St Mary Aldermary

Story

The Guild Church of St Mary Aldermary is an Anglican church located in Watling Street at the junction with Bow Lane, in the City of London. Of medieval origin, it was rebuilt from 1510. Badly damaged in the Great Fire of London in 1666, it was rebuilt once more, this time by Sir Christopher Wren, unlike the vast majority of his City churches in a Gothic style.HistoryThere has been a church on the site for over 900 years. Its name is usually taken to mean that it is the oldest of the City churches dedicated to the Virgin Mary. The patronage of the rectory of St Mary Aldermary belonged to the prior and chapter of Canterbury, but was transferred to the Archbishop of Canterbury in 1400.In 1510, Sir Henry Keeble financed the building of a new church. The tower was still unfinished when he died in 1518. In 1629, two legacies enabled it to be completed, and the work, begun 120 years before, was finished within three years. Keble was buried in a vault beneath the floor of church, but his grave was not allowed to remain for long. Richard Newcourt recorded that Sir William Laxton, who died in 1556, and Sir Tho. Lodge, who died in 1583 (both which were Grocers and had been Mayors of this City), were buried in the Vault of this Sir Henry Keeble, his bones unkindly cast out, and his Monument pull'd down, in place whereof, Monuments were set up of the others. John Stow mentions various dignitaries buried in the early church in his 1598 Survey of London. They include Richard Chaucer, vintner, said by Stow to be the father of the poet Geoffrey Chaucer. John Milton married his third wife, Elizabeth Minshull, in the church in 1663. The parish registers date from 1558, and are now deposited in the Guildhall Library.