History of St. John’s Anglican Church, Montreux

History of English Churches in Switzerland: St. John’s Anglican Church - Montreux

Montreux: From Romantic Haven to Victorian Resort

Before the first Anglican services began in 1860, Montreux had already captured the imagination of Europe’s literary elite. In 1816, the 28-year-old poet Lord Byron fled England for self-imposed exile, settling on the shores of Lake Geneva. That legendary summer, Byron met fellow poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, and together with Mary Shelley, they created works that would define the Romantic movement. Their time in Switzerland produced Byron’s poem The Prisoner of Chillon, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, and John Polidori’s The Vampyre.

Byron’s influence on the region was transformative. From 1816 until around 1850, admirers including French writer Victor Hugo made pilgrimages to Lake Geneva, Château de Chillon, and the Alps to follow in the poet’s footsteps. As one historian noted, “Tourism was already quite big, but Montreux, Vevey, Clarens, Villeneuve and Caux developed a great deal because of Byron.” The romantic allure of the Swiss Riviera, combined with the completion of new railway lines, transformed Montreux from a quiet lakeside village into one of Europe’s most fashionable destinations.

The Railway Revolution and Access to the Alps

The development of Montreux as a major tourist destination accelerated with the arrival of the railways. Montreux lies at a strategic location on the north shore of Lake Geneva, at the historic fork in the Roman road from Italy over the Simplon Pass. By the late 19th century, Montreux had become both a stop on the Simplon Railway and a mountain railway hub.

The opening of mountain railways transformed Montreux into the gateway to the Pays d’Enhaut—the highland region that includes Château d’Oex. The Montreux Oberland Bernois Railway (MOB) connected the lakeside resort with the alpine villages, opening in stages from 1901 to 1905. This vital link meant British visitors could easily escape the summer heat of the Riviera for the cooler mountain air of Château d’Oex and beyond, making Montreux the perfect staging post for excursions into the Swiss Alps.

The Victorian Era Church (1853-1878)

It was into this cosmopolitan setting that the first Anglican priest was licensed to minister to the growing British colony at Montreux in 1860. The early history of St. John’s Anglican Church dates back to when English residents held services in hotels until a local hotelier generously donated land for the construction of an Anglican Church. During these first years, with no dedicated English church building, services were held regularly for more than fifteen years in the Swiss Protestant Church of Montreux.

Schniewind’s history of the Swiss chaplaincies takes the story back further still. In 1853 the Revd D. R. Morgan came to Montreux from Vevey, where he had been chaplain for five years, and the English colony was granted the use of the Montreux Swiss parish church of St Vincent on Sundays — so there was an Anglican congregation here seven years before the first licensed priest. In 1860 the Revd John Bennett, licensed by the Bishop of London, began eighteen years of ministry, which carried the congregation right up to the opening of its own church.

By the end of the 1870s there were at least fifty hotels and pensions between Vevey and Villeneuve. The congregation that built St John’s was drawn from all of them.

The need for a proper Anglican church became increasingly pressing as the region filled with Belle Époque palaces and grand hotels along the shores of Lake Geneva. British tourists arriving for the season expected the familiar comforts of home, including Anglican worship in their own tradition.

Architectural Heritage

In 1875, construction began on the church of Saint John the Evangelist. The church was designed by the renowned Victorian English Gothic Revivalist George Frederick Bodley, who had created or renovated hundreds of churches throughout England. Dedicated in 1877, St. John’s Anglican Church stands as a fine example of the Belle Époque style. Schniewind gives the consecration as 1878, which is consistent rather than contradictory: the church records its centenary as falling in 1977, and the two dates most likely mark the opening and the consecration in successive years.

Bodley was one of the most influential church architects of the Victorian era, having trained as a pupil of Sir George Gilbert Scott. He maintained close connections with William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones, and was among the first major patrons of Morris’s stained glass work. The church was specifically built to serve the 19th and early 20th century British guests who stayed at the two grand hotels nearby (now converted to private apartments), including those en route to the mountains via the new railway connections.

Growth and Expansion

The church had the good fortune of a long incumbency at exactly the right moment. The Revd Philip Menzies Sankey, chaplain from the church’s opening, cared for the ever-increasing congregation together with the Church Committee for twenty-eight years, until his retirement in September 1906.

