ANALYSIS I ANALYSE NINETEENTH-CENTURY CHURCHES IN PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND AND THEIR PLACE IN THE GOTHIC REVIVAL P1' ofessor Ma lcolm rl1ur!by, Ph.D F S A . >MALCOLM THURLBY 1 teaches r-nedi eval art and ar~cflitect:LH' e , and Canadian Bl'Ch!teCLLwe in the Oepar,trnent of Visual Arts. York University . His latest book, Rornonesque Architecture and Sculpture in !!Vales, was published by Loga,;ton P1·ess , Almeley INTRODUCTION fH er efol'dShll'el. 111 ,June 2006. The nineteenth-century churches of Prince Edward Island are relatively well known thanks to the publications of H.M. Scott Smith, Canon Robert Tuck, and Father Art O'Shea. 2 Smith provides a useful starting point for any study of the churches on t he Island. Yet there are some strange omis­ sions from his books, not least of which are three churches in Charlottetown. First, there is the monumental, one thousand two hundred-seater Trinity Wesleyan Methodist (now United) Church, built in 1863-1864; then, St. Peter's Anglican Cathedral, 1867-1869, and St. James Old Kirk, 1877, both by David Stirling (1822- 1887), one of the most accomplished nineteenth-century architects in the Atlantic provinces. William Critchlow Harris (1854-1913), who apprenticed with Stirling from 1870 to 1875, was respon ­ sible for a large number of churches in Prince Ed ward Island, all of which are carefully documented by Robert Tuck. Art O'Shea provides a com prehensive over­ view of Roman Catholic churches in Prince Ed ward Island, complete w ith excellent colour photographs. This paper builds on the work of these authors to inves­ tigate the nineteenth-century churches of Prince Ed ward Island in the context of the Gothic Revival in Canada, Britain, and the United States. EARLY GOTHIC REVIVAL CHURCHES DOWN TO 1840 Th e earliest churches in Prince Ed ward Is­ land depend strongly on the eighteenth­ century tradition of meetinghouses and churches in New England and Nova FIG. 1. BELFAST, ST. JO HN'S PRESBYTERIAN, 1824. EXTERIOR FROM SW. I M'kohnThodby JSSAC I JSE!I.C 31 > N' 2 > 2006 > 65-85 65 MALCOLM THURLBY > ANA LYS IS I ANALYS E FIG . 2. CROO ME D'A BITOT (WORCESTERSH IR E), ST. MARY FI G. 3. WEST COVEHE AD, ST. JAMES'S PRE SBYTE RI AN (UNITED). EXTERIOR FROM SW (SE). I Malcolm lhodby. MAGDALENE, 1763. LANCELOT BROWN. EXTERIOR FROM SW. I Malcolm Thodb y. Scotia. For the churches, the influence parallel for the setbacks is Wren's Christ gallery in the sanctuary.' 0 The simple of the English architect James Gibbs Church, Newgate Street, 1703-17047 pilasters at the corners of the church are (1682-1754) is of paramount importance, Just as the Belfast tow er owes nothing paralleled in St. Paul's, Halifax, w hile the as w itnessed, for example, in St. Paul 's, directly to medieval Gothic sources, so bro ken pediment above the w est door­ Halifax, Nova Scotia, 1749, wh ich was the multi-pane, sash windows of the w ay is a co mmon neoclassical detail, as modeled on Gibbs's Marylebone Chapel, west front and tower are made Gothic in Greenock Church, St. Andrews, New London, 1721-1722 3 St. John's Presbyteri­ with pointed arches and intersecting Brunswick, 1824. Other elements, like an, Belfast, 1824, has the pulpit platform glazing bars in the eighteenth-century the fan transom above the doorway and against the east wall and galleries around tradition of Batty and Thomas Langley the differentiation in the surface of the the other three sides of the sanctuary, in (1696 -1751) 8 The cusped Y-tracery of the fa~ade of the building from the sides a simplified version of that eighteenth­ si de windows at first seems more con­ and back, also recall a North American century tradition. 4 The west tower is di­ vincingly medieval, but the appearance neoclassical heritage. vi ded into four stages with pronounced of simi lar forms in the Gothic Cathedral setbacks in each storey (fig. 1). Setbacks desig ned for Kew Gardens by Johann In Charlottetown, the former St. James on towers are a d istinctly English fea ­ Hein rich Muntz, circa 1758,9 and at Presbyterian Old Kirk of 1831 (fig. 4) ture that goes back to the eleventh ­ St . Mary Magdalene's, Croome d'Abitot, was designed according to similar prin­ century Anglo-Saxon tower at Earls Worcestershire, by Lancelot Brown, 1763 cip les, and even included emphasized Barton, Northamptonshire, and remain (fig. 2). suggests that eighteenth-century keystones and pilasters with recessed popular through the rest of the Middle intermediaries were a factor in the de­ panels on the angles on