Any Questions? Please try here first

If you have any comments or new information about this record, please email us.

Summary

Albert memorial chapel built on site of King Henry III chapel (1240-8).

Monument Type(s):

• CHAPEL (Medieval to Post Medieval - 1240 AD to 1861 AD)

Description

Albert memorial chapel built on site of King Henry III chapel (1240-8) used 1350-1483 as chapel of the Order of the Garter. Rebuilt 1494 to form the Lady Chapel of St George's Chapel. Completed 1514 and remodelled by Queen Victoria 1861 <1>.

A heritage desk-based assessment was undertaken to support a Scheduled Monument Consent application to create 60 burial loculi (small chambers) between the buttresses on the south side of the Albert Memorial Chapel, on Chapel Hill within the Windsor Castle complex. The origins of the Albert Memorial Chapel date back to 1240. The north and west wall of the 13th century chapel survive at a lower level; the east end and the south wall, adjacent to the proposed memorial garden, were subsequently rebuilt. Between 1494 and 1498 the 13th-century chapel was reconstructed under the orders of Henry VII as a Lady chapel that the King initially chose as his intended place of burial. It is this Lady chapel that survives today as the Albert Memorial Chapel. St John Hope’s 1913 account of Windsor Castle suggests that Henry VII’s Lady chapel was narrower than its 13th century predecessor, although the author of this assessment suggests he is mistaken and it is far more likely that Henry VII’s Lady chapel made use of the foundational support of its 13th-century predecessor.

This is also the view in Tim Tatton-Brown’s 2010 account of St George’s Chapel in which he states that the Henry VII Lady chapel is on its 13th-century alignment <2>.

Under Scheduled Monument Consent (SMC) an archaeological evaluation and watching brief were undertaken between Buttresses 1 and 2 (counting from the west) on the external south side of the Albert Memorial Chapel following proposals to create 60 small burial chambers (loculi) to receive the cremation urns of Military Knights.

Removal of the five stone slabs on the east side of the bay revealed dabs of mortar on top of a loose, pale yellow substrate of sand and grit. When this was removed, the top surface of a well-defined block of masonry, Feature F1, was exposed. This was abutted by a hard surface of superimposed mortar spreads (2) ranging in thickness from 16 to 22mm, sloping slightly southwards. This was interpreted as the bedding for an earlier pavement surface. These hard mortar spreads sealed a fill of chalk lumps and occasional flints and brick fragments (3) which was notably clean, with only a few patches of dark grey earth. It appeared to have been imported, perhaps from a chalk pit, as an infill material to support the earlier pavement.

A small pit (F2) measuring 220mm (N-S) x 190mm (E-W) was observed dug through Contexts 2 and 3. At the bottom was a hard stone surface which subsequent excavation showed was the top of another stone block (F3).

Below this a further spread of yellow mortar residues and brick fragments was present (4), and this sealed a very hard layer of compacted chalk (lumps typically measuring 10-18mm in diameter) together with similarly sized flints, in a matrix of bright orange-yellow sand (5).

Located in the north-east corner of the trench, Feature 1 consisted of a chamfered block bedded on a hard purplish mortar on top of a shallow foundation slab. The sides of the chamfered block bore a well-defined ‘tide-mark’ corresponding to the mortar layer (02) defined as the bedding of an earlier pavement surface. Similarly, in the south-east corner of the trench was observed a foundation stone at the same level as the slabs forming the footings to the north-east chamfered block. It was clear from the outline in the mortar on the top of the latter stone that it had formerly supported a chamfered block similar to the first. These features could readily be identified from historic plans as deriving from a short-lived south porch added to the ‘Tomb House’ (later, the ‘Albert Memorial Chapel’) in the early nineteenth century by Sir Jeffry Wyattville. The porch was later demolished soon after 1862.

Evidence was also found for the west wall of the porch, including another chamfered block at the north-east corner of the trench, cut into the basal course at the foot of the main wall of the chapel. No evidence for the actual doorway into the chapel had survived, because the wall between the buttresses had been completely refaced.

Further evidence of later nineteenth century work was revealed during a watching brief. This indicated that previous excavation had occurred, down to the top of Context 5. The backfill included masonry fragments of Taynton stone, together with large medieval nails, suggesting that the excavation might have taken place in the later nineteenth century during Gilbert Scott’s work, and certainly after the demolition of the Wyattville porch. Both the buttresses and the chapel wall had evidently been refaced in Clipsham stone, presumably in the late nineteenth century.

The masonry identified as surviving from Wyattville’s porch cut into projecting footings of a very dark coloured greensand. This pre-existing basal course, found beneath the buttress and the main south wall of the chapel is considered to be of medieval date, dating from the reconstruction of the Lady Chapel by Henry VII in 1494-8.

Beneath the very hard layer of compacted chalk and flints in a matrix of bright orange-yellow sand (5), and at a depth of 44.06m aOD, was revealed a hard surface of lime mortar concrete (6). It is possible that this ‘concrete’ surface formed part of the foundations of Henry III’s first chapel—and this might imply that the walls of that chapel were as wide as those of the present chapel’s north wall. The latter thickness has been ascribed to Henry VII’s rebuilding, but if the chapel had massively thick walls both to north and south, this might explain the anomaly which St.John Hope considered an indication that Henry VII’s chapel was narrower than its predecessor as Henry VII might simply have reconstructed the south wall as a narrower structure whilst maintaining the internal width of the previous building <3>.

<1> W.H. St John Hope, 1913, Windsor Castle, An Architectural History (Bibliographic reference). SRW12714.

<2> Dr. John Crook, 2014, College of St George, Windsor (Unpublished document). SRM14787.

<3> Dr. John Crook, 24/03/2014, College of St George, Windsor - Military Knights Interment Project: Phase I. Report on an Archaeological Assessment and subsequent Watching Brief (Unpublished document). SRM14788.

Sources

Designations

• Scheduled Monument 1006996: Windsor Castle

Associated Events:

Associated Monuments

Associated Finds:

Search results generated by the HBSMR Gateway from exeGesIS SDM Ltd.