St Peter's, Wapping, is a

Grade I listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

Anglican Anglicanism is a Western Christian tradition that has developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the context of the Protestant Reformation in Europe. It is one of th ...

church in Wapping Lane,

Wapping Wapping () is a district in East London in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. Wapping's position, on the north bank of the River Thames, has given it a strong maritime character, which it retains through its riverside public houses and steps, ...

, London, E1W 2RW. It was built in 1865–1939, designed by

F. H. Pownall Frederick Hyde Pownall (22 August 1831 – 1907) was a British architect. He was County Surveyor for Middlesex for about 45 years, and designed both Anglican and Roman Catholic churches. Life He was the son of John George Henry Pownall (1 ...

. The church was the first Anglican mission to the poor of London. Work was begun in 1856 by the Revd

Charles Lowder Charles Fuge Lowder (22 June 1820 – 9 September 1880) was a priest of the Church of England. He was the founder of the Society of the Holy Cross, a society for Anglo-Catholic priests. Early life Charles Lowder was born on 22 June 1820 a ...

MA and a group of priests, all were members of the

Society of the Holy Cross The Society of the Holy Cross (SSC; la, Societas Sanctae Crucis) is an international Anglo-Catholic society of male priests with members in the Anglican Communion and the Continuing Anglican movement, who live under a common rule of life that i ...

. The Society had been founded a year earlier with the express purpose of banding priests to a common rule of life and prayer in mission service. Wapping was one of the poorest districts in London, a haunt of prostitutes and petty criminals, living alongside those who earned a precarious living from the docks. Lowder's work began in Lower Well Alley (now the park by the James Orwell sports centre) and moved to an iron church in Calvert Street (now Tench Street). Lowder's group of Clergy and Sisters provided practical care through schools, clubs, cheap canteens and child care and spiritual care through a wide range of services, centred on the Mass at the Mission Churches. St Peter, Wapping Lane, London Docks, London E1W - geograph

St Peter, Wapping Lane, London Docks, London E1W - geograph

In 1866 the new Church of St Peter was consecrated. Soon afterwards

cholera Cholera is an infection of the small intestine by some strains of the bacterium ''Vibrio cholerae''. Symptoms may range from none, to mild, to severe. The classic symptom is large amounts of watery diarrhea that lasts a few days. Vomiting and ...

struck the East End. Lowder organised

Sisters of Mercy The Sisters of Mercy is a religious institute of Catholic women founded in 1831 in Dublin, Ireland, by Catherine McAuley. As of 2019, the institute had about 6200 sisters worldwide, organized into a number of independent congregations. They a ...

and others to care for the sick and raised funds for a tented hospital. The Priests and Sisters took great risks and worked without stint for the people of Wapping. At the end of the cholera outbreak, people were calling Lowder ‘the Father’ because he seemed like the father of the whole community. After Lowder's death in 1880,

Maurice Bingham Adams Maurice Bingham Adams FRIBA (1849–1933) was a British architect in the Arts and Crafts style.Curl, J. S., & Wilson, S., (2015) ''The Oxford Dictionary of Architecture'', 3rd edn, (OUP, Oxford) Life Adams was born in 1849 and educated in Lewe ...

was engaged to design extensions in his memory. In 1884-94 a

mortuary A morgue or mortuary (in a hospital or elsewhere) is a place used for the storage of human corpses awaiting identification (ID), removal for autopsy, respectful burial, cremation or other methods of disposal. In modern times, corpses have cus ...

chapel A chapel is a Christian place of prayer and worship that is usually relatively small. The term has several meanings. Firstly, smaller spaces inside a church that have their own altar are often called chapels; the Lady chapel is a common ty ...

and

baptistry In Christian architecture the baptistery or baptistry (Old French ''baptisterie''; Latin ''baptisterium''; Greek , 'bathing-place, baptistery', from , baptízein, 'to baptize') is the separate centrally planned structure surrounding the baptismal ...

were all added. Further work was done to the church in the 1930s, and finished in 1940, only to be immediately destroyed by a bomb in the

Blitz Blitz, German for "lightning", may refer to: Military uses *Blitzkrieg, blitz campaign, or blitz, a type of military campaign *The Blitz, the German aerial campaign against Britain in the Second World War *, an Imperial German Navy light cruiser b ...

. Repairs were completed in 1949. The church was completely renovated in 1985. The Mass on Sunday is at 9.15am (said) and 10.30am (sung). The Church has a regular Thursday attendance from St Peter's, London Docks Church of England Primary School, founded in 1856 the same time as the Church was built as a part of the Mission in Wapping.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Peter's Church of England church buildings in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets 19th-century Church of England church buildings Grade I listed churches in London Grade I listed buildings in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets Buildings by F. H. Pownall

London Docks London Docklands is the riverfront and former docks in London. It is located in inner east and southeast London, in the boroughs of Southwark, Tower Hamlets, Lewisham, Newham, and Greenwich. The docks were formerly part of the Port of L ...

Diocese of London Wapping