the nave from Agess However, the setbacks at Belfast sign at Belfast. a North American classical-vernacular are far more extreme than in medieval tradition. The main entrance was on towers. Smith has compared the tower Pointed windows with intersecting glaz­ the south wall of the tower, as in meet­ w ith Sir Christopher Wren's St . Dunstan­ ing bars light the early 1830s St. James inghouses like Old Covenanter Church, in-the-East, London' The parallel is not a Presbyterian (United). West Covehead Grand Pre, Nova Scotia -" On the tower, close one, although it is interesting that (fig. 3). w here the small scale of the the stepped buttresses, the pi nnacles St . Dunstan's tower is Gothic. A better church provides room only for a w estern and the arcades at the top of the w alls 66 JSSAC I JSEAC 31 > No 2 > 2006 MALCOLM T HURLBY > ANALYSIS I ANALYSE FIG. 4. CHA RLOTTETOWN, ST. JAM ES OLD KIR K, FIG. 5. SOU TH RUSTICO, ST. AUGUST INE, 1838-1841. FIG. 6. SALISBURY CATHEDRA L, 1220-1258. 1831-1878. PHOTOGRAPH IN THE VESTRY EXTERIOR FROM SW. [ Makolmlhuciby. W FRON T. [ MalcolmThuclby. OF OLD KIRK. I Makolm lhuclby w ere Gothic, but they lacked sufficient One must have taste to be sensib le to the the mind I I which p1 le of bu ild in g conveys monumentality to be directly associated beauties of Grec1an archi tecture; one only the more d evout ideas, which f ills the with medieval models. wants passions t o feel Gothic. In St. Pete1·'s senses with the gr eatest attention of the I Rome I one is convin ced that it was bui lt by heaven above u s; w hich leads us more to Geddes Memorial Church, Springbrook, great pr inces I . I In Westminster Abbey, contemplate on the life t o come? If I may 1836-1837, represents the eighteenth­ one thinks not of the builder; the religion of take the liberty to Judge, it is !Westminster century meetinghouse tradition w ithout the place makes its first impression I . I and Abbey] St. Paul's can neve1· impart those any reference to Gothic details, while though stripped of its altars and shrines. it se nsations; it has the opposite effect. We at First Baptist (Cross Roads Christian). is nearer conve1·ting one to popery than all behold the wondrous object w ith a familiar Cross Roads, 1836, just east of Char­ the regular pageantry of Ro man dom es'3 eye ; we consider lit] as raised to pass the lottetown, we witness the same tradi­ hours in business, pl easure, and delight; tion, but with pointed windows on the The importance of John Carter (1848- no pious thoughts possess the m ind , as ground storey." 1817) for the revival of Gothic is encap­ while we a1·e gazing on the vaulted roof of sulated by Mordaunt Crook: IWestminsteJ-1." 14 The choice of the Gothic style, or rather the introduction of Gothic elements, in "C lassica l a1·chitecture I .. 1 ha s its place, The Church Building Act of 1818 was not the ecclesiastical architecture in Prince in mansions and other structures of ease specific on the matter of style, but some Ed w ard Island, should be considered and pleasure " But it was "the Invention of architects suggested that Gothic was less against three backgrounds: England, foreigners." And for myster y, sublimity and expensive than a classical alternative15 the United States, and Nova Scotia. drama ther e 1s nothing to match "that awful Kenneth Clark reported that of the two The origins are to be found in England. style of bu ilding" barba1·ously misnamed hundred and fourteen churches that re- Horace Walpole (1717-1797), creator of "Gothic." Compare I I Westminste1· Abbey suited from the 1818 Act, one hundred the Gothic "castle" Strawberry Hill, and St. Paul's· that "mortal r epository of and seventy-four w ere Gothic.16 While Twickenham, 1749, and author of the Engl ish glory" on the one hand, and "S ir the quality of these churches varied con- Gothic novel, Castle of Otranto (1764). Christophe r 's heathenized prodigy" on the siderably, the sheer weight of numbers wrote: other. "Which has the greater effect on could only further raise interest in the JSS AC I JSE AC 31 > N" 2 > 2 006 67 M ALCOLM THURLB Y > ANALYSI S I ANALYSE FIG. 7. SOUTH RUSTICO, ST. AUGUSTINE , 1838-1841 . FIG. 8. GRAND RIVER , ST. PATRI CK, 1844. FIG. 11. COVEH EAD, ST. EUGENE. INTERIO R INTERIOR TO E.] M• lmlmlh"dby. INTERIOR TO E. ] M•lcolmThmlby. TOW (E).] M•lcolmlh"dby. FIG. 9. GRAND RIVER, ST. PATRICK, 1844/1890. EX TER IOR FIG. 10. COVEHEAD, ST. EUGENE . EXTER IOR FIG . 12. liTTLE POND, ST. FR ANCIS DE SAL ES, 1863. FROM NW.] M•lmlmThmlby. FROM NW (SE). JM• lmlmlhmlby.