Description of Historic Place

St. Lawrence Anglican Church Provincial Historic Site is a small, wooden Gothic Revival church located on the south side of the Boutouche River at 42 Acadie Street in the Town of Bouctouche.

Heritage Value

Although the designer and builder(s) are unknown, the surviving architectural evidence suggests strongly that St Lawrence Anglican Church, constructed between 1864 and 1867, was based on a rural parish church model provided to the local Anglican congregation by Anglican Bishop John Medley. As such, it is an example of vernacular church architecture after a model promoted throughout New Brunswick by Bishop Medley in response to the nineteenth century Ecclesiological movement. It confirms that Bishop Medley’s influence on Anglican church design extended to parishes in south east New Brunswick. St. Lawrence is also recognized as a convincing example of vernacular Gothic Revival architecture, signifying its widespread popularity in ecclesiastical design throughout New Brunswick in the mid-nineteenth century. The consistency of its design elements is noteworthy, especially in the well executed Gothic detail around the windows, entrance porch, belfry, gable and in the surviving liturgical furniture inside the church. St. Lawrence is the oldest surviving church building in the Town of Bouctouche. Source: New Brunswick Culture and Sport Secretariat, Heritage Branch, Site File # 40.

Character-Defining Elements

Some of the character-defining elements of St. Lawrence Anglican Church include: - shingled exterior, high pitched roof and features distinctive Gothic decorative embellishments throughout; - high quality of the workmanship in the well proportioned nave, chancel, porch and vestry all expressed architecturally in the well balanced Gothic composition of this small church; - consistency of design reflected in the west front with a double lancet Gothic window surmounted by an elegant yet diminutive quatrefoil decoration which centres the Gothic gable; - patterned Gothic trim punctuating the west gable, which is capped on top by a delicate open bell-cote with pointed arch enclosure supported by small decorative buttresses; - slender single lancet windows on both sides of the nave, four on the north side and three on the south side, together with a little entrance porch on the south side of the church; - pointed arched entrance and a triple lancet window, both in the Gothic manner separating the chancel from the nave; - church interior divided by a central aisle with wooden plank floor and butternut period furnishings in the Gothic manner including bench-pews, font, altar, altar rails and pulpit.