About Us

St James Garlickhythe is a friendly City church where visitors are made most welcome. If you attend our Sunday service we would love to have the opportunity to get to know you over a post service hot drink or glass of wine.

Worship here is noted for services that are taken from the 1662 Book of Common Prayer, which has been our unbroken tradition since the completion of our current building in 1683. We also have a tradition of strong and engaging preaching, and fine music, all of which come together at the Parish Sung Eucharist each Sunday 

We are proud to be the church of the Intelligence Corps and hold their Book of Remembrance. A page is turned in the book on the first Sunday of every month.

Christians have worshipped on this site since Anglo-Saxon times and our church is first mentioned as a place of worship in a will dated between 1096 – 1115. The first recorded Rector was Peter del Gannok in 1259.

Before the Great Fire, the current parish boundaries were home to seven smaller parishes: St James Garlickhythe, St Michael Queenhithe, Holy Trinity the Less, St Michael Paternoster Royal, St Martin Vintry, All Hallows the Great, and All Hallows the Less.

The Parish Registers of St James Garlickhythe are the oldest in England.  The first entry was the Baptism of one Edward Butler on 18th November 1535. William Boyce the composer was baptised here on 11th September 1711.

St James was destroyed in The Fire and Sir Christopher Wren re-built the medieval parish church, which has since survived The Blitz, Death Watch Beetle, and a crane accident which destroyed a large section of the south wall in 1991.  

We are proud to serve our local community.  A number of groups, choirs, and businesses use our church, and a large number of Livery companies regard St James as their spiritual home.

We are also home to the Royal Jubilee Bells, cast in 2012 for the Diamond Jubilee of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.

We very much look forward to seeing you.