The patronage of the church has been in the hands of the Dean and Chapter of St. Paul’s, who received it from Almund the priest in 1100, or thereabouts, up to the present time.
Houseling people in 1548 were 2440.
This church is in the Perpendicular style and contains a nave, chancel, and two side aisles separated from the central part by clustered columns and pointed arches. The total length is 146 feet 3 inches, and the height 42 feet 8 inches; the total height of the steeple 146 feet 3 inches, that of the four pinnacles rising from the corners of the parapet of the tower 12 feet 9 inches.
Chantries were founded in the church: By Richard Chaurye, whose endowment fetched £4 in 1548; by Matthew Ashebye, whose endowment yielded £9 : 7 : 8 in 1548. The King granted his licence to found the Fraternity of Our Lady and St. Giles, September 21, 1426; there were several chantries endowed here by John Bullinger, William Lake, and William Serle, and by William Grove and Richard Heyworth.
From a drawing by W. Pearson.
ST. GILES, CRIPPLEGATE
Among the several memorial windows of the church the most interesting is that at the west of the south aisle, comprising three subjects, erected in memory of Edward Alleyne, the founder of Dulwich College. The earliest monument now existing is of Thomas Busby, who died in 1575. On the west wall, at the end of the north aisle, is a tablet commemorating the martyrologist John Foxe, who died in the parish in 1587. Sir Martin Frobisher was buried here, but it was not till 1888 that a monument was erected to his memory, on the eastern part of the south wall. On the same wall, farther west, John Speed is commemorated, author of various works dealing with the history of Great Britain. The chief interest attaching to this church is the fact that in it John Milton was buried in 1674; there is a stone commemorating him. In 1793 a monument in the shape of a bust was erected to him at the expense of Samuel Whitbread, and in 1862 a cenotaph designed by Edmund Woodthorpe was placed in the south aisle. The church contains numerous other monuments, a great many of which have a considerable degree of interest; many of them have been erected to the memory of benefactors and vicars. It was here that the wedding of Oliver Cromwell was solemnised in 1620; the register also contains entries to another family whose name is also linked with Milton’s—that of the Egerton’s, Earls of Bridgewater.
The greatest of the benefactors recorded by Stow seems to have been Throckmorton Trotman, who gave to the parish £547 in all. In later times, Sir William Staines, Lord Mayor in 1800, was a liberal donor, founding and endowing four almshouses for decayed parishioners; also the Rev. Frederick W. Blomberg, D.D., vicar of this church in 1833.
There was a school for 150 boys in the Freedom; also another for 50 girls, supported by the donation of the Lady Eleanor Holles, the Haberdashers’ Free School. There were six almshouses, founded by Mr. Allen, also the Lorrimer’s almshouses.
John Buckeridge (d. 1631), Bishop of Rochester, was vicar here; also William Fuller (d. 1659), Dean of Durham; Lancelot Andrewes (1555-1626), Bishop of Chichester, Ely, and Winchester; John Rogers, (1679-1729), chaplain to the Prince of Wales (afterwards George II.); John Dolben (1625-86), Archbishop of York; William H. Hale (1795-1870), Master of Charterhouse.