St. Edmund King and Martyr
St. Edmund’s stands on Lombard Street, as shown in Civitas Londinum (the ‘Agas map’) from about 1561.
St. Edmund’s stands in Lombard Street, which is now in the City’s financial centre. It is dedicated to the 9th century King Edmund of East Anglia who was defeated in battle by Danish Vikings in about 870. He was used for target practice for refusing to renounce his Christian faith and divide his kingdom with pagans. (He was later buried in the abbey of Bury St. Edmunds). During the 12th century the church was known as St. Edmund Grasschurch due to its proximity to a haymarket.
The medieval building was destroyed in the Great Fire and rebuilt under Wren, but possibly from a design by his assistant Robert Hooke, and completed in 1679. The older building may have been parallel to Lombard Street but reorientated along the lane leading into George Yard to reduce the frontage and capitalise on the valuable site. It is now one of three churches in the City, along with St. Botolph without Aldgate and St. Dunstan in the West, that is on a north-south axis. The tower, in the centre of the south wall fronting Lombard Street, had to be rebuilt in 1707 by Wren’s former apprentice Nicholas Hawksmoor. It is topped with an octagonal leaded lantern and trumpet-shaped tower. A projecting clock below the tower dates from around 1810.
The rectangular interior was much altered during the Victorian period. St. Edmund’s was hit by German bombs in 1917 and again in 1941, perhaps the only surviving City church to be damaged in both World Wars.
Several parishes were united with that of St. Edmund’s after they ceased to be parochial: St. Leonard Eastcheap, St. Mary Woolchurch Haw, St. Nicholas Acons (all destroyed in the Great Fire and not rebuilt); St. Benet Gracechurch (demolished in 1867); St. Dionis Backchurch (demolished in 1878); All Hallows Lombard Street (demolished in 1938); and St. Mary Woolnoth and St. Margaret Pattens (both becoming non-parochial Guild churches in the 1950s). St. Edmund contains a 17th century royal coat of arms from St. Dionis.
St. Edmund’s is now one of three in the City that are part of the IMPRINT group of independent churches, along with St. Mary Woolnoth and St. Clement Eastcheap, with limited opening times outside of services.
Sources include:
- Stephen Millar ‘London’s City Churches’
- R.G. Ellen ‘A London Steeplechase’
- Tony Tucker ‘City of London Churches’
