Royal Garrison Church

A 13th-century almshouse chapel attached to the old garrison hospital, used as a chapel by the Portsmouth military garrison for centuries. The medieval chancel and a few of the original windows still stand. The Georgian and Victorian nave was destroyed by German firebombing in 1941 and never rebuilt — the open shell, with the chancel roofed and the nave open to the sky, is now maintained by English Heritage.

It sits on the Hot Walls overlooking the harbour mouth. Open occasionally on summer afternoons; the rest of the time you can walk around the outside and read the boards explaining its history. Free.

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A story
Charles II married Catherine of Braganza in this church on 14 May 1662 — the only time a reigning English monarch has been married in Portsmouth. The nave was destroyed by a single incendiary bomb on 10 January 1941, the same night the Guildhall burned.

Other places in Old Portsmouth