A door in the south transept admits the visitor to the crypt, a very interesting part of the church. It appeals to the architect and scientific builder as well as to the historical student and the sightseer. We can study Wren’s methods of construction here much more readily than above, and can, moreover, see where he was eventually forced to alter the plans with which he commenced operations, and which were in his mind in the preparative work here apparent. First at the foot of the steps we reach “the Artists’ Corner.” At the eastern end, just where it is believed the high altar of Old St. Paul’s was placed, is the grave of the great architect himself. It is inscribed with the memorable sentence already quoted as over the northern entrance. Close by are the graves of Reynolds, Turner, Landseer, and other great painters including Lord Leighton and Sir J. E. Millais. Some eminent architects are near—Mylne, who succeeded as surveyor of St. Paul’s, and Cockerell who came after him. Goss, part of whose funeral ode on Wellington is inscribed on his tombstone, and Boyce represent music. In the crypt too were laid the scanty remains found in the Arabian desert of Palmer and his companions, murdered in 1882. Sir Bartle Frere and another great colonial statesman, Dalley, are both laid here. But to most visitors no tombs or memorials are so interesting as those of Nelson and Wellington. In a kind of chapel marked by its own candelabra, and situated just under the choir, the lofty sarcophagus which contains the body of the great Duke forms a conspicuous object in the view. It is formed of a large block of red porphyry from Cornwall, standing on a pedestal of the same stone, and a base of grey granite—all studiously plain. The funeral took place in 1852, three months after Wellington’s death; even then the sepulchre was not ready and the coffin rested for some weeks on the Nelson tomb farther east. Beside the Duke are the remains of Sir Thomas Picton, his comrade and lieutenant at Waterloo. Picton was killed in the battle, and his body was brought home to his house in Edwardes Street, now Seymour Street, Portman Square. Thence it was removed to the vaults of the chapel of St. George, now altered, in the Uxbridge Road, where it rested till 1859, when, nearly seven years after Wellington’s funeral, it was brought here. The tomb of Nelson is under the dome. He died on October 21, 1805, at the great victory of Trafalgar, and his body was brought home and buried here. It had been intended that his coffin should be enclosed in a black marble sarcophagus which, lying unused in Wolsey’s Chapel at Windsor, was presented by the King for the purpose. It had been sculptured by a Florentine named Bernardo da Rovezzano, for Cardinal Wolsey, and remained in the chapel. The wooden coffin, made of the mast of L’Orient, blown up at the battle of the Nile, which had been presented to Nelson by his friend Hallowell, of the Swiftsure, was too large to go into the marble sarcophagus, which is still empty. It stands on a fine base of black and white marble, and Nelson’s body is in the masonry below. Beside Nelson sleep Collingwood (d. 1810), the second, and Northesk (d. 1831), the third in command at Trafalgar.
To the west of Nelson’s tomb is preserved the funeral car or hearse made for the burial of the Duke of Wellington—a monumental work in itself. It was cast from cannon taken in the Duke’s victories, from designs by Redgrave, and is so fine as to have led many critics to attribute it to Stevens—wrongly, however, as Redgrave’s drawings are still extant.
Quite apart from the tombs here to be seen and the names of great men on every side, this crypt is well worth a visit. We observe in it, the care and attention to details which Wren bestowed upon every part of his great design. He altered the axis of the new church, the east end of which is slightly to the northward of that of old St. Paul’s. By this means he obtained fresh ground for the more important parts of his foundations. The great piers which support the dome do not stand where those which supported the old central tower stood. At one place, said to be near the north-east corner, he found that a gravel pit had been made and “the hard pot earth,” on which he depended, had been removed. He sunk a pit to where, at the very foot of the hill on which St. Paul’s stands, he found a firm foundation, and laid upon it a mass of masonry, 10 feet square, on which he could rely. It was not his intention to interrupt the view of the central aisle by placing the organ over the entrance to the choir, but, in the crypt, we see that when he had to comply with the taste of the time, he built “a row of columns and arches to strengthen the floor for the extra weight it was called upon to carry.”
The modest Guide, by Mr. Gilbertson, which is to be had at the ticket office at the foot of the stairs to the dome, contains by far the best account of the church. It is supplemented by a description of the mosaics, mentioned above. For a magnificent series of views a volume by the late Mr. Birch on the City Churches may be named. There is no modern history of the cathedral which can be recommended to the student as, so far, the great collection of records preserved in the library has not been used by historians. Milman and Longman do not seem to have been aware of its existence. The late Dr. Sparrow Simpson, whose delightful but desultory volumes have already been mentioned, made many extracts from these manuscripts, but his example has hardly been followed.
The manuscripts were well catalogued in 1883, by Sir H. Maxwell Lyte, for the Historical Manuscripts Commission.
St. Faith was situated under the choir of old St. Paul’s. In 1549, Jesus Chapel in the cathedral being suppressed by Edward VI., the parishioners of St. Faith’s were allowed to remove from their crypt to this chapel. It continued so till St. Paul’s was burnt down, when the parish was annexed to St. Augustine’s by Act of Parliament (1670). The earliest date of an incumbent is 1277.
The patronage of this church has always been in the hands of: The Dean and Chapter of St. Paul’s—as far back as 1148; and in 1277 Robert le Seneschal was rector.
Houseling people in 1548 were 400.
A considerable number of monuments are recorded by Stow, but none are of much note. The most interesting is that of Katherine, third daughter of Edward, Lord Neville.