Three Churches in Deptford, South East London

St Nicholas '




St Paul's








St Luke's

St Nick's has a memorial to Peter The Great, Tsar of Russia, who, in the 17th century, lived nearby with the diarist John Evelyn at his posh house, Sayes Court. He famously wrecked the hedges by having himself pushed through them in a wheelbarrow! (He was 6'7" so he would have made a big impression...) He came to Deptford to learn the art of shipbuilding. It was an important place back then. Elizabeth I knighted Walter Raleigh there. The playwright Christopher Marlowe was murdered in The Globe Tavern in what is now known as Evelyn Street. My school was part founded by shipbuilder John Addey, a man who was instrumental in bringing Peter to London, so we used to hold Founder's Day services in St Nick's.

St Paul's was built in the early 1700s by Thomas Archer and was described by the poet John Betjeman as "a pearl in the heart of Deptford". It is a truly elegant church, and puts to shame some of the lumpier examples from the same period that you can also see on a trip on the Docklands Light Railway. I was baptised in St Paul's in 1953. A few years ago I returned to sing at a wedding there.

St Luke's is a more pedestrian Victorian offering. It's back-to-front, with the apse facing the street. It's like going in by the back door. Three generations of my family married in the church, going back 100 years.