The British colony in Montreux grew so rapidly that the church had to be extended three times to accommodate the expanding congregation — the third time in 1896, bringing it to a capacity of over 500. Many of these new arrivals were following in Byron’s footsteps, as the poet’s influence had made the Lake Geneva region a must-visit destination for cultured travelers.

Even 500 seats were not enough. A few months before Sankey retired in 1906 the total Easter attendance was 900, and it was not only an Easter phenomenon: The Anglican Church Magazine reported in its June/July issue that year that “the winter season was very crowded with numbers of people being turned away from the church for lack of room”.

Bishop Wilkinson, after his second visitation, wrote in the church record: “Nothing can well be more quietly reverent and seemly than the church and services here. … It seems to me to be a model for the Continental Church in general.”

In 1889, a ‘Church Institute’ was built beside the church, initially housing the “English Library.” This institution became central to the British community’s cultural life, providing not just religious services but a complete social infrastructure for expatriates and long-term visitors. The English Library organization remains active in Montreux today and celebrated its centenary in 1989. Schniewind dates these two things separately: the Library was established in 1886 under the presidency of Sir George Bart, the chaplain noting that October that “it has met a want which has been long felt”; and the Church Institute next to St John’s was finished in 1892, when the Library moved into its new home.

Another measure of the colony’s size was the opening of a Montreux branch of the Girls’ Friendly Society in 1892 by Lady Vincent — the only Swiss branch besides Geneva. The society existed to welcome and assist girls and women working abroad: ladies’ maids, nurses, governesses, secretaries. Its lodge and clubroom in Montreux were still being mentioned in 1925.

Three churches, two traditions

Montreux is the one place in Switzerland where the English had a genuine choice of churchmanship. Two further permanent Anglican churches were built within a few miles: All Saints’, Vevey and Christ Church, Clarens. There were no geographical boundaries between them — all three drew their parishioners from across the whole region — and what distinguished them was tradition rather than territory. St John’s worshipped in the Anglo-Catholic tradition; Christ Church, Clarens, and All Saints’, Vevey, in the Evangelical one. Schniewind, writing in 1992, recommended attending each in turn as an unusually good way to understand the difference.

That distinction had consequences. When amalgamating the two Montreux chaplaincies was later proposed and described as “ultimately possible”, it did not happen, because each church wished to keep its own tradition.

The Rural Deanery, and the missing minutes

The chaplaincy’s standing was recognised in 1907, when the new chaplain, the Revd Charles Hesketh Knowlys, was appointed the first Rural Dean of Switzerland; he had already served at Territet as assistant chaplain in 1894. His three successors at St John’s were also made Rural Deans, and between 1907 and 1936 — with one interruption after the death of the Revd Sydney Smith — the Swiss Rural Deanery was directed from Territet. When Knowlys died in the summer of 1912, the recently appointed Bishop Bury took charge at Territet himself until the beginning of 1913.

There is then a hole in the record. The minutes from May 1910 to the end of 1948 have disappeared, so the principal source for the two wars and everything between them is simply gone. What is known from elsewhere is that the annual Chaplains’ Conference for Northern and Central Europe met at Montreux four times in the 1920s, resuming in 1921 after a six-year interruption; and that in 1927 two English girls’ public schools were founded in the district, St George’s College at Clarens and Châtelard School at Les Avants, St George’s taking the chaplain of St John’s as its school chaplain and Châtelard the chaplain of Christ Church.

1949: thirty-five people

The post-war collapse was as severe here as anywhere. Mr Dixon of the SPG reported in 1949 that before the war St John’s had some 150 in the congregation at Sunday morning and evening services; in 1949 there were about 35, most of them elderly.

It recovered. In 1954 the Library was moved and the Institute converted into a residence for the chaplain. A joint thé-vente with All Saints’, Vevey, is recorded at Montreux on 18 October 1958. When Aiglon College at Villars and Châtelard School combined for a Carol Service in Advent 1962, the church was filled to overflowing, gallery included, with the Presbyterian minister of the Scots Kirk at Lausanne preaching — a service which had begun in 1927 and remained much appreciated in the region. Arriving in November 1964, the new chaplain, the Revd John Lewis, introduced himself to the committee as the “youngest chaplain in the jurisdiction” and observed that some of his congregation had been attending St John’s for more years than he had been alive.

