Haggerston (St. Mary)
The living is a perpetual curacy; net income, £500; patron and appropriator, the Archdeacon of London. The church, erected in 1827, at an expense of £15,000, by the Parliamentary Commissioners, is a spacious structure, blending the early and decorated English styles, with a lofty embattled tower of singular design, destitute of relief in the lower part, and ornamented in the upper with crocketed pinnacles; at the western extremities of the aisles are octagonal turrets, with domed roofs surrounded by crocketed pinnacles rising from the angles. There are places of worship for Independents and Wesleyans. Six almshouses, for members of the Company of Goldsmiths, were founded in 1705, in Goldsmith-place, by Mr. Richard Morrell, who endowed them with an estate for their maintenance. Fourteen others, with a chapel in the centre, were erected in Kingsland-road, in 1713, by Sir Robert Geoffrey, Knt., for members of the Company of Ironmongers: on the south side of these are twelve more, founded by Mr. S. Harwar, citizen of London, of which six are for freemen of the Drapers' Company, and six for persons of the parish; and to the north of them, twelve for freemen of the Company of Frame-work Knitters or their widows, founded by Thomas Bourne, Esq., who gave £1000 for their erection, and £2000 for their endowment, to which additions have been made by other benefactors.
Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.