St Peter's, London Docks

St Peter’s stands in Wapping Lane, Wapping, within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. Built between 1865 and 1939 to designs by F. H. Pownall, the church is listed at Grade I. The Revd Charles Lowder MA began the mission in 1856 with priests from the Society of the Holy Cross. Their aim was to serve the poor of London’s docklands, where Wapping counted among the most deprived districts. Prostitution and petty crime mingled with families living from the docks’ uncertain work. Lowder’s team provided schools, cheap canteens and child care alongside spiritual services centred on the Mass. The iron church in Calvert Street served as an early base before the new church opened in 1866. During the cholera outbreak soon after, Lowder organised Sisters of Mercy to nurse the sick and raised funds for a tented hospital. Neighbours began to call him ‘the Father’ for his constant care. The church later received extensions by Maurice Bingham Adams between 1884 and 1894. Bomb damage in the Blitz was repaired by 1949, and a full renovation followed in 1985. Today the building holds a Sunday Mass at 9.15 am and 10.30 am, while the adjacent primary school founded in 1856 continues the mission’s work.