USA > New York > Erie County > Buffalo > History of St. Paul's Church, Buffalo, N.Y. : 1817 to 1888 > Part 24
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41
Extracts from Minutes of the Building Committee, 1888-1889.
List of the Clergy of St. Paul's, 1817=1903. List of the Westry, 1817=1903. The Architects of St. Paul's. Subscription Lists. In Conclusion.
" The Christian Sanctuary is emphatically the sphere of the Holy Spirit's . operation on the hearts and minds of men. . .
"Here He strives with the sinner - here He dwells with the saint - here He regen- erates, sanctifies, governs, comforts, commissions, guides and blesses the ransomed children of men, in the great work of leading them through the trials of earth. . . . .
" Such, my brethren, are the characteristics of this Holy Temple, now consecrated to God. A House of Prayer, Praise, Instruction, Vows and Grace. As such we have now set it apart and hallowed it as God's. As such may we ever enter it. As such may it ever be maintained. As such may the Divine Blessing ever rest upon it, and as such may it prove to all who serve and worship in it, the vestibule to conduct to that Higher Temple, not made with hands, eternal in the Heavens."
- From Bishop De Lancey's Sermon at the Consecration of St. Paul's, 1851.
-" Dear Cross ! bold fast thy beigbt in air; - Stand ever wide, blest door! And ever crowd, ye faithful, there, Digh, lowly, rich, and poor !
Sweet bells! ring ever pour glad sound, And let its message be -
Ibo! pe that thirst- bere Christ is found, And bere bis home is free."
- BBishop Core.
265
The Restored St. Paul's.
The Restored St. Paul's.
THE RESTORED CHURCH WAS OPENED BY BISHOP COXE WITH A SERVICE OF HAL- LOWING AND RECONCILING, JANUARY 3, 1890. (See pages 182, 183.)
As has been said, the fire of May 10, 1888, destroyed the entire interior of the church, with its columns, roofs, furniture and memorials. The main tower, with the graceful tapering spire, was nearly unharmed, as was the smaller tower, but the upper portions of the walls of the edifice were badly damaged, and had to be rebuilt in many places.
The plans of the architect, Robert W. Gibson of New York (archi- tect of All Saints' Cathedral, Albany), were accepted, Cyrus K. Porter & Son of Buffalo acting as supervising architects. It was thought best to make some changes in the plans of the church, as originally designed and built by the late Richard Upjohn, Sr. The chancel was car- ried out thirteen feet towards the east, and the beautiful stone entrance porch and vestry room on the Church Street side of the edifice were added, to take the place of the smaller north porch and vestry room of the older edifice. In the old church, the chancel organ was crowded into a small space over the vestry room. In the new church, a much larger organ chamber was formed by using, in addition, the space below, formerly occupied by the old vestry room. The former Church Street, or north, porch, with the room over it, were transformed into the baptistery of the present edifice. Although the chancel was extended thirteen feet on the outside, the gain in length on the inside is about fifteen feet. This was caused partly by changes made in the chancel arch - the jambs of which are now nearly flush with the side walls - and by not "furring out " the inside of the east wall of the chancel with wood as heavily as in the old church. The width of the chancel is also increased by a similar treatment of the inside of the walls, and the gain, both in size and appearance, is very marked. Other important changes were also made which will be noted later.
The general style used in rebuilding the church is in harmony with the Early English Gothic of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries used in the original edifice. Many of the features, however, especially the
266
History of St. Paul's Church.
great east window, the chancel furniture, pulpit, etc., are quite properly of later date, being in the Decorated Gothic of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries ; while the hammer-beam, open-timbered roof is a fine example of the beautiful roofs of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The blending of the old and new work is skillfully and suc- cessfully carried out, and the general effect of the restoration is most harmonious and imposing .*
The Pillars .- The north and south aisles are divided from the body of the nave by tall clustered pillars of brown sandstone, the design being a square central shaft surrounded by four round, engaged col- umns ; the capitals are beautifully carved with foliage having the stiff stem or stalk characteristic of the Early English style. The bases are moulded and much stilted - the plinths being raised to the height of the pew tops. The columns supporting the transept arches are of sim- ilar design, but larger, having six round, engaged shafts, which, at the sides, are coupled and separated by fillets. Half-pillars or responds are built into the walls at either end. These stone pillars replace the old wooden pillars, which were destroyed in the fire of 1888, but are two less in number, owing to the greater width of the transept arches in the nave, next to the chancel, in the new plan. (See "The Nave," page 267.)
