Russian chapel on Welbeck Street

First Church

The first evidence of the existence of an Orthodox church in London dates back to 1715, when FP Veselovsky was a resident in England.

In 1712, Thebaid Metropolitan Arseny, Archimandrite Gennady, two deacons, Protoslingel Jacob, translator and cell-mate of Archimandrite Bartholomew were sent to England from the Patriarch of Alexandria of Samuil to England for alms. They arrived in London in 1713 and received permission to hold services. However, soon, fearing that the delegation had a secret mission from the Pope, a ban on worship followed. After a year and a half of being “behind guard”, the metropolitan requested protection from his consul. As a result, the Orthodox were allowed to conduct private worship in the home church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

In 1715 there was a written confirmation of the construction of a separate temple. In November 1716, an apartment was hired with a special room for the church in Exchange Court near Strand ^[1] .

The former B.I. Kurakin , the Russian envoy to England, who came to London in 1716 , visited the church, where he was told that the British wanted to build a church and serve in three languages ​​(English, Russian and Greek) under the auspices of Russian tsar. The prince advised Metropolitan Arsenius to go to Holland , where Peter I was to arrive, which the bishop did.

Peter I, when speaking with the metropolitan, promised his assistance and ordered him to go to Russia to wait for a decision, and to Archimandrite Gennady to return to England, where he was supposed to serve with a salary from Russia. Subsequently, both the Greek and Russian clergy served in the temple.

The number of parish was small ^[2] . In 1738, the Russian envoy, Prince Antiochus Cantemir, reported that “there is no public church in London, but it is located in a rented house, there are few Orthodox Christians, and up to 10 Greek people, so the income is very small, but there are no Russian merchants”.

In 1747, Archpriest Antip Martemyanov, who did not enjoy a good reputation and squandered his and church property in the company of “renegades”, sent a petition for 98 signatures about the need to build a new Orthodox church in London outside the city, since “it’s like there up to 3,000 Orthodox. " The messenger in London, P. G. Chernyshev, wrote, “ that not only 3000 never happens, but also those 98 cannot be typed, moreover, all the sailors, the poor and every rabble who never happen to be in the church. It is not easy to build churches in England, not a single Catholic, but Lutheran and other confessions were built a long time ago, and what is worth building is not exactly possible to calculate without a plan, but it will be very expensive only. There is no need for it. The very small now existing in a rundown dirty alley, and that empty one also stands; it’s a pity that Archpriest Martemyanov contains it very unclean, but in order to place it in the proper place, you need to let go not 600, but 600 rubles a year - and it’s better if you improve the old one ... And in general the whole project of building a new church is no more, as a means for obtaining funds for those or other rogues ” ^[3] .

Since the church was increasingly destroyed and fell into disrepair, in 1755, 600 rubles were allocated for its repair from the States Office.

At that time in the basement or semi-basement of the church house there was a “kitchen” with a coal bag; on the first floor was a church; above the temple - two floors with living rooms and bedrooms. There were 22 icons and 2 skylines in the temple.

Already at the end of 1756 another house was filmed for the church, closer to the embassy, ​​on the cleaner street Burlington Gardens. Here in the temple-chapel living room has been redone. In 1784, the Embassy Church moved to Great Portland Street.

Temple on Welbeck Street

Since 1813, the temple was located on Welbeck Street, 32, in an annex located on the site of the stables, built directly behind the spacious house.

In September 1862, the idea arose to overhaul the church in order to increase its volume and improve its appearance. But at the very beginning of the work, in September 1863, it was discovered that under the old walls, with the exception of one, there was no real foundation. The archpriest of the church, Yevgeny Popov, began collecting voluntary donations. The funds were also contributed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Empress Maria Alexandrovna .

On February 14 (26), 1866, the temple was consecrated in the name of the Assumption of the Mother of God.

After 1917, due to emigration from Russia, the number of parishioners in the Ambassadorial Church has increased so much that the church could not accommodate all worshipers for the holidays.

In October 1919, the London Assumption Parish of the Russian Orthodox Church was established. In the same year, about 400 parishioners were registered.

In 1921, divine services in the former Embassy Church were stopped and transferred to the building of the former Anglican Church of the Holy Apostle Philip.

The building of the Russian temple on Welbeck Street has survived to the present day, is a monument of architecture. In the room is a warehouse of homeopathic medicines. The Assumption parish of the Russian Orthodox Church is located in the Assumption Cathedral .

The premises of the church adjoined directly to the hired church house. The temple did not have its facade facing the street; it was closed by a house through which the only entrance led.

Above the church was a Byzantine dome with a cross towering above it. The dome with a diameter of 7.9 meters was made of thick layers of forged iron covered with a lead roof. In the dome there were 12 oblong-semicircular windows, in the intervals between them the faces of 12 apostles were depicted in circles on a gilded background. On the upper border of the dome there was an inscription in Slavonic letters: “ Look down, heaven, God, and see, and visit this grape, and affirm, and, put Thy right hand on him! "

Opposite the throne on the window wall the Savior was depicted and the words: “ come to me all who labor and burdens, and I will give you rest .”

Icons for the iconostasis were written by a member of the Russian Academy of Arts .

• Antonov V.V., Kobak A.V. Russian churches and monasteries in Europe. - SPb: "Faces of Russia", 2005. - p. 23-30. - 3000 copies - ISBN 5-87417-208-4 .
• Christopher Birchall. Embassy, ​​Emigrants, and Englishmen: The Three Hundred Years of History. Jordanville, NY: Holy Trinity Publications, 2014.

• Russian church in London
• Russian church in London
• The history of the Russian parish in London