Sneaking up on a much-loved building ………

This is the former Congregational Church which has now been eclipsed by the high blocks of offices and apartments which surround it.

The Congregational Church, 2023

At the end of the last century and into the beginning of this one it was an impressive landmark in this part of the city, framed by the railway bridge, the canal network behind and the old Knott Mill Railway Station almost opposite.

Its spire rose upwards unchallenged by other buildings and always made me think it had a fine history.

My Pevsner tell me that it was built in "1858 by Edward Walters, Brick with stone dressing, a design of interpenetrating temple fronts with a tall slender Campanile attached to the s…..The Veneto-Byzantine style campanile has blind arcading to the first stage, with stone arcaded belfry stage and steep concave roof with lucarnes.  It was converted to recording studios in the 1980s and the basement is used as a café bar”.*

Since the Pevsner entry was written the owner of the studios, Pete Waterman sold it in 2006 and it is now a set of offices.

Glimpsed from Deansgate, 2023

Over the years I have photographed it from the road coming into the city centre, from the old canal side and from the platform of the Deansgate Castlefield tram stop.

Lost among the tower blocks, 2023

But yesterday I came across it while wandering around those little streets off the twisty bit of Deansgate.

These include Little Peter Street, Commercial Street and Hewitt Street.

And it is from Hewitt Street that I got the shot, with the railway bridge to my right and I rather like it.

That said this last image is the one most of us see and record.

The elegant church tower looks just an after thought set against the commercial skyline of the 21st century

Location; Hewitt Street and Deansgate

Picture; Sneaking up on the Congregational Church from Hewitt Street, 2023, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Manchester, Hartwell Clare, Pevsner Architectural Guides, 2001

A little bit of Deansgate in Thornham

Now, for most of us history doesn’t get any better than when you can touch something from the past.

St John's Church, 1924

And when that something comes from a building which was demolished 90 years ago it just gets better.

The romantic in me remains fascinated at being able to hold an object which some one else long ago was familiar with.  

And it works on several different levels.  

First there is that link with a different time and possibly someone whose outlook and experiences were so different from my own, which sets off that imaginative trail of wondering who they were, and how their life turned out.  

Added to which there is that fanciful idea that somewhere will be that person’s fingerprints.

Interior of St James', 2021

But being realistic I know the chances of any fingerprints still being on the object are pretty remote, while trying to conjure up a past life is not very historical.

Still, I was quite excited when Mark Johnson responded to a story I posted on Deansgate, with “Is that the tower of St John’s Church - there are many items from St John’s Church installed in my church at St James Thornham near Royton and Rochdale - including the congregation pews and the historic wardens pews?”

And then proceeded to add some pictures, including at my request one of the exterior of the church, with the comment, “Pews from St John’s Deansgate including the historic Wardens Pews.  

St James Thornham was consecrated in 1928 which coincided with the sad demolition of St John’s Deansgate.  Sadly, St James’s  was never completed and is missing the Bell Tower, North Aisle and original vestries.”.

Interior of St James', 2021

But what a bonus, to have a collection of church furniture dating back to the late 18th century.

St John’s was established in 1769 and demolished in 1931. Its site is now that of St John's Gardens, situated between Lower Byrom Street, Byrom Street and Quay Street.*

My copy of The Stanger’s Guide to Manchester, published in 1850,  …. tells me that as well as having a peal of bells and a clock, “the church contains three galleries, in one of which there is a very good organ”, a collection of stained glass including “two coloured windows … under the south gallery which were brought from a convent at Rouen in France”.

Interior of St James', 2021

The “first marriage was not until 1804 … and the times of the service  on Sundays, are at half-past ten, and half-past six.”

So, while I will never now be able to attend either of those Sunday Services, a visit to the church of St James Thornham near Royton sems a neat link with the past.

Location; Manchester & Thornham

Interior of St John's 1994

Pictures; St John Street, and St John’s Church, 1924, Phipson-E-A, Watercolour, m80190, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and pews in at St James Thornham near Royton and Rochdale, 2021, from the collection of Mark Johnson, and the interior of St John's, 1894, H E Tidmarsh, Manchester Old and New, Vol 11, William Arthur Shaw, 1894

* St John’s Church, Manchester, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_John%27s_Church,_Manchester

**The Stanger’s Guide to Manchester, H.G. Duffield, 1850, pages 27-28