page_title: St Mary Magdalene's Church, St Leonards-on-Sea
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: St Mary Magdalene's Church, St Leonards-on-Sea / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Greek Orthodox church of St Mary Magdalen, St Margaret's Road, Hastings, East Sussex, seen from the east. Designed by Frederick Marrable and built in 1852 as the Church of England parish church of St Margaret. Bought by the Greek Orthodox community in 1982.
context_page_description: St Mary Magdalene's Church is a Greek Orthodox place of worship in St Leonards-on-Sea, a town and seaside resort which is part of the Borough of Hastings in East Sussex, England. Built in 1852 for Anglican worshippers in the growing new town of St Leonards-on-Sea, a seaside resort which had been laid out from the 1820s, the church's prominent position on the skyline overlooking the town was enhanced in 1872 by the addition of a tower. No longer required by the Anglican community in the 1980s, it was quickly bought by the Greek Orthodox Church and converted into a place of worship in accordance with their requirements. The alterations were minimal, though, and the building retains many of its original fittings and its "archaeologically correct Gothic" exterior which reflected architectural norms of the early Victorian era. English Heritage has listed the church at Grade II for its architectural and historical importance.
context_section_description: By the 12th century, Hastings on the English Channel coast was one of Sussex's largest and most important towns.  The famous Battle of 1066 took place nearby; a castle was founded; the town operated its own mint; it was the leader of the Cinque Ports; and seven churches existed within its boundaries.  The surrounding manors included Gensing, a large and attractive expanse of land running down from a forested valley on to flat agricultural land and a beach immediately west of the town.  As Hastings recovered from an 18th-century slump and started to become fashionable and well patronised again in the early 19th century, speculative development was encouraged.
  James Burton, a builder and entrepreneur who later fathered the prominent architect Decimus Burton, saw the potential of the Gensing estate land, which was owned by the Eversfield baronets of Denne Park near Horsham, West Sussex.  He bought a large section of this manor, including 1,151 yards (1,052 m) of seafront land, for £7,800 in February 1828, and developed a carefully planned new town, St Leonards-on-Sea, on it.  Residential, commercial and hotel development was rapid, especially after it was incorporated as a town by an Act of Parliament in 1832 (previously it had been run as a private enterprise by Burton), and the resort soon rivalled neighbouring Hastings in popularity.
  Burton provided the town with its first Anglican church, St Leonard's Church, in 1831.  The 800-capacity seafront building was consecrated in 1834.  After Burton's death in 1837, the town continued to grow in all directions, helped by the opening of St Leonards Warrior Square railway station in 1851.  This was close to the square of that name, an early Victorian-era set piece (started in the early 1850s), which helped to push St Leonards-on-Sea's boundaries closer to those of Hastings.
  St Leonard's Church, the parish church, was in the western part of the resort, on the seafront road called Marina.  This was the only Anglican place of worship in the town, and in 1848 a Roman Catholic place of worship was established near Warrior Square when Augustus Pugin's Convent of the Holy Child Jesus opened its chapel for public worship; so in June 1850 a group of promoters contacted the Incorporated Church Building Society and applied for money to build a new church to serve the eastern part of St Leonards-on-Sea.
  The land Burton bought straddled two parish boundaries: St Leonard's and St Mary Magdalene's.  St Leonard's was named in reference to one of Hastings' ancient parish churches which apparently vanished by the early 15th century.  It belonged to an abbey in Rouen in France before that.  St Mary Magdalene's parish, to the east, was first described in 1656, but there was no ancient church of that dedication in the area; instead there was a medieval Hospital of St Mary Magdalene, from which the name may have come.  The new church then took the name of this ancient parish.
  Charles Eversfield of the Eversfield baronets gave the site for the church—a high, landmark site overlooking Warrior Square.  Funding came from the Bishop of Chichester, the vicar of St Leonard's parish church and others.  A building committee was assembled to administer the design and construction process.  Sir Thomas Smith Marrable was a member, and his son Frederick was commissioned to design the church.  Work on the Decorated Gothic-style building started in 1852, and the church opened in that year.  It had a capacity of 822 worshippers, split approximately equally between free and paid-for pews.  The ecclesiastical parish was officially reconstituted in 1870.  The building cost £12,000—expensive for the time.
  The plans provided for a tower and a large spire.  The latter was never added, but in 1872 a tower was built at the southwest corner.  Other work carried out in this year included the addition of an organ chamber (in the form of an apse) and a vestry, and a new east window in the chancel.  Stained glass windows by Morris & Co. were added in 1882.  A church hall, a simple brick structure, was built on the northwest side 
caption: The church was built on a high, sloping site.
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