St Michael

In the mid 12th century a 'monastery' of St. Michael in Chester was supposedly among the gifts of William fitz Niel to Norton priory. It was presumably the 'mighty minster' of St. Michael later said to have been burned in the great fire of 1180. A parish church with the same dedication, apparently on the existing site, was first mentioned in 1178. The parish was entirely intramural and its boundaries suggest that it was formed at the same time as its neighbour St. Bridget's. It was united with St. Olave's in 1839, and was incorporated in the new parish of Chester in 1972, when the church closed for worship.

St. Michael's was probably in the charge of a parochial chaplain in the Middle Ages, but the identity of the patron or appropriator is unknown. If the church was indeed William fitz Niel's then the advowson was presumably held by the canons of Norton, at least until the earlier 14th century, though it was not among their possessions at the Dissolution. After the Reformation the benefice was a perpetual curacy in the gift of the bishop of Chester.

The living was always poor. In 1541–2 the incumbent was said to live 'from the fruits of the church' (ex fructibus ecclesiae), and in 1547–8 his successor had a clear income of only c. £4. By the 1570s assessments were made on the parishioners to pay the minister's stipend. Even in the 1720s, after a number of legacies, the incumbent seems to have remained largely dependent on voluntary contributions amounting to c. £20 a year. Augmentations in 1772, 1791, 1810, and 1814 took the value of the living to £44 10s. in 1809, and £84 in 1834. By 1864 it had reached £173.

A chamber over the west porch may have served as a parsonage house in the late 16th century, and in the early 17th the minister was given a house in Bridge Street Row. No. 43 Bridge Street, a mid 17th-century timber-framed building, was left as a rectory house by Lettice Whitley in 1659 and was used as such, perhaps intermittently, until 1907. The small churchyard, first mentioned in the 1480s, was closed in 1854.

Provision for chantry priests, perhaps temporary, was made in 1384, 1439, and 1505; by the mid 16th century there was perhaps one chantry chaplain in addition to the incumbent.

The church contained an image of St. Michael by 1401. It possessed relatively few vestments and ornaments, and those sold by the royal commissioners in 1553 realized only 5s. 9d. The vestments and other appurtenances of catholic worship, including an altar stone, dismantled and in a coffer, survived until 1565, after which they were sold and the remaining Marian fittings were taken down. The rood loft and the vaults over the two altars survived until 1568.

The poverty of the living caused it to be held in plurality with St. Olave's in the mid 16th century and the 1630s. Nevertheless in the early 17th century the church was apparently used for civic services, for in 1606 and 1609 Randle Holme (I) was paid for painting the rest for the city sword. By 1633 St. Michael's was much neglected, the chancel full of pews, and the incumbent accused of failing to catechize and to church women correctly. Further disorder culminated in the parishioners' destruction of the chancel screen, and in 1637 they were ordered to erect a new one, make the seats in the chancel uniform and facing the holy table, and receive the sacrament not in their pews but at the altar rail. The instructions were observed only until 1641–2, when the screen and altar rails were removed.

By 1650 the parish had a strongly Presbyterian minister in William Cook. Arrested for aiding Sir George Booth's rebellion and taken to London in 1659, he had returned by 1660, when he gave £10 towards restoring the seats in St. Michael's, but he was ejected in 1662 for refusing to conform. Thereafter the church seems to have had no minister until John Hancock was presented in 1685. The congregation, however, retained its nonconformist sympathies, and in the 1680s Hancock's Wednesday and Friday lectures were attended by the Presbyterian Matthew Henry.

Throughout the 18th century the living was held by prebendaries or, more usually, minor canons of Chester cathedral. In 1778 holy communion was celebrated monthly and on the great festivals, and communicants numbered between 70 and 120. Thereafter attendances declined to 50 or fewer in 1825. From 1826 the incumbent, Joseph Eaton the younger (1796–1850), who was clerk to the cathedral chapter, employed a curate, and assistant clergy continued to be needed under his successor James Haworth (1850–93), who became insane. St. Michael's retained a tradition of moderate Anglicanism, with in the 1870s holy communion generally restricted to a weekly early celebration, an arrangement which persisted largely unchanged in the 1930s.

The redundant church of St. Michael is a mostly 19th century rebuilding of a much repaired medieval church. It is of buff-coloured sandstone and comprises a chancel with a north chapel, and a nave with a north aisle. Since it is built over the remains of the eastern abutment of the south gate of the legionary fortress, its entrance is well above street level. Fragments of 12thC masonry were discovered during restoration c. 1850. The earliest part of the present structure, the north arcade with its octagonal piers, probably dates from the 15th century; money was left for building work in 1413 and 1439. In the 1490s the chancel was rebuilt, and it was probably then that the arch-braced roof with decorated panels was installed.

In 1582 the church was almost entirely rebuilt with a slate roof, a wooden steeple, and a porch chamber presumably like the rectory house at St. Peter's. In 1610–11 further work was done, including a carved ceiling and, probably, the nave roof, which has tiebeams and crown posts.

The church suffered in the Civil War, and c. 1678 the chancel had again to be rebuilt, the medieval roof being adapted to fit the new structure, which was perhaps extended northwards. In 1708–10 the steeple was replaced with a square stone tower, eventually capped by a cupola.

By the 1840s the whole church was unsafe. Between 1849 and 1851 it was virtually rebuilt in a late Decorated style by James Harrison, only the north arcade, part of the north wall, and the roofs (but not the ceilings) being retained. After the closure of the church in 1972 it was reopened by the city council as a heritage centre in 1975.

Chester History and Heritage is a valuable resource if you want to discover your Chester ancestors or find out about the history of Chester City and District. They host a wide variety of family and local history sources to help you in your search. These include:


 * General Register Office Index for England and Wales, 1837-1969 (The Civil Registration Index of Births, Deaths and Marriages on microfiche) - £1 per hour charge
 * Census for Chester District, 1841 1901 (on microfiche and microfilm)
 * 1881 census for UK (on CD Rom)
 * Also on CD Rom: Ormerod, 1851 census for Cheshire, Holy Trinity Church Chester Parish Registers, Betram Merrall Marriage Index and the National Burial Index
 * Electoral Registers for Chester (on microfiche)
 * International Genealogical Index for Cheshire and surrounding counties (on microfiche)
 * Parish Registers for Chester City parishes (on microfilm)
 * Local newspapers (cuttings, full papers on microfilm)
 * Map collection
 * An excellent local studies library
 * Chester Archaeological Society Library
 * Chester Image Bank
 * Chester Photographic Survey - street by street documentation of Chester District from 1960s onwards
 * Past CHH exhibitions available to browse and to loan to groups.
 * Oral Histories on CD
 * Archive films on DVD