Paddington: Past and Present

by William Robins

The structure, as it now stands, is said to be the result of the combined genius of Messrs. Gutch and Goldicutt; and we are further told that this precious specimen of “Brummagem Gothic,” was originally designed for a Grecian building, but was altered to suit the “taste of the times.” Mr. Vulliamy, one of the gentlemen who had responded to the advertisement, felt his talent to be so scandalized by the acceptance of this clumsy design, that he printed a letter, which he addressed to the vestry; in which he points out that the successful candidate is very improperly, as he thinks, an influential member of that board. This gentleman, was the bishop’s surveyor, and the district-surveyor—two offices totally incompatible. But who could be supposed to know better the tastes and wants of the people of Paddington? So little did he know, however, that his second, or amended design, was found to be so obtrusively ugly that those who had adopted it could not see it carried out; and, although the original estimate for this design was fixed at £8,600, another thousand was readily added, in order that the deformity, which had been so unanimously fixed on, might be again amended!

This church in all its present taste, the vestry agreed should become the parish church; but it was not till March, 1845, that the Reverend Chairman reported to the vestry that the Church Commissioners had executed the deed to transfer the rights, &c., from St. Mary’s to St. James’s.

A distinct understanding was come to at this time that the old church should be enlarged. And “by these means,” says the report of 1840, “accommodation will be provided for four thousand persons, or including Bayswater chapel, which may hereafter be made a parochial chapel, for more than five thousand persons, in a parish supposed to contain twenty thousand souls.” The report goes on to state that each of the four districts, into which the parish will be divided, “will be placed under the immediate care of its respective minister or ministers; and these important results will have been obtained without any compulsory levy on the parishioners.”

Besides a miscalculation of at least four thousand in the then actual population of Paddington, these reporters must have been very ignorant of the previous history of the parish, or they must have had very bad memories. We have seen how St. Mary’s was built, and how it was paid for; and a church-rate enforced by warrants of distress, and these again backed up by the certainty of imprisonment, till the rate and all expenses were paid, I think one may call a compulsory levy. Even those who lived in the parish the year before this report was written, had felt the twitch of this clerical scourge,—not the last they were to feel by a great number; for on the twenty-fourth of April, 1839, a church-rate was made, and the Cash Accounts for the year ending, April, 1838–39, shew that £850 5s. 9¾d. had been collected by “compulsory levy,” in these years, “to pay off Mrs. Jenks’s last Church Bond Debt.” But how these reporters could have forgotten the day ever memorable in the annals of the present vestry of Paddington, I cannot imagine; nor how that on this fifth day of May, 1829, when the church-rate was in danger, the Bishop of London, the Viscount Bernard, the Honourable Mr. Mac’Donald, the Rev. John Joseph Pike, and nine others,—having taken the oath of office, to execute faithfully, impartially, and honestly, according to the best of their skill and knowledge, the several powers and authorities reposed in them—proceeded at once, with other vestrymen, to make a church-rate of threepence in the pound; for so far as I can discover, this is the only time the vestry of Paddington was ever honoured, at its sittings, by a visit from the spiritual and temporal lord of the parish.

This congratulation of the Committee, respecting all the good that had been done without any compulsory levy, was only the warming up, under more favourable circumstances for the instant, of one that had been tendered to the parish, when the first subscriptions for St. John’s were announced. But for that half year, 1826, sixpence in the pound was the amount of the church-rate levied, the full sum allowed by the law. And, although there was no compulsory levy at the time this report was written—none from 1839 to 1842,—yet there was one made in the latter year, which continued to be made twice-a-year, down to 1851, continues to be made annually now, and must be continued for years to come.

On the eighth of February, 1843, “the Committee for building the new church in this parish, have the satisfaction of informing the parishioners, that the church is nearly completed, and will be opened for Divine service, on or before the first of May next, provided sufficient funds for that purpose are previously collected.” So, “the immediate aid of those persons who have not subscribed to this important undertaking” is solicited, “to defray the whole expense, for which a considerable sum is still required.”

