XIII. THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND AFTER 1850.
The most important Church building, in central Dover, after 1850 was the erection of St. James's new Parish Church. That parish had long been short of Church accom- modation, owing to the closing of the Castle Church in 1690, after which St. James's Old Church had to provide accom- modation for the Castle population. When the question of re-building was raised in i860 it was found to be impossible to erect a sufficiently large Church on the old site at the top of St. James's Street; therefore a .spot was selected further north where a new suburb was extending along the Maison Dieu Road. The building was designed by Mr. Talbot Bury in the Early English Decorated style ; the cost was ;^ 1 2,000; and accommodation was provided for 1,400 persons. A graceful tower, surmounted by a spire, gives the west front a picturesque appearance. When this new building was opened in 1862 it became the Parish Church. The old edifice, at the top of St. James's Street, was used for a time as a French Protestant Church; but in 1869 it was restored and used, under the control of the Rector, as a Chapel-of-ease.
The old Church of St. Mary-in-thc-Castle was restored at the expense of the War Department by Sir Gilbert Scott, and re-opened in i<S62, after being in ruins for 172 years, and the principal Military Chaplain ofliciates there for the Military population in and around the Castle.
On the W^estern Heights, just within the ramparts, overlooking the North Military Road, a Garrison Church, which is a spacious and substantial Gothic structure, was erected in 1859. It is in the vicinity of the foundations of an ancient round church, said to have belonged to the Knights Templars, but it was so small that it seems more likely to have been a shrine on the wayside in the Middle Ages when the main road from Folkestone passed over these Heights into Dover.
The first effort of the Church of England to provide for public worship in Tower Hamlets was the building of a small Mission Room in Black Horse Lane, since called 'Tower
Hamlets Road ; and further accommodation was provided in 1873 by the erection of an iron church beyond the railway in Tower Hamlets Street. The Rev. Walker Flower first ministered there, and was succeeded by the Rev. E. F. Churton, who continued the services until St. Bartholomew's, in the Early English style, was built at a cost of ;^7,5oo, a short distance from where the original Tower Hamlets Mission Room stood. The Iron Church up in Tower Hamlets was disposed of, but a brick building, called St. Michael's Mission Church, was built near the same spot. Later, that Mission Church was used as a Girls' Elementary School, and a new Mission Hall was, in 1905, erected in Curzon Road, Tower Hamlets, at a cost of ^1,200.
Buckland Parish Church was further enlarged in 1880. At that time there was a debt of ^80 left from the enlarge- ment of J 85 1, and an attempt was made in 1876 to raise that amount by a Church Rate, Init that being overruled by an appeal to the House of Eords. it was raised l)y voluntary contributiuns. .so the way was cleare<l for U\o enlargement of 1880. The nave was extended by adding three more arches, 250 additional sittings were provided, at a cost of ;^2,ooo. The great expense was partly due to the fact that the historic yew tree at the west end had to be remove 1 sixty feet westward to make room for the extension. The tree, which is supposed to be a thousand years old, has maintained its vitality in the new situation, and is now more than ever an object of curiosity.
The small Parish Church of Charllcjn, which from the Thirteenth Century had stood beside the mill-pond, a picturesque fabric, was taken down in 1893, and a large new Church of Early English '^esign was built a short distance eastward. The cost of the ne.v building was about ^12,000, the prime movers in the buildi ig movement being Mr. George Fielding, solicitor, and the Rev. Canon Walker Flower, both of whom have passed to their res*^. The English Church Union contributed ;^ 1,200, the inuntion being to meet the cost of the Chancel as a memr rial of the saciifice of position and personal liberty made, 1 ir Church [irinciples, by the then Rector, the Rev. S. F. <ireen, M.A., when he was in the Diocese of Manchester.
A new Church, in Buckland parish, near the boundary of Charlton, dedicated to St. Barnabas, was built on a part of Barton Me.idow in the year 11,01. the memorial stone
being laid by the late Mr. Robert Hesketh Jones, J. P. The plans, in decorated Gothic, were prepared by Mr. B. Ingelow, and the cost was ;£6,it^o as far as the permanent work was carried out, which included the chancel and portions of the nave and aisles. A corrugated iron annexe provides the further accommodation intended to be supplied eventually by the completion of the nave and aisles. The first Vicar was the Rev. Cyril Golding-Bird, who, in 1907, was appointed Dean of the Falkland Islands, and in 1914 became the first Bishop of Kalgoorlie, West Australia.
In the suburb of Maxton, at the entrance to Elms Vale, a modern Church has been built, dedicated to St. Martin, the patron saint of Dover, in an ecclesiastical district formed partly out of Christ Church district and partly out of the old parish of Hougham, of which the first Vicar was the Rev. Arthur Jephson.
The population of Dover having increased in the period between 1850 and 19 10 from 20,000 to 45,000, the above mentioned additional Church accommodation had become absolutely necessary.