Baptism Font, St John’s Cathedral - Portsmouth, Hampshire - Stone Church Artefacts on Waymarking.com

Victorian font made of white stone with gilded highlights in the Cathedral of St John the Evangelist.

"Before 1791 it was illegal for Catholics to have chapels within towns of Borough status, like Portsmouth. The Second Catholic Relief Act of 1791 allowed Catholics to open a chapel in Portsmouth. A group of Catholic lay people in the town appealed to the Catholic bishop in London for a priest whom they would support. The first priest was John Cahill who had a chapel in a private house in Unicorn Street. He was succeeded in 1794 by Joseph Knapp who opened a purpose-built chapel in 1796 in Prince George Street to seat 300 people. This chapel was enlarged in 1851 because of the ever-increasing number of Catholic soldiers in the British Army (about 30%) and Portsmouth was a major garrison town. By the late 1870s an even larger church was needed. The land that this cathedral is built on was purchased from the War Department in 1877 because Portsmouth's defensive ramparts, 100 metres to the west, had become redundant and were demolished.

It is the first cathedral to have been built in Portsmouth as the Anglican Cathedral Church of St Thomas was not opened until 1927. The new church was opened for worship in August 1882 and was immediately made the mother church of the new Catholic Diocese of Portsmouth. The old chapel was closed and the cathedral was completed in four phases: 1882, the nave; 1886, the crossing; 1893, the chancel; 1906 the narthex and west Porch. The cathedral was badly damaged when enemy bombing in 1941 destroyed Bishop's House next-door. Since restoration in 1950 the inside of the cathedral has been reordered three times: in 1970, 1982 and 2001.

Until 1884, the cathedral and chapel which proceeded it were the only Catholic churches in the Portsmouth area. In 1884 St Swithun's Church was opened in Southsea."

SOURCE - (visit link)

Approximate Age of Artefact: Not listed Relevant Website: Not listed

Visit Instructions:
Please supply an original picture when visiting this waymark.

Recent Visits/Logs:

There are no logs for this waymark yet.