Welcome to Our Parish

The first Parish Priest of St Peter’s arrived in 1891.  Father Joseph Haynes was temporarily housed at Dockhead whilst he conducted mass in a chapel established in Paradise Street at the school of St Joseph in 1892. The Diocese purchased land adjacent to the school (now destroyed) and Father Haynes oversaw the build of St Peter and the Guardian Angels, for which funding was immediately sought.

The church was built in memory of Sir Peter le Page Renouf (1822-1897), a convert to the Catholic faith who finished his career as an Egyptologist (Curator of the Oriental Collection at the British Museum) but had previously been one of Her Majesty’s Inspectors for Schools.  In this latter role he had visited St Joseph’s school frequently, and his wife, Ludovica de Brentano, Lady Renouf, helped to fund the church due to that connection, in the memory of her husband.

The church was built in a style reminiscent of the Romanesque by architect Francis William Tasker (1848-1904) and cost £6000.00.  It is built of London stock brick with six tall round-headed windows and an inset arched and gabled entrance formed of good quality yellow stock brick and decorative white and dark grey bricks.  It has a timber roof supported on hammer beams. A large round window was set into its western end, a feature particularly favoured by Tasker and seen in other Churches built by him.

There is a choir gallery and a stone font that sits on five columns with various emblems. A small organ was added in 1922.  Between 1925-1930 Father David Leahy was responsible for adding an eastern apse with a sanctuary that contains a baldacchino Arch in Sicilian marble. The Lady Altar was also added by Father Leahy, with a stone reredos featuring the Madonna and Child, St Joseph and King David. The Church was redecorated in 2013.

The sanctuary occupies the eastern bay of the main space and a shallow apse beyond this, with a giant white marble baldacchino.  This has coffering in the underside of its arched top and Egyptian-style capitals, possible in honour of the donor (although he baldacchino was added 25 or so years later).  Tis, forward altar, ambo and retaining walls are all of Sicilian marble.  On the north side of the sanctuary is the Lady Altar with a stone Gothic reredos of Our Lady flanked by St Joseph and King David, and with marble cladding to the walls.  Nearby is plaque to the donor.

The Stations of the Cross are framed canvas paintings by Luigi Morgari (1874 -1936).

The Statues in the Church were installed shortly after the Church was built.

• Sacred Heart and plaque – was given in memory of Peter Joseph Dennien and Francis Joseph Dennien who died in the great war (1914 -18)
• The statue of St Joseph is by Mayer of Munich.
• Our Lady of Lourdes and Bernadette
• Statue of St Peter
• Statue of St Teresa of Lisieux
• Statue of St Anthony
• Statue of St Patrick.

The Portrait of the Holy Family is by anon.

No bombs fell near it from either airships or planes in the First World War, but during the Second World War, when the Surrey Commercial Docks were targeted, a bouncing bomb landed on its roof.  There was no damage to the church itself but much of the surrounding area was destroyed.

Directly opposite the church in the early 20th Century were the Park Buildings, five storeys high, which opened in 1908 and were demolished in the 1970s. A little further down the road to the west was the Queen’s Head public house (which was demolished in 1973). The church now sits on the edge of King’s Stairs Gardens.