Tall pointed arches of masonry, richly moulded and decorated in gold and colors, spring from the stone pillars.
The Clere-Story .- Above the arches is the clere-story, which is one of the most striking and beautiful features of the new building. It has sixteen lancet-pointed windows on either side, in groups of four windows above each bay. The clere-story shows what is known as a double plane of ornament ; the arches of the windows in the stone wall, or
* For description of the original frame church, see page 16, and footnote, page 32. For the article published in the "Gospel Messenger " in 1851, describing the stone edifice as it was then, see page 68. For a later description of the church, from the "Church Kalendar," 1883, see page 141. For accounts of the tower and spire, see pages 108-110, 310, 311 and 314.
267
The Restored St. Paul's.
outer plane, are of lancet form, while the inner plane of ornament forms a range of pointed trefoiled arches above each window, sup- ported on clustered shafts.
The range of the nave arches is continued by blind arches on both sides of the west bay, which is mostly occupied by the west gallery and main vestibule.
The Nave, 104 feet long inside, including the main vestibule under the west gallery, is divided into five bays or arched divisions. North and South Transepts are formed by making the bay on either side next the chancel thirty-four feet wide, twice the width of the other bays, which are about seventeen feet each ; the arches spanning the openings into the transepts extend nearly up to the top of the clere-story walls, and the north and south walls of the transepts opposite these arches are carried up in tall pointed gables, whose sharply-pitched roofs inter- sect that of the body or central division of the nave at right angles. In each of these north and south gables is a circular or wheel win- dow ; another of these windows is high up in the west end of the church. The north and south walls of the transepts are flush with those of the north and south aisles of the nave.
The impressiveness of the interior of the church is greatly enhanced by the increased effect of breadth and height given by these wide and lofty transept arches, together with the transept gables and the clere- story. These changes in the old design give the much-desired Cruci- form effect to the main edifice, whether viewed from the exterior or interior.
It is a tribute to the skill of Mr. Gibson, the architect, that these successful results were obtained with very slight alterations in the original ground plan of this part of the church as built by Mr. Upjohn. A comparison of the ground plans of the church before the fire and as rebuilt gives but little information of these particular changes, suc- cessfully carried out in the superstructure, after the fire of 1888. (See the various illustrations and plans of St. Paul's before and after the fire, in this volume.)
268
History of St. Paul's Church.
The Side Aisles (north and south) occupy three bays of the nave, and are each fifty-one feet six inches long ; adding the transepts gives a length of eighty-five feet six inches.
It should, perhaps, be explained here that the terms north and south aisles are used, not as referring to the alleys between the pews, com- monly called " aisles," but in their architectural meaning, to designate the flat-roofed divisions of the edifice on either side of the central division, or body, of the nave. In the church as rebuilt, these aisles end and the transepts begin at the columns from which spring the western extremities of the lofty transept arches, and above these col- umns it will be noticed that the flat roofs of the north and south aisles meet the slanting roofs of the transept gables. The body of the nave extends one bay to the west beyond the side aisles ; this fifth bay is mostly filled, as stated above, by the main vestibule and west gallery. On each side of the main vestibule are the south -or Erie Street - porch, and the northwest porch leading to Pearl Street. The small rooms over these two porches connect by doorways with the west gal- lery, and look down into the north and south aisles of the nave through pointed arched openings with oak balustrades, similar to the oak balustrade which extends across the front of the west gallery. This gallery space, formerly occupied as the organ loft, in the western end of the nave, and which, in the old edifice, extended out into the church to afford accommodation for the famous chorus-choir, is now of less depth and has been fitted with pews, which are free. The space under the gallery forms the main vestibule, and is separated from the nave by a handsome screen of oak and glass. Immediately under the balustraded openings mentioned above are deeply-recessed, pointed- arched niches, which in former years, when the church was first built, were doorways through the stone walls at the west end of the north and south aisles, as can be seen in the picture of the ruins of the west- ern end of the church, and the 1851 plan, opposite pages 168, 84. (See also page 69 and note, and pages 100, 101.)
