St Bartholomew-the-Great

Interior facing east: sanctuary in centre with Sir Robert Chamberlayne's monument (1615) on the left wall, opposite a memorial tablet to Alderman Percival and Agnes Smallpace[2][3]

The church was founded in 1123 by Rahere, a prebendary of St Paul's Cathedral and an Augustinian canon regular.[4] While in Italy, he had a dream that a winged beast came and transported him to a high place, then relayed a message from "the High Trinity and...the court of Heaven" that he was to erect a church in the London suburb of Smithfield.[5] Rahere travelled to London and was informed that the area in his vision – then a small cemetery – was royal property, and that nothing could be built upon it. Henry I, however, granted the title of the land to Rahere after he explained his divine message.[5]

Rahere started construction on the building with the use of servants and child labourers, who collected stones from all over London.[5]

Coat of arms of the Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great

The priory gained a reputation for curative powers, with many sick people filling its aisles, notably on 24 August (St Bartholomew's Day). Many miracles were attributed to occur within and without the walls of the building, including "a light sent from heaven" from its first foundation, and especially miraculous healings; many serious disabilities were claimed to be cured after a visit.[5] Many of these cures were undertaken at the church hospital, the still existing St Bartholomew's Hospital.[5]

The final Prior was Robert Fuller, the Abbot of Waltham Holy Cross. He was favoured by King Henry VIII, having been invited to attend the christening of Prince Edward, and did not oppose the dissolution of the Priory.[6]

While much of the hospital survived the Dissolution of the Monasteries, about half of the priory's church was ransacked before being demolished in 1543.[7] Having escaped the Great Fire of London of 1666,[8] the church fell into disrepair, becoming occupied by squatters in the 18th century. W. G. Grace, however, was one famous congregant before its restoration in the late 19th century,[9] when it was rebuilt under Sir Aston Webb's direction.[10] During Canon Edwin Savage's tenure as rector, the church was further restored at the cost of more than £60,000.[11] The surviving building had comprised part of a priory adjoining St Bartholomew's Hospital,[12] but its nave was pulled down up to the last bay but the crossing and choir survive largely intact from the Norman[13] and later Middle Ages, enabling its continued use as a parish church. The church and some of the priory buildings were briefly used as the third Dominican friary (Black Friars) of London, refounded by Queen Mary I of England in 1556 and closed in 1559.[14] Part of the main entrance to the church remains at West Smithfield, nowadays most easily recognisable by its half-timbered, late 16th-century, Tudor frontage built on the older (13th-century) stone arch. This adaptation may originally have been carried out by the Dominican friars in the 1550s,[14] or by the post-Reformation patron of the advowson, Lord Rich, Lord Chancellor of England (1547–51).[15] From this gatehouse to the west door of the church, the path leads along roughly where the south aisle of the nave formerly existed. Very little trace of its monastic buildings now survive.

In the early 1720s, at the suggestion of Governor of Pennsylvania Sir William Keith, 4th Baronet, the American polymath and patriot Benjamin Franklin worked as a typesetter in a printer's shop in what is now the Church of St Bartholomew-the-Great.

South aisle, looking east toward the sanctuary and Lady chapel

The Lady chapel at the east end had been previously used for commercial purposes and it was there that Benjamin Franklin worked for a year as a journeyman printer. The north transept was also formerly used as a blacksmith's forge.

The principal remaining area of the churchyard is a raised garden, which was laid out by the Metropolitan Public Gardens Association's landscape gardener Fanny Wilkinson in 1885.[16]

In 1889, a restoration programme began which saw the restoration of the Lady Chapel and south transept and a new north transept. The restored south transept was opened by Frederick Temple, the Bishop of London, on 14 March 1891; and the south transept in February 1893 in the presence of the Albert Edward, the Prince of Wales, Alexandra of Denmark (the Princess of Wales), Edward White Benson (the Archbishop of Canterbury) and other dignitaries.[17]

The Priory Church was one of the few City churches to escape damage during the Blitz and, in 1941, was where the 11th Duke of Devonshire and the Hon Deborah Mitford were married.

North aspect of the church from Cloth Fair

The poet and heritage campaigner Sir John Betjeman kept a flat opposite the churchyard on Cloth Fair. Betjeman considered the church to have the finest surviving Norman interior in London.[18]

In 2005 a memorial service was held for Sir William Wallace, on the 700th anniversary of the Scottish hero's execution nearby, organised by the historian David R. Ross.

Charitable distributions in the churchyard on Good Friday continue. A centuries-old tradition established when twenty-one sixpences were placed upon the gravestone of a woman stipulating that the bequest fund an annual distribution to twenty one widows in perpetuity,[19] with freshly baked hot cross buns nowadays being given not only to widows but others.[20]

The church was designated a Grade I listed building on 4 January 1950.[21] In April 2007 it became the first Anglican parish church to charge an entrance fee to tourists not attending worship.[22]

After a few years in which the rector of the church was simultaneously priest-in-charge of the nearby St Bartholomew the Less, which retained its own Parochial church council (PCC) and churchwardens, on 1 June 2015, the parishes of both churches were dissolved and replaced with the united benefice of Great St Bartholomew. The Rector of the former parish of St Bartholomew the Great became rector of the united benefice. The boundary of the new parish incorporates precisely both former parishes. There is now a single PCC and churchwardens responsible for both buildings. The parish church is St Bartholomew the Great, while St Bartholomew the Less is a chapel of ease within the parish.

Priory Church's pipe organ (2009)

St Bartholomew the Great had an organ installed by John Knopple in 1715. This was superseded by an organ in 1731 from Richard Bridge. In 1886, it was replaced by the organ from St Stephen Walbrook which was installed by William Hill. Further modifications were made in 1931 by Henry Speechly & Son, in 1957 by N.P. Mander and in 1982–83 by the firm of Peter Wells. Specifications of the church's organ are detailed on the National Pipe Organ Register.[46] Currently, the church is using a Viscount digital organ for services, but the process of acquiring a new instrument (an American Symphonic Pipe Organ built by Schoenstein & Co.) has begun.

Unusually for a parish church, the Priory Church Choir comprises professional singers; it is directed by Rupert Gough. A choir of amateur singers, the Rahere Singers, sings for some services.[47]

In 2009 the roles of Organist and Director of Music were divided into two posts.

• Nigel Short 2009–15[49]

In 2015 the roles of Organist and Director of Music were recombined as the new post of Organist and Director of Music.

• Rupert Gough, 2015–present[50]

• Ben Horden, January 2016 – May 2017