Not every church on this shore survived. In October 1968 Christ Church, Clarens, served in its last years from Vevey, was closed by the bishop as a place of worship. It was declared policy in the deanery that any church which was not self-supporting should close, and St John’s finances were a constant worry; on a visit on 11 February 1972 the bishop stressed the church’s special role and encouraged it to continue as a guiding light. It did. On 24 May 1977 the centenary of the opening of St John’s was celebrated in the bishop’s presence before a large congregation that included the Swiss Reformed and Roman Catholic clergy of the town.

In 1988 the Rt Revd Ambrose W. M. Weekes, until 1986 Suffragan Bishop of Gibraltar in Europe, came out of retirement to take charge of St John’s — serving as chaplain, visiting chaplain to Gstaad, founder of new congregations at Monthey and Anzère, and a confirming bishop across Switzerland on the diocesan’s behalf. His Christmas greeting for 1991 is the warmest thing in Schniewind’s book: “I have enjoyed life here immensely, Switzerland is wonderful, and this area of the Riviera particularly so. St John’s is a beautiful Church, and the people here, as well as in Monthey, Gstaad and Anzère so kind and hospitable. It will be hard to leave!”

In 1954, the Library was relocated to allow the Institute building to be converted into a residence for the Chaplain of St. John’s Anglican Church, ensuring the church could maintain a permanent clergy presence.

20th Century Challenges and Restoration

As the 20th century progressed, the building suffered from wear and tear, compounded by ill-conceived attempts at patchwork repairs. Much of the church’s original beauty was lost during this period. The distinctive English-style roof, while architecturally authentic, proved vulnerable to the Swiss climate and developed persistent leaks.

Faced with mounting repair costs and water damage to the church walls, the congregation made the difficult decision to sell their most valuable asset: a Madonna and Child painting by the Italian Renaissance artist Andrea Previtali. The painting was auctioned at Sotheby’s, fetching a high price partly because the wall where it had hung was miraculously spared from water damage.

Toward the end of the 20th century, a massive restoration effort began, funded by generous local benefactors. The highly ornamented Lady Chapel, including its lovely shrine to Our Lady, the stencilled decorations throughout the church, and the finely carved crucifix that serves as the centrepiece of the reredos, have all been restored to their original glory.

St. John’s Anglican Church Today

Today, St. John’s Anglican Church continues to serve as a worshipping Anglican community in the heart of the Swiss Riviera. The church maintains its vital role as a spiritual home for the international English-speaking community in Montreux, offering regular services, Bible studies, choir activities, and concerts.

The church remains part of the Anglican Diocese in Europe and continues to welcome visitors from around the world, particularly during Montreux’s famous Jazz Festival and other international events. As it has for over 160 years, St. John’s Anglican Church stands as a beacon of English tradition and Anglican worship on the shores of Lake Geneva.

---

Key Information:

• Date of first Chaplaincy: 1853 (services in the Swiss parish church of St Vincent); first licensed Anglican priest 1860
• Church construction: 1875-1877; consecrated 1878 in Schniewind’s account
• Architect: George Frederick Bodley
• Architectural style: Gothic Revival/Belle Époque
• Original Patron: Society for the Propagation of the Gospel (SPG)
• Current Status: Active parish with regular services
• Address: Avenue de Chillon 92, Montreux 1820, Switzerland
• Website: stjohnsmontreux.ch

---

Sources and References:

1. St. John the Evangelist Montreux, Church Pamphlet
2. Byron’s influence on Swiss tourism: Patrick Vincent, “Following in Lord Byron’s Swiss footsteps,” swissinfo.ch, 2016
3. Church architecture: “Ship of Fools: St John the Evangelist, Montreux, Switzerland,” 2019
4. Bodley biographical details: Michael Hall, “George Frederick Bodley and the Later Gothic Revival in Britain and America,” 2014
5. Railway development: “Montreux Oberland Bernois Railway,” Wikipedia
6. Tourism history: “Montreux trumpets heritage buildings,” swissinfo.ch, 2024
7. Paul Schniewind, Anglicans in Switzerland, Past and Present (Berne, 1992), pp. 56–61 — the chaplaincy before 1878, the chaplains, the Rural Deanery, the lost minutes, and the twentieth-century figures