St Peter's History: Part One
Pre 1914
Before the First World War
For centuries, the everyday life of the Cathedral and City of Ely depended upon the River Great Ouse. In the Middle Ages, clerics and pilgrims came from far and near, landing on the river bank and taking the steep paths - now Fore Hill and Back Hill - up to the monastery. Goods came to the Ely docks by barge from King’s Lynn in the north bearing timber, coal and iron products. From Peterborough came bricks and from Cambridge and the south came other types of merchandise. Out from Ely, especially to King’s Lynn, went exports of baskets, malt and grain. River traffic was considerable even in the late 1920s. In 1845, the railway was extended to Ely and the station was built at the foot of the hill by the river.
Thus, a large part of the city's population lived in Ely's riverside area, south of the Cathedral, as it was usual in those days for workers to live as close as possible to their places of work. Many small dwellings were crowded together in the narrow flat space between the river and the Cathedral precincts but there was no place of worship nearby. The Cathedral was away up the hill and served an entirely different need. The City of Ely was divided into two parishes and both churches were on the hill: Ely St Mary served the district to the west of the Lynn Road whilst Ely Holy Trinity served the area to the east of it and to the south of The Gallery. This latter parish included Broad Street and the riverside area but its principal church, housed from 1566 to 1938 in the Cathedral's Lady Chapel, seemed remote from the needs and life of the workers living along its southern border.
For centuries, the everyday life of the Cathedral and City of Ely depended upon the River Great Ouse. In the Middle Ages, clerics and pilgrims came from far and near, landing on the river bank and taking the steep paths - now Fore Hill and Back Hill - up to the monastery. Goods came to the Ely docks by barge from King’s Lynn in the north bearing timber, coal and iron products. From Peterborough came bricks and from Cambridge and the south came other types of merchandise. Out from Ely, especially to King’s Lynn, went exports of baskets, malt and grain. River traffic was considerable even in the late 1920s. In 1845, the railway was extended to Ely and the station was built at the foot of the hill by the river.
Thus, a large part of the city's population lived in Ely's riverside area, south of the Cathedral, as it was usual in those days for workers to live as close as possible to their places of work. Many small dwellings were crowded together in the narrow flat space between the river and the Cathedral precincts but there was no place of worship nearby. The Cathedral was away up the hill and served an entirely different need. The City of Ely was divided into two parishes and both churches were on the hill: Ely St Mary served the district to the west of the Lynn Road whilst Ely Holy Trinity served the area to the east of it and to the south of The Gallery. This latter parish included Broad Street and the riverside area but its principal church, housed from 1566 to 1938 in the Cathedral's Lady Chapel, seemed remote from the needs and life of the workers living along its southern border.
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In the late 1880s Catharine Maria Sparke, widow of Canon Edward Bowyer Sparke, was looking to provide a fitting tribute to her husband's memory and, knowing that he had been keenly aware of the need for a church in Ely's riverside district, decided upon such a venture. The church was to be a mission church within the Parish of Holy Trinity. Already, before its foundation, there existed in the parish a Guild of St Peter which offered to ordinary working people a simple rule of Christian living. Thus its dedication was decided and presumably it was envisaged that members of this Guild would form the core of the new mission church's congregation.
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The new church was built at a cost of £5,000 on land which had previously been an orchard. On St Peter's Day, 1889, the foundation stone was laid and, on Monday 30th June the following year, the church was dedicated to St Peter by the Bishop of Ely, Lord Alwyne Compton, and opened for worship. Catharine Sparke established two endowed Trusts: one for the building and establishment of the church and the other for the provision of a Priest or Curate under the direction of the Vicar of Holy Trinity and his successors who would be responsible for holding services in accordance with the Doctrines and Liturgies of the Church of England.
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In 1892-93, a young Curate of Holy Trinity, The Revd Salisbury Price, who had taken an interest in the St Peter's project both before and after the church was built, transformed its internal appearance by commissioning a Rood Screen by the young Ninian Comper and an East Window by the celebrated glass-artist Charles Kempe.
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A third astonishingly generous adornment of St Peter's, the Pipe-Organ by William Hill and Son, was given rather later by the Upcher family, into which the daughter and heiress of Edward and Catharine Sparke had married.
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