St Peter's Roman Catholic Church, Liverpool


St. Peter's Roman Catholic Church is a former church in Seel Street, Liverpool, Merseyside, England, that was transformed into a restaurant and bar called Alma de Cuba. On 14 November 2024, the building reopened as St Peter's Tavern.
Until its closure, St. Peter's was the oldest Catholic Church in Liverpool. It is recorded in the National Heritage List for England as a designated Grade II listed building.
In September 2024 it was announced that the building had been acquired by The 1936 Pub Company that intended to renovate and reopen under the name St Peter's Tavern.

History

Some milestones in St Peter's history include:
  • 7 September 1788 - opening of St Peter's.
  • 11 September 1788 - The 'Liverpool Advertiser' reports that "On Sunday last, a new Roman Catholic Chapel in Seel St. was opened with high Mass: and a sermon by the Rev. Mr. McDonald."
  • 28 September 1788 - first baptisms performed, with the first entry: "Was baptised Mary, daughter of John and Mary Goosse; Sponsors, Paul Hewit and Margaret Yates".
  • 1 April 1789 - perpetual lease granted by the City Corporation, "to Father McDonald and successors, of the site of St. Peter's Chapel, so long as a place of worship." A separate lease granted for the house and schools, at an annual ground rent of twelve pence.
  • 29 July 1814 - Death of Fr Archibald Benedict McDonald, O.S.B.. On the Founder's Monument was inscribed: "In the vaults of this chapel are deposited the remains of the Rev. Archibald MacDonald, who departed this life on the 29 July 1814, aged 78 years. The founder of this chapel, and for a period of 26 years its liberal, intelligent and revered pastor, to whose memory the Catholics of Liverpool erect this monument. - R.I.P."
  • 1817/1818 - The church is enlarged. The enlargement includes the porch and the gallery, and possibly encompassed part of the Presbytery.
  • 1817 - The opening of St Peter's Schools in Seel Street, the "first Catholic School founded". In fact the school probably transferred from a smaller school founded opposite the church in 1789.
  • 1840 - Fr Vincent Glover, O.S.B., died of fever on 6 August, contracted whilst attending the sick. Fr Glover had served the Parish for 22 years.
  • 1845 - A major extension to the church takes place. Next to St. Peter's Church stood the house in which the priests had lived for over 60 years. The main part of the floors were removed and the wall between the church and the house was taken down. The result created the Sanctuary. The front room of the house then became the Sacristy. The extension was carried out under the auspices of Fr James Francis Appleton, O.S.B., the Parish Priest at the time.
  • 1847 - In 1846 and 1847 hundreds of thousands of Irish immigrants landed in Liverpool to escape the famine, and they swarmed to the poorer quarters of the town. An epidemic of typhus began and at a Vestry Meeting on 8 June 1847 it was reported that 57,701 cases of typhus had been dealt with. Fr Appleton, O.S.B., died of typhus fever contracted whilst administering to the sick on 26 May 1847. The English Benedictine Congregation History records that " was gradually recovering when contrary to Doctor's orders he very injudiciously took some Whisky which acted like poison on his constitution and terminated his life."
  • 1854 - The last burial takes place in St. Peter's vaults.
  • 1856 - Fr Davey, O.S.B. and '400 children' walk in the "Peace Procession" to celebrate the end of the Crimean War.
  • 1864 - The Lady Chapel was built in memory of Fr Benedict Bonney, O.S.B..
  • 1872 - Fr Scarisbrook, O.S.B. was consecrated Bishop of Mauritius at St. Peter's.
  • 1898 - The Lady Altar is erected to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of Fr Anderson's entering the Order of St. Benedict.
  • 1920 - Electric light installed for the first time in the Church and Church redecorated. Funds for this refurbishment were raised by sources including an "extraordinarily successful" Grand Bazaar held 14–16 October 1920. The cost of this work entailed "an outlay of several hundred pounds". This work was undertaken during the period when Fr Basil Primavesi, O.S.B., was Parish Priest.
  • 1934 - Data from the 1934 Parish Census states that there were 622 families in the parish, with a total of 2,823 Catholic "souls".
  • 1938 – On 19 June 1938 St Peter's celebrated its 150th anniversary. The Jubilee Mass was celebrated by Archbishop Downey, and hundreds of people attended the event. The streets around St Peter's were extensively decorated to mark this big event as is illustrated by the photos taken by Fr D’Andria and which are now held in the Liverpool Records Office. The photos show that there were very extensive decorations in Pitt Street, the Lydia Ann Flats, and other streets including Seel Street, Sparling Street and Slater Street.
  • 1940-1941 - Fr Louis Joseph D'Andria, O.S.B., writes a series of letters to Fr Kevin Byrne, O.S.B., Abbot of Ampleforth Abbey about life in Liverpool during the Blitz. These letters are subsequently published in the year 2000 by the North West Catholic History Society in a book. Fr D'Andria left St Peter's after the heavy bombing of May 1941. Fr D'Andria was active in collecting historical and contemporary material from the St Peter's and the surrounding districts from his arrival in the Parish in 1930. These materials were deposited at the Liverpool Records Office upon his death. D'Andria was a keen photographer, and at some stage the photos taken by D'Andria of the church and the surrounding districts were separated from the main D'Andria Collection and integrated into the Record Office's general collection of photographs of Liverpool. Some more detail is given in the section on The Blitz below.
  • 1962 - Fr Martin Rocheford, O.S.B., deposits the pre-1837 Parish Registers at the Liverpool Records Office.
  • 1976 - transferred to the Polish Community and for a short time was known as Our Lady of Czestochowa.
  • 1978 - The Parish is closed and falls into a period of disuse.
  • 1978 - The Parish records are deposited in the Liverpool Records office by Fr Everest. The Parish Registers were transferred to St. Vincent de Paul's RC Church.
  • 1993 - The Church is deconsecrated.
  • 20 November 2003 - A press release is issued stating that funding has been approved to convert the Grade-II listed building of St Peter's Church into high-specification offices by Urban Splash. Funding is received from the EU, the North West Development Agency and Urban Splash itself.
  • 7 January 2004 - The BBC report that developers have discovered the body of Fr Bede Brewer, O.S.B. in the crypt of St Peter's. Dom Bede Brewer was one of the founding members of Ampleforth College in 1802, and President of English Benedictines. The Liverpool Echo also indicate that Ampleforth Abbey was keen to reclaim all of the monastic bodies in St Peter's crypt.
  • 2004 - Fr Brewer was reburied at Ampleforth Abbey in July 2004 along with the remains of 6 other monks. In total there were 22 bodies in the crypt of St Peter's. In addition to Dom Bede Brewer, the monks reburied at Ampleforth Abbey according to the Yorkshire Post were monks James Calderbank, Denis Allerton, Benedict Glover, Francis Fairclough, Gregory Robinson and Joseph Glover. However, St Peter's founder, Fr McDonald, was the first buried in St Peter's crypt and his coffin was not clearly labelled. Due to this fact and other pressures it was not possible to positively identify Fr McDonald's remains, and so he was reburied along with the remains of 14 lay people in Ford Cemetery in Litherland, Merseyside.
  • 2005 - a bar and restaurant, Alma de Cuba, opens in St Peter's Church.
  • 2024 - The former Alma de Cuba reopens as "St Peter's Tavern" by The 1936 Pub Company, owned by Rob Gutmann who had founded Alma de Cuba.

