Patrick Comerford
When we were in Oxford earlier this week, and as temperatures rose during the day and the heatwave took a grip on the land, I spent part of the day walking by the river and in search of some churches and ecclesiastical sites I had not visited before, including Holy Rood Church near Folly Bridge on the Abingdon Road, and Holy Rood Church, the Roman Catholic parish church of Grandpont, which I was writing about yesterday.
Saint Matthew’s Church on Marlborough Road is the neighbouring Church of England parish church. The Grandpont area was named after the ‘grand pont’ or big bridge, which was more of a causeway with a series of bridges leading to the road to Abingdon. The causeway was first built by the Norman baron Robert d’Oilly, who had been made Governor of Oxford by William the Conqueror.
The low-lying land south of the River Thames at Folly Bridge remained part of Berkshire until it was incorporated into the City of Oxford in 1889. This opened the way for much house building in the area that became known as Grandpont.
It takes no more than half an hour to walk from one end of the parish to the other. It is just over a mile long, has an area of 0.4 sq miles and had 3,154 residents at the 2011 census. The parish begins at Folly Bridge, stretches south down the Abingdon Road, past Salter’s Steamers and the site of the original boatyards, and by Holy Rood Church. Within the bounds of the parish are college playing fields, the Buddhist Vihara house and the former South Oxford Baptist Church, now the home of the Oxford Salvation Army and a South Asian congregation.
The streets of Grandpont around Saint Matthew’s form a grid of Victorian and Edwardian terraces, with some student accommodation, and a development of retirement apartments. To the south and west of the parish is the Church of Saint John the Evangelist, New Hinksey, part of the Parish of South Oxford with New Hinksey. Saint John’s is in the Catholic tradition of the Church of England, with episcopal oversight from the Bishop of Ebbsfleet. From time to time, members of Saint Matthew’s have joined Saint John’s for services.
Immediately to the north of the parish, Saint Ebbe’s is a large evangelical church that shares the governance of Saint Ebbe’s Primary School with Saint Matthew’s. To the north and east of the parish, Saint Aldate’s is the large city centre church where Saint Matthew’s has its roots.
Canon Alfred William Millard Christopher (1820-1913), who had been the Rector of Saint Aldate's Church since 1859, raised funds to build a large church on Marlborough Road, one of the principal roads in Grandpont that followed the line of a former spur track from the nearby Great Western Railway.
aint Matthew’s Church, Grandpont, was designed in 15th-century Gothic style by the Bloomsbury-based architects JT Christopher and EE White. The partners were John Thomas Christopher (1830-1910), who had worked briefly in the office of William Burges (1821-1881), the architect of Saint Fin Barre’s Cathedral, Cork (1863), and who may have been a younger brother of Canon Christopher; and Eley Emlyn White (1854-1900), who also designed Saint John’s Church, Watford. Whyte’s private life was turbulent: he separated from his wife and shot himself in Kensington in 1900 after shooting a young actress.
Saint Matthew’s Church was consecrated on 21 June 1890 by William Stubbs (1825-1901), Bishop of Oxford and former Regius Professor of Modern History at Oxford. The church became independent from Saint Aldate’s in the 1920s, with its patronage going to the Oxford Churches Trust, while the patronage of Saint Aldate’s remained with the Simeon Trustees.
A brass plaque on the south wall is in memory of James Arthur Paintin of Marlborough Road, a steward on the Titanic who drowned when the liner sank in April 1912.
The Rev Wilfred Williamson was the vicar during World War I, when 66 men from Grandpont died in the war. Those 66 men are commemorated on the war memorial, and two of them, William Reginald King and Charles George Tyrrell, both 20, are commemorated in plaques on the north wall of the church.
Land behind the church to the east was leased from Brasenose College in 1921 and a small hall was built on the site. The vicarage was originally in Edith Road but a large house on the Abingdon Road was left to Saint Matthew's by an Oxford bookseller, and it remained the Vicarage until 1979.
The Revd (later Canon) David Keith Stather-Hunt (1896-1979) became Vicar in 1929 and remained until 1975. He had been in the Machine Gun Corps during World War I, and was a chaplain in the Territorial Army throughout World War II.
