Category: Little Gidding

This beautiful church was the inspiration for the last of T.S.Eliot’s Four Quartets.  William Hopkinson bought the 700 acres estate in 1848 and became Lord of the Manor of Little Gidding.

The installation of this east window by William Hopkinson during his restoration of St Johns in 1851 dangerously weakened the wall. It was removed in 1990 and is now in the chapel of the Westwood House School in Peterborough (the school is now called the Peterborough school. An image of the window can be seen on their website at the bottom of the following page: Window photograph

The present church of St John the Evangelist, Little Gidding has been a place of worship and pilgrimage since the 18th century, although there has been a place of worship on the site for eight centuries. This grade 1 listed building has significance to many people with its connections to Nicholas Ferrar who established a community here in the 17th century, William Hopkinson Lord of the Manor of Little Gidding and T. S Eliot who, following a visit to Little Gidding in 1939, wrote Little Gidding, the last of the Four Quartets.
St John’s Church is now in need of significant restoration. This work includes structural work, window repairs, bell restoration, refurbishment of the inscription over the west door and re-gilding of the weather vane.

Please contact the church at through their website (there are contact numbers as well) to find out how to donate.

Little Gidding Church prior to its restoration in 1853: as it probably was in the time of Nicholas Ferrar.