The distinctive wooden pulpit was designed in 1898 by architect George Bodley. The pulpit, in perpendicular Gothic style, has carvings of the Crucifixion and the Annunciation around it, a canopy above, and two figures in cope and mitre on either side of the stairway. The figures represent the first Archbishop of Canterbury, St Augustine (d. 604) and his mentor, Pope St Gregory I (590-604). Known also as Gregory the Great, he instigated St Augustine’s mission to convert the Saxon kingdom of Kent to Christianity.

As on the Font, the Holy Ghost is represented by the figure of a small golden dove. The colours of the Pulpit serve as a reminder that the medieval Nave was vibrant with coloured painting and decoration.

On the floor of the sanctuary is the emblem of The Compass Rose, which signifies, by showing all points of the compass, that the Cathedral is the Mother Church of the Anglican Christian Faith throughout the World. This is where all the Anglican Bishops of the World gather at the time of each Lambeth Conference (held approximately every 10 years). The emblem bears a Greek inscription, which translates: “The Truth Shall Make You Free” – (John Ch. 8, v. 32). It was designed by Giles Blomfield of Truro and installed at the time of the Lambeth Conference in 1988. The first Lambeth Conference was held in 1867 and the most recent, the fifteenth, in Canterbury, in July/August 2022.

The Altar frontal is reversible, the front depicting All Seasons and the reverse Lent, portrayed by a Crown of Thorns. It was designed and worked by the Royal School of Needlework and was dedicated in 2006. The central motif of the All Seasons frontal is an adaptation of the Canterbury Cross in the form of the Compass Rose within a circlet of acanthus leaves, representing the NADFAS (National Association of Decorative & Fine Arts) sponsorship of the work, and surrounded by Greek lettering, repeating the motto: “The Truth Shall Make You Free”.

There are several military monuments along both sides of the Nave but the most intriguing of them all is connected with a forgotten event that has been described by some historians as as the greatest naval disaster in English history. The monument is a memorial to Sir James Hales (d.1589), his wife Alice and son Cheney.

Sir James was a soldier and treasurer to the Portugal Expedition (also known as the English Armada or Contra Armada) of 1589. The top part of the monument features a bas-relief sculpture showing Sir James being buried at sea. The English Armada was Elizabeth I’s attempt to capitalise on the failure of the Spanish Armada a year earlier. Despite the losses it had suffered around the coast of the British Isles in 1588, Spain remained the dominant naval force, and the Spanish Empire (the Iberian Union of Portugal and Spain 1580-1640), under Philip II of Spain controlled the sea routes and lucrative trade between Europe and Spanish/Portuguese territories in the Caribbean and the Americas.

The expedition, led by Sir Francis Drake and General Sir John Norreys, spectacularly failed to accomplish any of its objectives. The joint English/Dutch fleet of 150 warships and armed merchantmen that sailed from Plymouth on 15^th April 1589, limped home only three months later, having lost at least a quarter of its ships. Around half of the 23,000 men who set sail were killed, injured or died of disease. Sir James himself died during the return journey and was buried at sea in full armour, as depicted on the monument.

Sir James was the grandson of another Sir James Hales (1500-1554) an influential judge, avowed Protestant and adviser to Archbishop Thomas Cranmer who was imprisoned during the reign of Queen Mary and forced to convert to Catholicism; an experience that so disturbed his mind that he committed suicide by drowning in the River Stour. Though hard to see from floor level, the painted backdrop of the central panel of the monument depicts the Stour at Thanington where the drowning occurred.

The Hales monument was commissioned by Sir James’ friend Richard Lee. In his will, Sir James bequeathed to his “good friend” Richard Lee, all his books, pictures and maps, and excused him all money he owed him. Richard Lee subsequently married Sir James’ widow, Lady Alice Hales, and moved to the Hales manor house, known as “The Dungeon” (Dane John) on the edge of Canterbury. Shortly after Lady Alice’s death in 1592, Lee became MP for Canterbury in 1593 and, in 1600, he was knighted and became ambassador to Russia.

Lady Alice (d.1592) is shown in the central panel, kneeling at a prie-dieu (prayer desk) and, in the bottom panel, their son Cheney Hales (d.1596) also at prayer.

Footnote. Notice that the two figures at prayer face west when, by convention, they normally face east. It is likely that the memorial was originally installed on a south wall, where it would have faced conventionally east. St Michael’s (The Buffs’) Chapel has been suggested, though it would be a tight fit!

This often overlooked window, in the northeast corner of the nave, is by Clayton and Bell and was installed in memory of Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, Dean of Westminster, formerly a Canon Residentiary at Canterbury, who died in 1881.

The window celebrates the lives of the archbishops and priors who, in the 10th and 11th centuries, were involved in the building of the second Saxon cathedral and its Norman replacement. The panels are arranged in pairs – the upper part depicting the individual and below that, the event that is commemorated.

Archbishop Odo (942/959) and the rebuilding of the second Saxon Cathedral. When the Cathedral was almost complete, except for the roof, a storm arose. In response to prayers, God sent the sun to shine on the Cathedral, while, all around, it poured with rain. The Cathedral was saved from ruin.

Archbishop Stigand (1052/1070) This panel shows the last Saxon archbishop. In 1067, the year after the Conquest, the entire Cathedral burnt down. In 1068 William the Conqueror deprived Stigand of the archbishopric and appointed Lanfranc to succeed him.

Archbishop Lanfranc (1070/1089), was the first Norman Archbishop. Lanfranc presided over the rebuilding of the Cathedral in Norman/Romanesque style, between 1071 and 1086.

Prior Ernulf (1096/1107). Lanfranc’s Norman cathedral was extended eastwards during the time of Archbishop Anselm (1093/1109). When Anselm was exiled, Prior Ernulf took charge of the building of a magnificent new Choir and extended Crypt beneath it, though his successor, Prior Conrad, took much of the credit for its lavish furnishings. Barely 50 years after its consecration, on the 5^th September 1174, the magnificent Choir was destroyed by another great fire, though the Crypt escaped serious damage.