Paddington: Past and Present

by William Robins

Chaterlain’s series of views, dated 1750, contains two of this church; a near north-west view, not mentioned in the King’s Catalogue, British Museum; and a distant view from the green, a copy of which is to be found in the King’s collection.

St. Mary’s.

On the twenty-sixth day of February, in the twenty-eighth year of his reign, George the third, granted by his letters patent to the Rev. Thomas Hayter, the curate of the parish; the Rev. John Shepherd, the assistant curate; and certain others; the power to beg “from house to house throughout England, our town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, &c.” to enable them to rebuild the parish church, which this Brief, and the preamble of the twenty-eighth Geo. III, cap. 74—“An Act for rebuilding the parish church of Paddington, in the county of Middlesex, and for enlarging the church-yard of the said parish,”—tell us “is a very ancient structure, and in such a decayed state, that it cannot be effectually repaired, but must be taken down and rebuilt; besides which, the same is so small, that one-fourth of the present inhabitants within the said parish cannot assemble therein for Divine worship.”

Down to this time, the lords of the Paddington soil, or their lessees, had furnished the tenants, who lived on this church-land, with some sort of church accommodation; but another church was now required and was to be built, although this very ancient and decayed structure was but one hundred and ten years old; and the question naturally arose, who was to build it? The then lessees; as the lessees had done in 1678? The “Lord of the manor of Paddington;” as the then bishop is called? Or these together? Neither the one, nor the other, nor the two combined. It is no longer those who hold “the rectorial and other lands,” and whose income from those lands has been increasing ever since the time of Bishop Sheldon, who are to build churches in Paddington. The lord and his lessees know their duty better than that. Begging boxes are to be sent “from house to house throughout England;” and as that does not succeed, those to whom a portion of the increased accommodation is to be offered, are to be induced or compelled to furnish the necessary funds. Moreover, at the expense of the people, (for the Act expressly declares the pews shall be “rent-free,”) comfortable accommodation, “in or near the chancel,” is to be provided for the lord of the manor of Paddington, “or his or their lessee or lessees.” And although there is now no Dunstan’s bailiff to dread, let those who doubt that the law had power in Paddington at the end of the last century, as it has now, “to take by force” this extra and new church-tax, look to the fourteenth, thirty-fourth, and other sections of this public Act; the first of the Paddington church building Acts.

Up to one shilling in the pound, on “the yearly rent of lands, houses, shops, warehouses, vaults, mills, and other tenements,” forty-five trustees—six of whom were clergymen—“or any five or more of them,” they, and their successors, had power to assess, and for the sum assessed had power to distress, “in order to accomplish the good and pious purposes of this Act.” Provided always, that the sum raised by this and other means set forth in this Act, “shall not exceed in the whole the sum of four thousand five hundred pounds, including the charges in the enclosing the said waste ground and other incidental charges, and of the procuring, obtaining, and passing this Act.”

“The said waste ground,” here spoken of, being a portion of the enclosed green [135] nicely measured and carved out—vide Act—which “The Right Reverend Father-in-God, Beilby, Lord Bishop of London, is willing and desirous” to give; and which he does give at a rent of six shillings a year. First, having in this Act, and for the first time anywhere, so far as I can discover, put in his claim to be “entitled to the waste ground within the said parish (subject to commonage thereon).”

But the sum to which this Act limited the taxing, was found to be insufficient; and another Act was required, “for enlarging the powers of, and rendering more effectual, an Act, made in the twenty-eighth year of the reign of his present Majesty, entituled, An Act for re-building the Parish Church of Paddington, &c., &c.” This, the thirty-third Geo. III, cap. 43, dated thirtieth April, 1793, contains all the whining for further powers, which so commonly saluted the ears of his Majesty’s faithful Lords and Commons when church-building Acts had to be separately passed. [136]

And the prayer of those who asked, was answered; and a further sum was to be raised by the means provided in the previous Act; but with this additional screw—“That in every case where a justice or justices of the peace shall grant a warrant or warrants of distress, for recovering of any rate or assessment made under the said former or this Act, and a sufficient distress cannot be found, it shall be lawful for such justice or justices of the peace to commit the person or persons, against whom or whose goods and chattels such warrant or warrants of distress may have been issued, to the common gaol or house of correction for the said county, there to remain without bail or mainprize, for any time not exceeding one month, or until payment of such rate or assessment, and the costs and charges attending the recovery thereof”—Section 2.

Further, desecration of the church-yard was permitted; and in spite of all the thought which had been bestowed on the monuments and tombstones in the previous Act, any decayed vault, tombstone, or grave, which offended the sight of the officials, was now to be taken down, or removed, after six months’ notice to repair had been given to “the owner or owners of such vaults.” And the churchwarden or churchwardens, for the time being, were empowered “to sell and dispose of such vaults for the best price that can be got, and to apply the money arising therefrom towards rebuilding or repairing the said parish church.”

And why were these extraordinary powers granted? Because the inhabitants of Paddington were not “capable of raising without the further aid of Parliament,” or were not willing to raise, “a further sum of one thousand five hundred pounds,” to defray the expences required to finish the church-yard; and to pay “a considerable sum of money due on account;” and because those who took the profits of “the rectorial and other lands,” did not think it their duty to pay it for them.