St. Matthias Old Church Poplar

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In 1627, the East India Company purchased a house on Poplar High Street to serve as a hospital for disabled seamen. Earlier, in 1618, a corrupt jeweller named Hugh Greete had been returned from India after being caught stealing stones. He died in prison the following year but directed in his will that a school or hospital be established using his estate.

The Company had already set up a shipyard at Blackwall in 1614, making nearby Poplar an obvious choice for such a foundation. By 1633, the inhabitants of Poplar and Blackwall—many of whom were Company employees—petitioned for a chapel to be built locally, as St Dunstan’s in Stepney was too distant for regular worship.

When Gilbert Dethick, Lord of the Manor of Poplar, died in 1639, he bequeathed £100 towards the construction of the chapel, on the condition that work commenced within three years. However, the early stages coincided with the outbreak of the English Civil War. William Laud, the William Laud, who had been heavily involved in contemporary debates over church architecture and decoration, was executed in 1645.

With a further bequest from Sir John Gayer, a director of the Company, and additional funding from the East India Company itself, substantial progress finally began in 1652. The first recorded payment was made in 1654 to John Tanner, Master of the Bricklayers' Company, who became the principal builder. The burial ground was formally allotted to the chapel in 1657.

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Architecture

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St Matthias is a brick structure enhanced with stone quoins at its corners. Its design combines both Classical and Gothic elements, drawing comparison with St Katherine Cree, which was consecrated in 1631.

Inside, the barrel-vaulted roof is carried by eight Tuscan columns—seven made of oak and one of stone. Although it is often claimed that these were fashioned from ships’ masts, there is no evidence to support this. The overall effect gives the interior a distinctly Dutch character, reminiscent of the work of Hendrick de Keyser, who designed several notable churches in Amsterdam during the early seventeenth century.

During the eighteenth century, a number of alterations were undertaken: a tower was added in 1718, a triple-decker pulpit installed in 1733, and extensive repairs along with modifications to the windows were carried out between 1775 and 1776 under the direction of Richard Jupp. In the early nineteenth century, a mural monument to George Steevens, created by John Flaxman, was commissioned. This monument is currently on loan to the Fitzwilliam Museum.

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