History
Additions and Modifications
A hundred years later an organ was placed in the western apse, and Benjamin West's huge altarpiece of 'The Burial of St. Stephen' was placed above the reredos, blocking the main east window. Benjamin West, born in Springfield, Pennsylvania, was the first (and so far the only) American painter to become President of the Royal Academy. He is buried in St. Paul's Cathedral. In 1850 the painting was moved to a position on the north wall, where the doorway intended by Wren, with portico, was blocked up because of the stench of the Stocks Market, the principal market at that time (now the site of the Lord Mayor's City residence, the Mansion House). At that time the windows were all filled with Victorian stained glass, which was later destroyed in the Second World War and replaced afterwards with clear glass. In 1963, War damage compensation paid for east windows of stained glass designed by the artist, Keith New, but because the higher buildings around have robbed the Church of much of its light, a return to clear glass is now planned.
In 1888 the box pews were removed and the paving stones replaced by mosaic, which unfortunately contradicts Wren's statement that this is a neo-Classical, not a Gothic, church. This provided for choir stalls and pews arranged to make a 'nave, transepts and chancel'. Neither the liturgical ideas of Wren's time, which called for a pulpit more impressive than the altar, nor the artistic ideas of the nineteenth century, allowed glorious use of the space under the dome for a central altar.
