Saturday 4 August 2007

Now and Then IV

The view of the Cathedral from Morpeth Terrace has vastly changed in the last century, but as these old pictures show, before the construction of the Piazza, it was the favourite dramatic shot of the building.



Just glimpsed on the far right is the edge of St Anne's Anglican Church, destroyed in the Blitz. The Church is more clearly seen below: I've never heard how they felt co-existing with their Roman Catholic neighbour!

The post-war buildings now owned by John Lewis parternship make this a rather dark and dull passage. The cars are not nearly so interesting as their predecessors. The trees, however, thrive!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The Anglican church that once stood next to the cathedral, and was built beforehand, was St Andrew's. St Anne's was a small former Irvingite church near Strutton Ground that was dedicated to her when it was bought by the Catholic church. It was dark and had a wonderful atmosphere. Pity it's gone. St Andrew's was bombed but the vicarage continued as a clergy house for St Stephen's, Rochester Row. The views of the resident clergy towards the Cathedral were probably ambivalent. In it's heyday St Andrew's was broad to low and probably resented the building of the Cathedral so close. There was no competition.