Parishioners attending St Paul's
St Peter's has been an extensive and rural parish and when the city spread off the hill and its population eventually jumped over the Midland Railway in the 1870s, the Parish Church acquired a "tin building" to serve the new parishioners on the country side of the tracks. The new residents settled in Stanhope Road, Granville Road, the Cavendish estate and villas in Hatfield Read and those occupying the new homes in Clarence Park Road.
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| St Peter's Mission Church and Sunday school in Granville/Stanhope Road c1900. |
The tin church was bolted together facing the former prison at the junction of Granville Road and Stanhope Road, opening just before the beginning of the new millennium, 1900. An equally tinny Sunday School building was put together soon afterwards where later the car park for the cinema stood. Chatsworth Court flats are here today.
Two further generations of buildings have since occupied the pinnacle location since the church. The first was The Adult Schools, and more recently de Novo flats. But the little church also had later lives, as we shall see below.
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| Even the new permanent parish church of St Paul's had – and still has – its own temporary "church hall" building in Blandford Road. |
But the tin church site did not last long, for work began on a new daughter church, St Paul's, at the junction of Hatfield Road and Blandford Road. That corner site was acquired by Henry Sear who had already launched a garden nursery to serve the owners and tenants of the nearby new homes.The new permanent building was pushed into use in 1908, after which the tinny was demounted and re-erected as St John's tinny church and Sunday school in Old London Road.It was only taken out of use and removed in recent years.
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| A Nissen hut dating from the early 20th century in use as part of St Paul's Sunday school in the mid 1940s. |
St Paul's played an early social and supportive role during the First World War, and a tablet inside the church confirms its connection with the War Graves Commission and its graves in the cemetery opposite.
The East End of St Albans continued to grow in its population and unfinished building works remained unoccupied at the start of the Second World War.
Throughout the war St Paul's accommodation was used by children evacuated from Camden, and an increased young population as new families squeezed into rooms in Fleetville. Even a section of Blandford Road became a temporary playground.
Among the unfinished building frenzy included new homes on the Beaumonts' estate, and at the close of the war St Paul's rented a temporary agricultural building to extend their Sunday school to benefit the children growing up on the estate. These children were soon absorbed into the main church site at Blandford Road, and its seems no time was lost in the Nissen hut being used as part of the structure for the large building firm of Tacchi & Burgess.
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| Two builders' huts brought back into use c1948 as a public house: The Bunch of Cherries at Oaklands. |
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| Originally a station yard in Jill End Lane, it was occupied by pre-fab homes, and then park homes on the same site. |
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| Scouts have always been adept at bringing in temporary buildings as troop/group headquarters, The original Salway Hut in the foreground and a re-use of the former Bunch of Cherries pub behind for the 2nd St Albans Group. Now the site of houses in Liberty Walk, of Camp Road. |
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| Another scout building, now much upgraded for the 9th St Albans Group in Sandpit Lane. Formerly a basic timber structure on railway land. |
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| A former chapel for Astwick parish in Coopers Green Lane, no longer standing. |
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| Temporary structure in Ashley Road used by voluntary organisations. Now replaced by modern housing. It is probably the last remaining plot formerly a nursery garden originally a section of Beaumonts Farm before homes were built in Castle Road and Burleigh Road. |
Many temporary buildings could be found in Kingshill Avenue, Sandpit Lane – one of which is still there and much improved, Ashley Road – of which there were at least four – Oaklands College, formerly the Agricultural Institute, and at Beaumont Schools. Readers will undoubtedly remind us of others.
All of these sites, and others, have had their time or are still being adapted for further uses. But our research has identified where they are or were, and the stories which have resulted from their existence.
