St Mary Redcliffe

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St. Mary Redcliffe from the north west.

The nave of St. Mary Redcliffe church. Some of the thousand gilded roof-bosses can be seen.

St. Mary Redcliffe, the Harrison and Harrison organ console of 1912, restored in 1990

St Mary Redcliffe is a large Anglican parish church located in the Redcliffe district of the English port city of Bristol, close to the city centre. The church is Grade I listed, the tallest building in Bristol, and the second tallest parish church in the country after St James, Louth.

Parts of the church date to the beginning of the 12th century. However, most parts are the work of 15th century masons. The strong vertical lines of the gothic church direct the eye upwards giving the impression of great space and height. Much of the medieval church decoration was lost during the Reformation and the English Civil War. Little of the stained glass remained. In the west window of St John's Chapel, for instance, the mediaeval glass barely survived the destruction (said to have been caused by Oliver Cromwell's men). Most of the higher portions went untouched, but others were severely damaged. In some cases the windows were impossible to repair, and clear glass was eventually introduced to replace the missing scenes.

In the times of Queen Anne, the interior of St. Mary Redcliffe was decorated in the flamboyant Baroque style. A great altarpiece by William Hogarth was commissioned to fill the east end of the chancel. The Churchwardens paid him £525 for his paintings of the Ascension flanked by The Sealing of the Sepulchre and the Three Marys at the Tomb.

The first pipe organ in the church, built by Harris and Byfield in 1726, was of three manuals and twenty-six stops. In 1912 a four manual seventy-one stop organ was built by Harrison and Harrison. Towards the end of his life Arthur Harrison said that he regarded the organ at St. Mary Redcliffe as his "finest and most characteristic work". This view has been echoed since by other notable organists. This organ was restored most recently in 1990, but remains essentially as Arthur Harrison designed it in 1912.

The Victorian stained glass windows were created by some of the finest studios of that period. In 1872 the spire was rebuilt to a height of 292ft (90m).

During the Second World War a bomb exploded in a nearby street, throwing a rail from the tramway over the houses and into the churchyard of St. Mary Redcliffe, where it became embedded in the ground. The rail is left there as a monument.

In 1571, what was to become St Mary Redcliffe and Temple School was formed in a chapel in the churchyard. The church and school have remained closely linked in many aspects of their operations.

Thomas Chatterton lived next to the church in the mid-18th century.