    The Blitz

St Peter's was damaged a number of times during the Blitz of 1940–1941. One example of the damage can be found in Fr Louis D’Andria's letter of 22 December 1940 to the Abbot of Ampleforth Abbey. Referring to the previous night D’Andria wrote: ‘To the Guild Room – doors blown in, big balk of timber across the entrance, stairs covered with sticky chemicals and heaps of rubbish…. To sacristy where sacristans were carrying on as usual despite a hole in the sacristy roof, and other damage. In the church Frs. Bruno and Chad were in the gallery examining a hole in the roof on the street side of the organ. Two more holes in the Lady Chapel, and a big stone in the sanctuary which had come through the skylight’.
In D’Andria's letter of 6 May 1941 he recounts events of Sunday 4 May 1941: ‘So it seemed the fire would spread to the church and the house. Bruno said we must clear out so we took the registers etc. into the road….I saw our roof definitely on fire.’
In his letter of 9 May 1941 D’Andria tells Fr Abbot : ‘Church has notice ‘closed till further notice. Mass on Sunday at Mount Pleasant.’ Suggest carrying on at St Peter's but Bruno said it was impossible.’ The Church Notice Book recorded that ‘The church was too wrecked a condition for Mass after the first raids of the first week of May.’ D'Andria went on to quote his Rector, Fr Francis Bruno Dawson, O.S.B. who announced 'No Church, no congregation, no house, no school, no good staying here.'
Masses were eventually restored, with one weekday Mass from 25 May 1941 at 08:00, rising to two Masses the following week, and by 12 June, three Masses were said.
Damage to the priests’ house included complete destruction of the 3rd floor of the building and partial damage to the 2nd floor, and the repairs which were finally undertaken reinstated the 2nd floor, and not the 3rd floor. In total 7 bedrooms were destroyed, and only 3 remained, ‘two with rain pouring in, in bad weather’. On 11 September 1944 The City Architect and Director of Housing reported that the 2nd floor was covered with a temporary lean-to corrugated iron roof which was "leaking badly", and that "the domestic servants’ sleeping accommodation is deplorable."Liverpool Records Office document 720KIR/2900
Photographs which were taken in May 1941 by Dom Louis D’Andria, OSB, show significant damage to the Presbytery and show the Sanctuary covered in debris following an air raid.
St Peter's Church Guildhall was located on Park Lane, and was completely destroyed during a bombing raid in 1941.
Documents held by the Liverpool Records Office show the problems that the priests had in getting repairs to St Peter’s Church, school and the Presbytery completed following the war damage. There are correspondence with various builders and the War Damage Commission. These include correspondence showing differences of opinion between the Parish Priest, Fr Dawson, OSB, and some of those undertaking work which led to Fr Dawson throwing some men off site. Whether Fr Dawson was justified in his actions is not clear, but in a letter written to Fr Dawson on 28 January 1945 Fr Dawson is told that "My plaster left on Saturday, and refuses to return to the job. He wants his cards if I send him back." In the case of the school roof repairs, leaks were evident in the school roof apparently due to faulty repairs. A letter written to Fr Dawson on 4 February 1945 states that "the fault is due not so much to faulty slates as to the fact that the roof timbers were not set and aligned previous to slating…the roll and drip gutter between the schools and church building should definitely have been renewed….the ridge lead still shows shrapnel holes.…to put the roof right by stripping, resetting and reslating would ….be a bigger job than the original one."
During the 8 nights of the 1941 Liverpool Blitz beginning on 1 May 1941, almost 1,750 people in Liverpool were killed, ~90,000 houses were destroyed, and ~ 75,000 people made homeless. Many areas close to St Peter's were destroyed, specifically the area around Paradise Street.