The Lancet Windows, marking the first period of the Early English
26g
The Restored St. Paul's.
style, extend along the south aisle and in the wall of the west bay of the north aisle up to the point where the chapel joins ; there are five of these windows in the south transept, and two in each of the smaller bays.
The north and south aisles are each fifteen feet six inches wide, and the body, or central division of the nave, is thirty feet wide.
The entire inside width of the nave, including the north and south aisles, is, therefore, sixty-one feet and, adding "the chapel," gives a total inside width to the church of ninety feet. The greatest outside length of the edifice is 190 feet, and the greatest outside width is 103 feet, including the buttresses.
There are four principal entrances to the church: two on Pearl Street, one on Erie Street, and one on Church Street, the latter being through the handsome stone north porch, erected since the fire. This porch has a floor of marble mosaic, and contains two large traceried windows filled with stained glass - one opening onto Church Street, and the other, immediately opposite, lighting the baptistery. The ceil- ing is of paneled wood. The doorway leading from this porch into the chapel was, in the old church, a window, in front of which the font was placed. Under this porch is a broad entrance, also built since the fire, leading from Church Street to the crypt and choir-rooms. The main entrance to the Sunday School room in the basement is on the Pearl Street side, and to the left of this is another entrance, which now leads to the furnaces, but which, in former years, was the doorway to the receiving vault.
The main entrances on Pearl Street, to the west end of the nave, are especially massive, the stone steps leading from the west porch and the northwest porch curving towards each other to meet at the broad stone platform at the Pearl Street gate. The steps and platforms were not injured in the fire of 1888, but the fine arched west porch, with its stone-vaulted ceiling, was badly damaged and had to be largely rebuilt. In the north wall of this western porch is a narrow lancet win- dow filled with stained glass. The original glass in this window, which
270
History of St. Paul's Church.
was unfortunately destroyed in the fire of 1888, was placed there by Dr. Shelton, as a memorial to his personal friend, the Rev. Thomas Bowdler of Brompton, London, a much-loved clergyman of the Church of England, a prebendary of St. Paul's Cathedral, London, and a gen- erous contributor to the fund for the erection of this porch. (Page 431.) The original window was put in place about the year 1856, and was inscribed with the name of the Rev. Mr. Bowdler, who died in 1855.
Above the gable of the west porch is the flying buttress, which, although just under the "fire mark" on the main tower, was fortu- nately not injured by the flames. It springs from the corner buttress of the porch to the main tower, and, according to tradition, was inserted in the original design by the architect, Mr. Upjohn, at the request of Dr. Shelton. It was not in the preliminary design. (See page 314.)
The south, or Erie Street, porch, and the northwest porch leading to Pearl Street, are interesting as examples of the ancient two-story stone porches which are occasionally met with in the old churches of Eng- land, where the room over the porch was used for the safe keeping of records, books, wills and other valuables. In the older edifice, the orig- inal Church Street porch, which has now been transformed into the baptistery, was also a two-story porch. In 1879, in the early days of the vested choir, the second story of the Church Street porch was fitted up for the keeping of the choir vestments. From the Erie Street, or south, porch a stairway leads up, through the small room over the porch, to the west gallery, formerly the loft for the great organ and chorus-choir. Under this stairway is another, leading down to the Sun- day School room in the basement ; and at the west end of the porch a door opens through the massive stone wall into the tower room, from which leads the winding stairway to the belfry of the great tower and to the lofty spire above. In the tower room is a large oak cabinet, fitted with folding racks, for the preservation of the embroidered altar cloths of the church. This cabinet was given by Miss Amelia Stevenson, who has also executed much of the elaborate and artistic needlework on the altar cloths and linen.
271
The Restored St. Paul's.
There is a private entrance for the clergy directly from Church Street into the beautiful little Vestry Room, which has been built since the fire and which adjoins the new north porch. This room is 12 X 16 feet in size, and the walls are paneled seven feet high with antique oak, as is also the ceiling. It is lighted by a bay window of Gothic design, filled with stained glass. Doorways open from this room into the chancel, and into a winding passage behind the organ leading to the church through the baptistery.
