ ...

, who served during 1859.

Demolition

In 1854 the declining residential population led to proposals to reduce the number of churches within the "Square Mile" - a procedure the church's vicar had himself proposed. The church was eventually demolished under the auspices of the Union of Benefices Act in 1897, and many bodies were disinterred from the churchyard and reburied at

Brookwood Cemetery Brookwood Cemetery, also known as the London Necropolis, is a burial ground in Brookwood, Surrey, England. It is the largest cemetery in the United Kingdom and one of the largest in Europe. The cemetery is listed a Grade I site in the Regist ...

. The parish was then united with St Alban Wood Street, and, after the destruction of that church in

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, with

St Vedast Foster Lane Saint Vedast Foster Lane or Saint Vedast-alias-Foster, a church in Foster Lane, in the City of London, is dedicated to St. Vedast (Foster is an Anglicisation of the name "Vaast", as the saint is known in continental Europe), a French saint whose ...

. The site has undergone several redevelopments: as of 2020, it is the site of a low-rise commercial building (stated to be a public house in 2013).

Ministers of the church

* John Ive, fl 1399 * Arthur Jackson (minister), c.1624 Lambeth Library CM VII/34
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Bibliography

*'Church of England, Parish of St. Michael Wood Street. - Assessment of the annual tithes of the joint parishes of St. Michael Wood St, 1671'. - M0014588CL cited in ''City of London Parish Registers Guide 4''

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Michael Wood Street 13th-century church buildings in England 1897 disestablishments in England Churches rebuilt after the Great Fire of London but since demolished Churches in the City of London Former buildings and structures in the City of London Christopher Wren church buildings in London