OCA – St Bride’s Church

Reading time: 3 minutes...

Another organised day out thanks to my old School – Selhurst Grammar School for Boys and The Old Croydonians’ Association. Today, it was a trip to London and St Bride’s Church in Fleet Street, London.

Actually, it was a full-on day even before the Church visit. By the time we headed for Fleet Street, we’d already had a meeting with our Investment Manager, Hilary, at Mercer, over at Tower Hill. This all meant leaving home before 9am this morning! Retirement, ehh?! – the busiest time of our lives!! 😮

Back to today’s event. It was a sad day in some ways, as this outing was the last one organised by Committee Member, Bob Smith, before his passing in September last year. Bob joined the Committee during my time as Chair (2010-2016), and personally and professionally, he is very sadly missed 🥲🥲

These OCA events are always worth looking forward to – not just because it’s an opportunity to meet up with old school chums – but to explore places that wouldn’t usually be on our radar. So far, thanks to the good work of the OCA looking after us Members, we’ve enjoyed visits to:-

Fulham Palace (September 2025)
Hidden Greenwich (September 2024)
Backstage at the National Theatre (February 2024) – missed that one!
Behind the Scenes at the Royal Opera House (October 2023)

…so we’re building quite a list! 👍😊

Up until today, we weren’t really familiar with St Brides, but it has a proud history and goes back more than a thousand years! It’s also seen more than its fair share of damage.

According to their website: Fleet Street is a warm and welcoming Christian community, and our Church is one of the most famous and fascinating historic buildings in London. A place of Christian worship for 1500 years, we continue to proclaim God’s love in the heart of the city. We are a thriving and inclusive parish church, renowned for our outstanding music and unique ministry to all who work in the media.

Today, was a special tour conducted by none other than the Head Verger, Robin Turner and was scheduled to last 90 minutes.

2.15pm: Let the Tour begin! 😊

Well, not quite yet! Initially, it was all a little confusing. It turned out that earlier in the day, the Church had welcomed a VIP. And not just any VIP – it had been the Queen herself!!!

The morning Piano Recital had therefore been moved to the afternoon, overlapping with OUR Tour. Thoughtfully, the Church recognised we would get in each other’s way, and around 20-or-so of us Old Croydonians were relegated to The Crypt!

We’ve probably all got an idea of what a Crypt looks and feels like, but this was no dark, cold and dusty environment! Instead, we discovered a brightly lit, scrupulously clean, almost sterile area – and as we were about to find out – uncomfortably warm too! 🥵

Robin quickly got into his stride!

And what a stride! We learned that Queen Camilla had officially opened the newly refurbished area earlier today as part of the 650th celebrations. The Crypt now sported a lengthy information board/Timeline explaining the Church’s history.

Robin gave a thorough explanation of the display (perhaps TOO thorough?) and, combined with the warmth generated by the over-enthusiastic floor heating system, meant that after 30 minutes or so, some of us were beginning to wilt.

If you like your Church visits to have a fascinating history, St Brides certainly deserves to be on the list. Robin’s extensive history lesson certainly covered a lot of ground – and a lot of years. So much so that an hour later, we were only just coming to the end. And we hadn’t been upstairs yet.

But wait, there’s more!

Robin then split us into two groups and took us into the storage area adjacent to the information boards. Inside, bones, bones and more bones were neatly boxed up, sharing shelf space with various other bits and bobs that you and I would keep in the loft.

The bones were actually the property of the Museum of London, and we were also lucky enough to see a partial skeleton laid out awaiting inspection. Next, MORE bones to enjoy, locked behind a door to the Church’s own Charnel House. Sadly, no photography was allowed of the bones.

Time was marching on and (as usual, we were ‘on the clock’)! It was now almost 3.45 – and we’re still ‘underground’. We snuck out, snapped a photo of the Altar and then took the short walk to City Thameslink Station.

It had been a fascinating visit, but we rushed it all to ensure all our train connections worked out. It had been good to walk in the footsteps of royalty (literally!), but it would be great to make a follow-up visit here to pick up where we left off.

Thanks, Bob! A worthy day out in your memory! 👍

Our next OCA trip? A behind-the-scenes tour of Theatre Royal, Drury Lane.