St Peters Convent
The Order of St Peter was founded by Rosamira and Benjamin Lancaster. Concerned about patients discharged from hospital who needed some form of convalescent care, they devoted a large part of their wealth to the foundation of a religious community devoted to nursing.
The Sisterhood’s first house was at 27 Brompton Square , London , where two Sisters cared for twelve
convalescent patients. Owing to pressures on space, in 1869 the Sisterhood moved to St Peter’s Home, Mortimer Road , Kilburn, which became the mother house until 1944.
The largest of the branch houses was established at Woking . Land at Maybury Hill was purchased for the Sisters towards the end of the nineteenth century by Mrs Matilda Blanche Gibbs, wife of a wealthy businessman of Wraxall, Somerset . The intention was to open a long-term care-home. The Home was officially opened on 20 October 1885 and called 'St Peter’s Memorial Home'. It initially had accommodation for 60 patients but a further wing with extra rooms and two more wards was added in 1892. After the evacuation of the Sisters from Kilburn in 1944 following bomb damage, Woking became the mother house and became known as 'St Peter's Convent'.
By the 1980s, with the phasing-out of convalescent homes under the National Health Service and a reduction in numbers entering the Sisterhood, it had become clear that the buildings in Woking were too large and too expensive to be viable. It was decided to sell part of the site, including the Convent buildings, and use the proceeds to build a new, smaller Convent and apply the remainder to charitable trusts. In 1990 the Sisters moved into the new, purpose-built Convent buildings adjacent to the old Convent. The former Convent buildings were converted into luxury flats.
Dwindling numbers of Sisters finally brought about the closure of the Convent in 2004 and it seems that
recently it has become a bit of a ‘smashing’ play area for the local kids with quite a lot of graffiti and damage within the buildings. Quite sad to think that something built as recently as 1990 is now abandoned and ruined. I don’t know what the plans are for the convent but given that Woking seems to be estate agent heaven my moneys on more flats!