Town Church (St Helier)

The story

The island's civic church and pro-cathedral, standing beside the States building and the Royal Court. A chapel is said to have been raised on this site shortly after the death of Helier in the sixth century; the present building was begun in the eleventh, and the earliest documentary record is a tithe agreement signed by Duke William II of Normandy before 1066. In September 1643, at the height of the Civil War, the Rector, Pierre d'Assigny, ordered his parishioners from the pulpit to build an artillery battery against Royalist-held Elizabeth Castle - on a Sunday, to the dismay of many; when the Royalists regained the island later that year he fled. The future Charles II worshipped here on his visits of 1646 and 1649. In 1651 the victorious Parliamentary forces used the church as a barracks and then as a garrison church. The parish militia guns were stored here until French troops seized them in 1781. The Germans also used the building as a garrison church, while regular services continued.

✓ Notes checked with the Société Jersiaise - History Section ↗