St Stephen's Chapel, Auckland
| St Stephen's Chapel | |
|---|---|
 St Stephen's Chapel in 2018 | |
 | |
| 36°51′1.28″S 174°47′22.37″E / 36.8503556°S 174.7895472°E | |
| Address | 12 Judge Street, Parnell, Auckland |
| Country | New Zealand |
| Denomination | Anglican |
| Churchmanship | High church |
| Website | www |
| History | |
| Status | Chapel and churchyard |
| Dedication | Saint Stephen |
| Events | 1857 signing of the Constitution of the United Church of England and Ireland in New Zealand |
| Architecture | |
| Functional status | Active |
| Architect(s) | Frederick Thatcher |
| Architectural type | Church |
| Style | Neo-Gothic |
| Completed | 1857 |
| Administration | |
| Province | Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia |
| Diocese | Auckland |
| Parish | Cathedral of the Holy Trinity |
| Designated | 1 September 1983 |
| Reference no. | 22 |
The St Stephen's Chapel is a historic Neo-Gothic Anglican chapel and associated churchyard located in Judges Bay, Parnell, Auckland, New Zealand, and registered as a category 1 building with Heritage New Zealand.
Description
[edit]St Stephen's Chapel is situated on an elevated position above Judge's Bay. The chapel is designed in a Greek cross shape, unlike the Latin cross shape used for most churches. The chapel is made up of five different units each one 10ft by 10 ft (3.0 m). It has high pitched rooves, small lancet windows, and a belfry in the middle.[1][2]
History
[edit]George Augustus Selwyn, the first Bishop of New Zealand moved to Parnell in 1844. At this time the nearest Anglican church was the old St Paul's Church in Emily Place. Selwyn purchased two and a half acres of land situated above Judge's Bay. Selwyn then funded construction of a chapel, which he named St Stephen's Chapel. The chapel was an English Gothic building designed by Sampson Kempthorne and constructed from scoria and rubble. Bishop Selwyn used the chapel until 1847 when a hurricane caused it to collapse on account of the poor quality of construction.[1]
In 1857 Bishop Selwyn commissioned a new chapel. Frederick Thatcher designed it.[1] The chapel is unique in that it was almost certainly built specifically as the place of signing of the constitution of the United Church of England and Ireland in New Zealand on 13 June 1857, and its floor plan is a Greek Cross as a symbol of the establishment of the church, whilst all other churches built for Bishop Selwyn use the traditional Latin cruciform plan.[2]
The chapel fell into disrepair, and was restored in the late 1920s by Archbishop Alfred Averill.[3][1]
The chapel and its churchyard were registered on 1 September 1983 by the New Zealand Historic Places Trust as a Category I historic place with registration number 22.[2]
Notable burials
[edit]- Charles Baker (1803–1875), missionary[4]
- Josiah Firth (1826–1897), businessman and politician[5]
- James Kemp (1797–1872), missionary[6]
- Frederick Whitaker (1812–1891), premier of New Zealand (twice)[7]
- Reader Wood (1821–1895), politician and architect[8]
References
[edit]- ^ a b c d Knight, Cyril Roy (1972). The Selwyn churches of Auckland. Reed. p. 19,43–45.
- ^ a b c St Stephen's Chapel (Report). New Zealand Historic Places Trust. 1980.
- ^ Haworth, Jenny (2016). Auckland Then and Now. United Kingdom: Pavilion Books. p. 88-89. ISBN 978-1-910904-79-4. Wikidata Q116870435.
- ^ "Untitled". New Zealand Herald. 8 February 1875.
- ^ "Mr J. C. Firth's funeral". Auckland Star. 13 December 1897. p. 4. Retrieved 4 April 2021.
- ^ "Untitled". The New Zealand Herald. Vol. IX, no. 2521. 23 February 1872. p. 2. Retrieved 14 July 2020.
- ^ "Imposing funeral cortege". Auckland Star. 7 December 2015. p. 3. Retrieved 14 May 2015.
- ^ "Death of Mr Reader Wood". Auckland Star. 21 August 1895. p. 2. Retrieved 24 May 2021.
External links
[edit]
Media related to St Stephen's Chapel, Auckland at Wikimedia Commons
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- Heritage New Zealand Category 1 historic places in the Auckland Region
- 1857 establishments in New Zealand
- Churches in Auckland
- Churches completed in 1857
- 1850s churches in New Zealand
- Frederick Thatcher church buildings
- Parnell, New Zealand
- 19th-century Anglican church buildings in New Zealand
- Selwyn churches
- Oceanian church stubs
- New Zealand building and structure stubs
- Auckland Region building and structure stubs