Here stood the parish church of St. Antholin, destroyed in the Great Fire, A.D. 1666, rebuilt 1677 by Sir Christopher Wren, architect.
On the bases of the columns are inscribed the names of the churchwardens of St. Antholin’s and St. John Baptist’s, Walbrook, respectively. While the following inscription is beneath:
The change of population in the City during two centuries rendering the church no longer necessary, it was taken down A.D. 1875, under the Act of Parliament for uniting City Benefices; the funds derived from the sale of the site were devoted in part to the Restoration of the neighbouring church of St. Mary Aldermary, where are also erected the monumental tablets removed from St. Antholin, and the erection at Nunhead of another church dedicated to St. Antholin greatly needed in that thickly populated district.
And again, right across the bases of the pillars and the stone, run the words:
In a vault beneath are deposited the greater part of the human remains removed from the Old church. The remainder are laid in a vault in the City of London Cemetery at Ilford, where also a monument marks the place of interment.
The Church of St. Anthony or Antholin stood on the north side of Budge Row, at the corner of Shoe Lane, in Cordwainer Street Ward. It derived its name from being dedicated to St. Anthony of Vienna, who had a cell here founded by Henry II., but it is not known when the church was first built. About 1399 it was rebuilt, and again in 1513, but the Great Fire of 1666 destroyed it. From Wren’s design it was rebuilt, and completed in 1682; it was remarkable for its tower, with a spire all of freestone. In 1874 the building (except the steeple) was taken down, and in 1876 the steeple was also demolished, the materials of which were sold for £5. The earliest date of an incumbent is 1181.
The patronage of the church was always in the hands of the Dean and Chapter of St. Paul’s, who granted one part to John, son of Wizo the goldsmith, about 1141.
Houseling people in 1548 were 240.
In 1623 a very beautiful gallery was added to the church, every division of which (52 in number) was filled with the arms of kings, queens, and princes of the kingdom, from Edward the Confessor to Frederick, Count Palatine of the Rhine.
Chantries were founded here by: Nicholas Bole, citizen and skinner, at the Altar of St. Katherine, to which William Pykon was admitted chaplain, 1390, on the resignation of Richard Hale—the endowment fetched £6 : 13 : 4 in 1548, when Robert Smythe was chaplain; John Grantham, whose endowment fetched £4 in 1548.