Clerkenwell St John, Middlesex Genealogy

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St John the Baptist, St John Square, Clerkenwell was a chapel of ease within the ancient parish of St James Clerkenwell. It was created as part of the Building Act previous to when it began operation--the year 1723.

The churches of St. James and St. John, formerly the only churches, have each a distinct parochial district attached... The living of St. John's is a rectory not in charge, in the patronage of the Crown; net income, £260. The church, with large curtailments and alterations, is the choir of that belonging to the priory of the Knights Hospitallers. The ancient edifice was purchased of the Aylesbury family, in 1721, by Mr. Simon Michell, who, having repaired the choir, built the present west front, and covered the whole with a new roof, disposed of the church and adjoining grounds, in 1723, for £2950, to the commissioners for building fifty new churches in Queen Anne's reign, who constituted it a parish church, and caused it to be consecrated on St. John's day, December 27th. The interior of the building was much improved in 1845. Notwithstanding that it enjoys the privilege of religious rites, the incumbent of St. James' is entitled to the surplice fees, which he has received since the year 1771, when a lawsuit was successfully prosecuted for their recovery: there are separate churchwardens for St. John's church, but the inhabitants of both districts contribute to the repairs of the two churches, and the same overseers of the poor act for the whole.

From: A Topographical Dictionary of England (1848), pp. 626-632. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=50882 Date accessed: 15 April 2010. [Adapted from: Guide to Ancestral Research in London; published 1987]