Saint Matthew’s Church struggled during World War II and in the absence of Stather-Hunt, despite Cecil Pain, a churchwarden and the local undertaker, urging him to return to Saint Matthew’s. After the war, and after a sharp disagreement in the parish in 1949, Saint Matthew's sub-let part of its land to Oxford City Football Club.
In the late 1950s and early 1960s, the congregation and Canon Stather-Hunt had aged, and church attendance was in decline. Only 12 parishioners attended his last AGM in February 1975, and at the age of 79 he retired as both Vicar of Saint Matthew’s and prison chaplain in Oxford at Easter 1975, with speculation that Saint Matthew’s would close and become a snooker hall.
Thanks to the efforts of the Revd Keith Weston, Rector of Saint Ebbe’s and Area Dean, the Revd Brian Ringrose became priest-in-charge in September 1975 on his return from mission work in India. When he moved to Scotland in 1979, Saint Matthew’s once again become part of Saint Aldate’s Parish, with the curate of Saint Aldate’s as priest-in-charge of Saint Matthew’s. The Revd John Woolmer, and the curates who followed him, lived at 60 Abingdon Road, and it became ‘the Vicarage’.
John Woolmer was succeeded as priest-in-charge by the Revd David Hawkins, who later became Bishop of Barking (2002-2014). Slowly, Saint Matthew’s began to grow again with the encouragement of Saint Aldate’s Church and the arrival of new, active parishioners.
When the church floor was being replaced in 1982, the congregation of Saint Matthew’s found hospitality for six weeks at Holy Rood Catholic Church on the Abingdon Road, the church I was writing about yesterday.
The Rev John Samways became the curate of Saint Aldate’s and priest-in-charge of Saint Matthew’s in 1986, and when the parish again became independent from Saint Aldate’s in 1995, he became the Vicar of Saint Matthew’s.
Brasenose College repossessed the adjacent Oxford City White House football ground in 1992 and began to redevelop the site, including land leased by Saint Matthew’s with the parish hall. At the same time, Saint Matthew’s bought a yard on the north side of the church. The compensation and changes enabled the parish to build Saint Matthew’s Family Centre beside the church, a new vicarage was built on Marlborough Road, and the church was refurbished.
When John Samways moved to Keynsham near Bristol, he was succeeded by the Revd Steve Hellyer as priest-in-charge from 1998 and then as vicar from 2010.
Saint Matthew’s Church today has a similar appearance to when it was built In 1890, The choir vestry has been removed, and the rood screen has been placed at the back of the church. It was decided in recent year to ‘worship in the round’, the pews are no longer fixed, the chairs are movable, and a projector and screen were installed in 2013.
Saint Matthew’s is in the centre of Grandpont, close to the river and city centre, and has an average Sunday attendance of 120, with about one-third living in the parish.
A new council estate was built in the early 1930s, and Stather-Hunt built a wooden church there dedicated to Saint Luke in 1933. That building served the Saint Luke’s end of the parish until it was rebuilt in 2013. The new Saint Luke’s was officially opened by the Bishop of Oxford in 2014. Saint Luke’s Church is about a mile away, in the Cold Harbour area and marks the southern-most point of the parish.
Saint Matthew’s and Saint Luke’s have their own distinct styles. Saint Matthew’s has an ‘Open Evangelical’ tradition, but the spirituality in the congregation includes the contemplative, the charismatic, and people with a passion for social action.
The Revd Dr Jenni Williams, the Vicar of Saint Matthew’s and Saint Luke’s, is a former tutor in Old Testament at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford, and the author of several books; the Revd Jon Williams is the associate vicar, the Revd Mike Rayner is the associate minister, and the Revd Rob Rogers and the Revd Bethan Willis are curates.
The staff team includes a families’ worker, youth worker and children’s worker.
• The usual Sunday services in Saint Matthew’s Church are: 10:30: Holy Communion, 6 pm: Evening Prayer (first Sunday); 9:45: Holy Communion, 10:30: Morning Prayer, 6 pm: Evening Prayer (second Sunday); 10:30: Holy Communion, 3 pm: Messy Church, 6 pm: Evening Prayer (third Sunday); 9:45: Holy Communion, 10:30: Morning Prayer, 6 pm: ‘Sustain’ (fourth Sunday); 10:30: Morning Prayer; 6 pm: ‘Sustain’ (fifth Sunday).
