The central detail from the east window of St Olave Hart Street in the City of London, taken for the 10th anniversary of the bombings in London that constitute the worst terrorist action on British soil since the Lockerbie bombing in 1988. 52 people died and more than 700 were injured in four separate explosions. The four bombers also died, as these were suicide attacks, the first such incidents on British soil.
The window was designed by A.E. Buss, chief designer for the stained-glass makers, Goddard & Gibbs, and bears the date 1953. St Olave's was damaged by two bombs on 17 April 1941, one of the worst nights of the London Blitz. A month later, incendiaries hit the church tower and the eight bells crashed to the ground in a mass of molten metal. For several years afterwards the congregation of St Olave's worshipped nearby in a temporary church building on land provided by the Clothworkers' Company, historic benefactors of the parish, while the church remained open to the elements, its monuments having been removed and stored in places of safety.
In 1947 the decision was made that the church should be rebuilt and the work of reconstruction was carried out between 1951 and 1954. The little parish church that had escaped the Great Fire of 1666 was restored to its pre-war plan, thanks to the determined efforts of many, not least its Rector, The Rev'd Augustus Powell Miller, who himself joined in the effort of collecting fallen masonry from the municipal yard with a wheelbarrow.
"Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning" – Psalm 30: 5
No comments:
Post a Comment