Craig Inns

Do you know why you were given that name?

That’s an interesting question. I believe it was just a decision from my parents, I don’t actually know why I was given that name but there you go.

Where were you born?

I was born at Minster Hospital on the Isle of Sheppey.

What year were you born?

1986.

Have you lived here all your life?

Yes, most of my life, I have lived in Ireland and Germany for short periods but back here right now.

Do you think it’s a good place to grow up?

Ah it’s fantastic, it is a fantastic place, it’s a brilliant community. I understand that there’s not a lot that kids can do but I believe that with a good imagination growing up you can have a lot of fun.

What’s your favourite or least favourite aspect of the church?

The sad thing is that it burnt down and I remember catching the train that morning in sheerness, the morning that it was actually on fire. That was a few years after I lived there. Seeing that on fire and the subsequent difficulties they had repairing it, I understand that the owner didn’t have the building insured so it was quite an unfortunate experience all round to see that.

Why did you go to the church?

Well I lived there at number 5 naval terrace, my grandparents lived at number 7, and my mates were living at some of the other numbers as well. Because I lived there for a short period of time it was really a very safe place to be out playing, there were no dangers or heavy traffic with people moving around. As a young boy, about 10 years old, I’d be playing football and running around. That’s why I was around that church. I did go in it once from underneath, there’s a basement around the back of the building, very scary as a 10 year old your imagination goes crazy. We went down the steps at the back of the church and got in there, which we shouldn’t have done, very dangerous, but boys have to explore I suppose don’t they. We found an old range cooker actually, a really old one, me and my mate Jake thought it was much older than it actually was, but your imagination sort of runs away with you. I learned later after living there that it was used as a boxing gym, so that would have been in the early 1990s that it would have been a boxing gym, then previously to that I have got photos of it actually as a functioning church.

Would you like to tell us about these photographs?

I went to see my grandmother yesterday and my grandfather, when they lived there, he was a very keen photographer, and as you can see he took photographs of pretty much everything from when he lived there. Obviously you are welcome to use any of this. As you can see there is a photograph of the inside of the church. It’s very old that photo. Going through, you can see what it looked like when I lived there, it was all boarded up, you couldn’t access the church at all. There are some beautiful photos in here. I’m not too sure of the year it burned down, I can’t remember, but I do remember that I was heading off to work somewhere, so I think I was about 15/16. So, at least 15 years ago at least.

The fire I believe was started by the owner, who was doing a bonfire at the back of the church, and it unfortunately spread and caught fire to the back of the church, I don’t know if that was known.

As you can see this is all the terrace, there are 8 houses there and they were originally for admirals and high ranking sailors who were to do with the dockyard of the time. At the front of the houses there is a walkway that the butlers used to use, they used to stay in the basements and they could come out and walk along and come in all underneath the ground. There is a series of tunnels underneath these as well, I found a couple of them and some bunkers as well, shelters so that if the dockyard was under attack there would be places to hide.

You can see some beautiful photos of the church in the snow. There are some lovely photographs taken, that was my grandad there, his name was Albert Snelley, he passed away about 9 years ago. But my grandmother, who is still alive, she lives in Minster now, she’s kindly let us use this book.

Do you know anything about the clock?

The clock at the top? I’m afraid I don’t know anything about that except that it’s up there. I do know it didn’t work, I never saw it working, I’m not too sure that there was a bell up there for it.

I take it that you have positive memories of the church?

Yes, I really enjoyed the time that we all lived there. The houses were rented by the dockyard directly to the tenants, then they went to auction and the tenants were given two days’ notice of that. A lot of the people who were residents there didn’t have the opportunity to go and purchase their homes as a result. My grandmother went to the auction, and had the opportunity to buy her one for £37,000 at the time, possibly around 1998. No. 1 recently sold for nearly £700,000, so there is a huge increase in value for these properties.

Do you know what that is there in the picture? It’s a scorpion. In the wall behind the church these scorpions live. There’s lots of them in there. They grow to just about over a centimetre, or a centimetre and a half. I was petrified of these obviously as a young boy, but when my grandad got hold of one and took a photo of one I realised they weren’t as dangerous as you’d think. They are apparently quite tame.

Other than the scorpions you enjoyed your time there?

Yes. We had horse chestnut trees directly out the front, so every September the floor would be scattered with huge conkers, so we always had the best ones.

What do you think of the restoration work that is ongoing?

I think it’s fantastic, it’s been a long time and I think that as a piece of island history the church deserves that investment in it and deserves that community engagement, and I feel that a large portion of the local community will benefit from this in the future no matter what the building is used for, whether a boxing gym or a café. It’s such a historic building that people need to know it’s there and be able to access it. I think that it is actually fantastic that his project is going ahead.

“I think it’s fantastic, it’s been a long time and I think that as a piece of island history the church deserves that investment in it and deserves that community engagement, and I feel that a large portion of the local community will benefit from this in the future no matter what the building is used for...”

If you have your own memories of the dockyard church – as a church, a social club or as it is now, we’d love to hear from you. We're also keen to build an image archive by making copies of photographs and memorabilia of the church.

If you’d like to contribute memories or images to the archive, please tell us a bit more about what you have using the form.