All the main entrance doors of the church are double, of heavy, paneled oak, and are all hung to swing outward.
The Roof of the body of the nave, modeled after the beautiful ham- mer-beam roofs of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, is an open- timbered one of fine design, the spandrels filled with geometrical pierced work. It is of spruce, stained and finished to match the oak wood- work. Spruce, from its strength, and greater lightness than oak, is particularly suitable and much used for work of this kind. The pen- dant posts which, with the curved hammer-braces, form the triangular supports under the hammer-beams, are carried on slender vaulting shafts, rising from corbels between the springings of the arches of the nave, excepting over the points of the transept arches, where the hammer-beams rest directly upon corbels of carved stone, above the apex of the arches. The ends of the hammer-beams bear the carved and gilded figures of angels, with outstretched wings.
The roof is sharply pitched, and is divided into six bays or sec- tions, which are ceiled with narrow, matched boards, and paneled in large squares by the heavy longitudinal beams and light moulded cross-ribs. At the top of the walls, between the hammer-beams, is a broad band of wooden panel-work, forming a cornice or frieze, and covering the open space behind. The spandrels of the lofty transept arches are decorated with symbols of the four evangelists, in colored fresco work. The spandrels of the arches opening from the body of the nave into the side aisles, on either side, are decorated with medal- lion heads of the Twelve Apostles, finely executed in colors. Above
272
History of St. Paul's Church.
the lofty chancel arch is a fine fresco representing a group of angels in adoration. The spandrels of the blind arches in the west bay of the nave are decorated with symbolic designs.
The roofs of the side aisles are flat, and are ceiled with narrow matched boards, in antique oak finish, divided into square panels by light moulded ribs or beams.
Supporting the roofs of the north and south aisles, at right angles to the body of the nave, are pointed arches of wood, the spandrels of which are filled with pierced timber work in geometrical design. In the north aisle, these wooden arches spring from the stone pillars of the nave and chapel. In the south aisle, they spring from the stone pillars of the nave and from carved corbels in the outer wall. They are also placed against the walls at the ends of each aisle.
The roofs of the transepts are in antique oak finish, ceiled with narrow matched boards ; the spaces between the heavy timbers are divided by light moulded ribs, or beams, into square panels placed diagonally.
The inside of the outer wall of the south aisle is divided into large panels placed opposite to the pillars of the nave and ornamented with nook shafts. Across the top of each panel runs a corbel table sup- porting the timbers of the roof of the south aisle.
In the center of the south wall of the south transept is a gabled niche, ornamented with crockets and finial, containing the marble bust of the late Sheldon Thompson. (See page 292.)
The width of the middle alley, or "aisle," between the pews, in the body of the nave, is seven feet six inches, and that of the alleys of the north and south aisles is four feet eight inches.
" The Chapel," an extensive addition to the main edifice on the north side, is fifty feet long inside, from east to west, and twenty- eight feet six inches deep. It is connected with the main body of the church by three lofty arches of masonry, the easterly one of which opens into the westerly half of the north transept, and the other two into the north aisle.
THE RESTORED ST. PAUL'S. Interior, looking east from the main vestibule. (See pages 265 to 293.)
Photograph by G. H. B., September, 1902. Copyright, 1902, by G. Hunter Bartlett.
273
The Restored St. Paul's.
This range of arches is continued one bay towards the east by the archway between the baptistery and the north transept, and one bay towards the west beyond the open arches by an arched panel in the wall of the north aisle.
The arches spring from brown sandstone clustered pillars of the same height as those on either side of the body of the nave, but more slender. These pillars are about seventeen feet apart and are placed opposite the corresponding pillars of the nave, and carry also some of the wooden arches and pierced work which support the roof of the north aisle. The seats in " the chapel " face south, being at right angles with the pews in the body of the church, and rise towards the north in three gradations of four inches each. In the east and west ends of "the chapel," high in the wall, are large stained-glass win- dows. Under the western one of these is a window which is interest- ing as representing one of the first forms of Early English "plate " tracery - pierced through a plate of stone - which in the later forms of Gothic architecture developed into the elaborate and delicate "bar" tracery.
