St Peter's Church, Nottingham

St Peter's is one of the three mediaeval parish churches in Nottingham, the others being St Mary's and St Nicholas. The parish of St. James' Church, Standard Hill, founded in 1807 was united with St Peter's in 1933 and the official title "St Peter with St James" came into being. (St James's was demolished a few years later; some monuments from St James's are preserved in St Peter's.)

The church shows traces of many stages of construction from about 1180 onwards (the original church of around 1100 was destroyed by fire).

St Peter's has a new organ, a choir and a series of Saturday morning concerts. The Organist & Director of Music since 2007 is Peter Siepmann.

In 1552 Edward VI's commissioners delivered to ‘parson’ Nicholas Cooke a clock in the ‘steeple’, which had probably been there since the fifteenth century. The earliest reference in the church records ‘chargs pyed owete fforw the church of St Peter’s in the yre off oure lord god 1577 2 sh. to Toms Lockwood for looking after the clock.’[11]

In 1723–4, the Chamberlains’ Account record a payment of £1 to the Sexton of St Peter's for ringing a 4 o’clock bell.[12]

On Wednesday 29 April 1846, a vestry meeting was called to consider the offer of new church clock.[13] On Thursday 15 October 1846, as Richard Ward, a man employed by Messrs. Taylor and Garrett, was assisting in taking down the old face of St. Peter's church clock, when it gave way. A rope attached to it dragged him with it.[14]

The new clock was installed in 1847, manufactured by Reuben Bosworth at a cost of £125 (equivalent to £11,507 in 2019)[15] and was at the time, the largest in Nottingham. It had a pendulum 10 feet 4 inches (3.15 m) long and a bob weighing 60 pounds (27 kg). It was an eight-day clock with four dials, each 7 feet (2.1 m) in diameter.[16] The clock was tested for several weeks before the hand on the dials were connected to the mechanism on 7 April 1847.[17] On Christmas Eve 1852 a hurricane broke off one of the minute hands of the clock.[18]

New cast iron clock dials, 7 feet (2.1 m) in diameter were presented by Henry Smith to the church in 1872[19] at a cost of £66 (equivalent to £5,936 in 2019).[15]

A new clock was installed by G. & F. Cope in 1881[20] which had a Denison Remontoire, compensation pendulum and wire rope lines. The strike was provided by a hammer on the hour bell on E. This was replaced by an electrically driven clock by Smiths of Derby in 1965.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to St Peter's Church, Nottingham.

• Alfred Stapleton, 1905, Churches and monasteries of old and new Nottingham
• Keith Train, 1981, Train on churches, Nottingham

Media related to St Peter's Church, Nottingham at Wikimedia Commons

• Southwell Diocesan Church History Project Website
• Pictures of St.Peter's from Nottingham21
• See St. Peter's Church on Google Street View.