But even St. James’s was not finished without a “compulsory levy;” for on the thirtieth of June, 1843, the committee report that after paying £10,000, other expenses had been incurred, and were about to be incurred, which they hoped to raise by subscription. No further subscriptions were forthcoming, however; and in August, 1844, the committee state to the vestry that £950 is still due; that the clock and organ were not subscribed for, as anticipated; and that there are other additional works estimated at £300 more; all of which they beg to transfer to the especial care of the ratepayers. These, as well as other sums, were paid out of the church-rate by order of the vestry.

“The churchwardens’ account for the year 1843–44” shews the “total expenditure for Saint James’s church, for the year ending April, 1844, to have, been £2,190 12s. 5d., the whole of which, with the exception of £200, “the first annual payment from the pew-rents,” was paid by the Churchwardens out of the parish funds. This, however, was not all the Churchwardens paid towards St. James’s; for in “the church-rate account” for the ensuing year, the following item occurs, “January thirtieth, 1845, Paid Mr. Bishop, for organ at St. James’s Church, £497 12s. 6d.” There are other items, too,—balance of architect’s commission, church plate, and printing—which bring the sum paid this year up to £753 8s. 4d., over and above the ordinary disbursements, which are this year £100 more than the pew-rents paid to the churchwardens. Neither was this church, which was to have been built without “compulsory levy,” paid for yet; for in the next year’s account, we find a “Cross Wall” in the vaults paid for; roofing over the vestry room, at St. James’s church; building new porches to the lobby entrances; and the “Turret clock.” These four items amounted to £662 19s. 3d., the ordinary expenses being increased by £246 14s. 11d., above the receipts, for other church fittings. And on the twenty-fourth of December, 1847, there is another £100 paid for re-glazing the windows with ground-glass; so that before St. James’s was fairly done with, it had cost the rate-payers over and above all subscriptions, £3,850 at the least—to say nothing of interest of money borrowed, at a very high rate, to pay these sums. [151a]

Trinity.

“The Holy Double Trinity,” as I once heard it called by the showman, who pointed with his wand to the young lady with two triangles on her breast, who is perched with that ornament, or symbol, in full view of all who enter by the south door; her duplicate being in the same position over the northern entrance. But for this notification, this church might be taken to belong to saints of the masculine gender; the western door being decorated by a gentleman on either side; one with the cross-keys, the other with the cross-swords. But these Guardian Saints are not the only images set up for our love or hatred; confidence or fear; instruction or bamboozlement; on the walls of this church, or they would not be noticed here. Trinity, “the pet church of Paddington,” the church on which church-goers pride themselves as something that is worthy of this great and important parish, is in fact, garnished all over with images, or symbols, and may be considered a creditable mimick of antiquated masonry on a small scale. On this building, both architect and mason appear to have exhausted all the skill of their craft, to produce an edifice, which shall transport the sense of sight, if not the mind it influences, to those glorious middle ages, for the revival of which some few enthusiastic ladies and gentlemen of the nineteenth century are working so desperately. To be obliged to work with the materials of the nineteenth, must be a sad drawback on their enthusiasm. These artists devise all kind of means to give the charm of antiquity to their works, it is true; but there is an air of newness about Trinity, and such like buildings, which is any thing but pleasing, and which ill assorts with any notion of veneration. Some centuries hence, if Trinity does not share the fate of the Sheldon church, children may look on it with something like awe; and grown-up persons with pity for that generation, whose genius—able to make the lightning-force subservient to its will [151b]—able to contrive machines to carry the material form to which that genius is linked, sixty miles an hour with certainty and safety—able to raise structures which surpass in size and beauty, anything the genius of man ever before created, was yet unable to erect a house in which to worship its God, except in mimickry of forms suitable to the intelligence of past and darker ages. [152a]