In the gable, formed in the center of the north side of "the chapel," is a window in the shape of a spherical triangle, filled with stained glass, immediately above the beautiful window which is a memorial to the late Mrs. Shelton. (See page 295.) On each side of this last-named window are two tall lancet windows, similar to those in the body of the church.
The roof of "the chapel " is an open timbered one of similar design to that in the nave, but on a smaller scale, and is broken in the center by a north gable. In the east wall of "the chapel " is the entrance ยท door from the Church Street, or north, porch, and to the north of this door is the broad stairway leading down to the choir-rooms and the Sunday School room and chapel in the basement or crypt.
In 1851, when the church was first used, "the chapel " was divided into a lower floor and a gallery. The portion below the gallery was separated from the body of the church by a glass partition, while the
274
History of St. Paul's Church.
gallery filled the entire upper portion, and opened into the nave by three arches, similar in size to the present arches. The seats in this gallery faced south, towards the body of the church, and were at right angles to it, rising on a slant toward the north wall of the chapel. In the room under the gallery, the pews faced towards the east. In 1856, the glass partition between the lower floor of " the chapel " and the body of the church was taken down, and in 1857, the gallery above was removed, with Mr. Upjohn's approval. (See page 84.) The peeling off of the plaster in the fire of 1888 revealed the floor line of this old gallery. (See page 70 and note ; also photograph of ruins facing page 166.) In 1867, at Mr. Upjohn's suggestion, all those pews in " the chapel " north of its south aisle were changed to face south. After the fire, this aisle was moved south to the pillars, and all the chapel pews now face south. This portion of the church has always been appropriately known by the old name, although its use as a separate chapel has long been discon- tinued. The term is also in harmony with its architectural design, which is that of a side, or attached, chapel, and not a transept. In Mr. Upjohn's preliminary design, the chapel was only one-half the height finally adopted. (See page 314.)
The Baptistery is at the north end of the north transept, and opens into it through a large moulded archway, which is a continuation of the range of arches between the main edifice and " the chapel." At the west end of the baptistery a smaller archway leads into "the chapel "; in the old church, this opening was the doorway from the Church Street porch. The baptistery occupies the space formerly filled by the old Church Street porch and the room over it, before the fire. The large, traceried, stained- glass window immediately back of the font in the present baptistery fills the space once occupied by the outer doorway of the old porch.
The baptistery is a large alcove, containing the handsome brown sandstone font, which was given to the church by William D. Collingwood. (See pages 181, 288, 394.) The walls are decorated in colors with symbolic designs ; around the top is a frieze with the words :
"Be baptized, every one of you, in the Name of Jesus Christ."
275
The Restored St. Paul's.
A door in the east wall of the baptistery leads into the vestry room through a winding passage, and also to the circular stairway of the small tower. In the north wall is the traceried window, spoken of above, looking into the north porch, and also four smaller windows.
In the frame church the font was near the chancel rail. When the stone church was consecrated in 1851 this old font stood at the east end of the nave immediately in front of the chancel, and a little to the north of the line of the center alley or "aisle." It was placed on the floor of the nave just in front, or west, of the position occupied in the restored church by the present brass lectern. (See pages 59, 70.) When the interior of the church was decorated and the chancel refurnished in 1867, the font, at Mr. Upjohn's suggestion, was removed to a platform at the east end of the chapel, in front of the window which has now become the entrance from the chapel to the new north, or Church Street, porch.
This old font of white marble was destroyed in the fire of 1888. The various positions of the font are shown in the plans and illustrations opposite pages 34, 84, 138, 154, 250, 272.
The Chancel .- The chancel is divided into the Choir and Sanctuary, and opens into the nave through a lofty, pointed arch, deeply recessed and moulded. The mouldings of the inner rim of the chancel arch are carried upon small, corbelled shafts, and the outer mouldings rest upon small shafts, which, in turn, rest upon slender nook-shafts recessed into the angles of the flat, pilaster like jambs of the archway, which project only five inches beyond the side walls of the chancel. In this way the space between the jambs of the arch is made about four feet wider than in the chancel archway of the old church. The new arch is also considerably higher than the former one.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.