In 1791, Rev. John Cahill was assigned to Portsmouth and held services in a private house. A chapel was opened in Prince George Street in 1796 by Rev. Joseph Knapp. As a garrison town with an increasing number of Catholics, a larger space was needed. In 1877 Rev. John Horan purchased land from the War Department and hired architect John Crawley. Construction started in 1880, thanks to a donation from the Duke of Norfolk. It was opened in 1882 and is the first cathedral to have been built in Portsmouth. When the Diocese of Portsmouth was formed in May 1882, St. John's was named the cathedral. The cathedral was consecrated by the first bishop of the new diocese, John Vertue, on 29 March 1887. He enlarged the cathedral and completed its interior decorations. He built an episcopal residence and a large hall adjoining, which, with the cathedral, form a group of buildings artistic in design, and architecturally, a most noteworthy structure, among the ecclesiastical buildings in the Borough of Portsmouth.
Architecture
The cathedral was designed in Gothic Revival style by John Crawley in 1877-1881. Crawley died just as building started and his partner Joseph Hansom took over the project and modified the design, working on it until 1896. The church is built of Fareham Red Brick with Portland stone dressings. In 1900, John Cahill succeeded Vertue as Bishop of Portsmouth. Cahill completed the cathedral by adding the west front; the bell towers, designed by Canon Alexander Scoles, were added in 1906. A memorial chapel dedicated to Our Lady Immaculate and St Edmund of Abingdon, patrons of the Diocese of Portsmouth, was created at the east end of the north aisle in memory of Bishop Vertue. A bronze statue of St John the Evangelist, by sculptor Philip Jackson, stands eight feet tall outside the Cathedral. Most of the stained-glass windows sustained some bomb damage in 1941, especially those over the high altar. The round window in the south transept was the only one not damaged. An elaborate baldacchino surmounting the high altar was removed in the 1970 reordering. The last part to be built was St Patrick's Chapel in 1924.
