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Record Repository
By an order-in-council in the reign of Charles II St. John’s was dismantled as a chapel and became a store for state records. So it remained until in 1857 the state papers were removed to the Public Record Office. Despite an attempt to use it as an army clothing store, Queen Victoria, following the excellent advice of the Prince Consort, restored it to its proper use.
Nearly all the stained glass panels in the windows were purchased by the Board of Ordnance in 1842 from Horace Walpole’s collection at Strawberry Hill. At first they were installed in the Horse Armoury and then, just before 1900, were placed in the Chapel. The panels include sepias of various Old Testament subject such as the Creation, the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden, Esau seeking Issac’s blessing and the anointing of David by Samuel. There are also some heraldic devices, including the portcullis of John of Gaunt and the wheatsheaf of Chester. A representation of a holly bush with the letters H R would seem to commemorate Henry VII’s discovery of the Crown on Bosworth Field after his victory over Richard III in 1485.
St. John’s Chapel may lack its late medieval splendour, but, as A. L. Rowse says, ‘the stark chapel as we see it today exposes the masculine muscularity of its Norman architecture’. Surely few can remain unmoved when they attend the Holy Communion services which are held there three times a year and recall that, except when the Chapel housed the state records, it has been a place of worship for over 900 years.
This was originally the Council Chamber. The armoured figures, horse and foot, in the centre show the development of armour from the late 15th century to the reign of Charles I.
The other gun, elaborately ornamented with laurel branches and medallions, mounted On a carriage carved to represent two Furies, was captured by the French at Malta in 1798. The ship which carried it to France was taken by the British Frigate HMS Seahorse and with it was taken the banner of Baron Ferdinand Hompesch, last Grand Master of the Knights of Malta, which hangs near to it.
At the south end is a mortar of nine bores used for fireworks at the peace of Aix la Chapelle in 1748. Near to this is a ship's gun dredged from the wreck of HMS Royal George, sunk by accident in 1782. Admiral Kempenfeldt and the whole of the crew of over six hundred men were drowned in this disaster.