Mary Elizabeth and John Griffith, Canon of Rochester 1827-1879

Mary Elizabeth and John Griffith, Canon of Rochester 1827-1879

T. H. James introduces Rev. Dr John Griffith and his wife Mary Elizabeth Griffith, benefactors to the Cathedral in the 19th century.

Read More

Portrait prints, 17th-20th century

Portrait prints, 17th-20th century

The Chapter Library and Cathedral collections features a number of painted and printed portraits of former bishops, deans and Cathedral clergy.

Read More

Sarah Baker and her Kentish Theatres, 1737-1816

Sarah Baker and her Kentish Theatres, 1737-1816

A brief outline by Dr Jean Baker of the life and times of a remarkable but little-known woman (not an ancestor of hers) who played a significant role in the political, social and cultural evolution of Kent’s rapidly growing towns at the end of the eighteenth century.

Read More

Early photographs, 19th-20th century

Early photographs, 19th-20th century

The Cathedral architecture has featured in photographs since the mid-19th century, opening fascinating windows onto previous forms and arrangements of the building and Precinct.

Read More

Colonial heritage at Rochester Cathedral

Colonial heritage at Rochester Cathedral

A reinvestigation of the Early Modern history and collections of the Cathedral was spurred by the 2020 Black Lives Matter Protests and ensuing debate on memorialisation in public spaces.

Read More

Charlotte Boyd (1837-1906)

Charlotte Boyd (1837-1906)

Revd. Lindsay Llewellyn-MacDuff, author of Bertha’s Daughters, explores the life and work of Charlotte Boyd, one of the greatest benefactors to the Diocese of Rochester in modern times.

Read More

Baptisms, marriages and burial registers

Baptisms, marriages and burial registers

Facsimile and transcriptions of the baptism, marriage and burial registers of Rochester Cathedral.

Read More

Archaeologia Cantiana

Archaeologia Cantiana

Rochester Cathedral has featured in dozens of articles in the county archaeological journal Archaeologia Cantiana, now available on the Kent Archaeological Society website.

Read More

The Last Stand of Lieutenant Henn and his Sappers

The Last Stand of Lieutenant Henn and his Sappers

The story behind the names of the ‘Native Sappers and Miners’ commemorated in the 1888 Royal Engineers memorial mosaic at the west end of the Nave.

Read More

Isabella Gilmore and the deaconess movement

Isabella Gilmore and the deaconess movement

Bishop’s Chaplain Lindsay Llewellyn-MacDuff discusses the life and work of Isabella Gilmore and the genesis of the Deaconess Movement in the early 19th century.

Read More

Dean Reynolds Hole (1819-1904)

Dean Reynolds Hole (1819-1904)

Dean of Rochester Philip Hesketh introduces the life and work of Samuel Reynolds Hole, Dean of Rochester 1887–1904, a celebrated gardener notable for his expertise with roses. First of a two-part series.

Read More

Kings, Queens and Consorts

Kings, Queens and Consorts

The medieval equivalent of a datestone, dozens of regal sculpted heads adorn the Cathedral architecture, from the House of Normandy to Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.

Read More

Rochester Cathedral Lapidarium and Spolia

Rochester Cathedral Lapidarium and Spolia

Dissertation submitted for an MA at the University at Leicester, December 2021.

Read More

Dean Reynolds Hole: King of the Roses

Dean Reynolds Hole: King of the Roses

The Old Deanery was built in 1640 over the east part of the Chapter house of the Priory. A plaque records 'The deanery is situated where the prior's lodging formerly stood with its gardens extending south-eastward'. Dean Samuel Hole laid out a garden and planted a rose collection in the 1890s.

Read More
/Source

The Oxford Movement at Rochester Cathedral, 1895-1930

The Oxford Movement at Rochester Cathedral, 1895-1930

David Cleggett examines the times of Bishop Edward Talbot, Bishop John Harmer and Dean John Storrs over the late 19th and early 20th century, a High Church period in the history of the Cathedral.

Read More

Cottingham's Crossing bosses, 1840

Cottingham's Crossing bosses, 1840

The crossing ceiling was rebuilt several times in the C19th. The crossing bosses designed by Lewis Cottingham in 1840 are based on medieval Green Men and grotesques in the Nave Transept and the North and South Quire Aisles and are painted as vividly as they would once have been.

Read More

Gravestones

Gravestones

Three areas of graveyards in the vicinity of the Cathedral were used until the mid-nineteenth century.

Read More

Altar slab, 19th century

Altar slab, 19th century

A previously unrecorded thirteenth-century altar slab identified within a garden feature at King’s Orchard.

Read More