Fisherman's Chapel

The Fishermen's Chapel (French: Chapelle-ès-Pêcheurs, Jèrriais: Chapelle ès Pêtcheurs) is a small chapel located beside St Brelade's Church in St Brelade, Jersey, by the shore at the western end of St Brelade's Bay.

Only a few monastic chapels survived the destruction of over fifty others at the hands of the Reformers in the 16th century. This is one of the few remaining with the exception of some Manorial Chapels, and those at La Hougue Bie.

The name of the chapel is the Chapelle-ès-Pêcheurs, and it was originally thought to be associated with the fishing guilds existing in the Island. More convincingly, Warwick Rodwell has suggested that "pêcheurs" (fishermen) is a corruption of " pécheurs" (sinners); this agrees with his archaeological investigations which show the chapel to have been a "chantry chapel", i.e. a chapel funded by a local family to say masses for the souls of the dead. There is no evidence of "fishing guilds".

The walls of this ancient chapel are reputed to date from the middle of the 6th century; some authorities give a later date.

The archaeological work done by Warwick Rodwell place the date of the chapel well after the construction of the main Parish church; because it is smaller, and has no later architectural accretions, it has a more ancient appearance, but this is in fact superficial. However, Rodwell suggests that a primitive wooden structure may have existed on this site as the first "St Brelade's Church"; this was replaced by the core of the present church in stone, with a site better suited for expansion, the first being used for worship while the second was being built. The wooden structure was then rebuilt as a secondary focus of worship, and later taken over as a Chantry chapel.

The material used in the building is the same as was used in the Parish Church: limpet shells crushed and dissolved with boiling sea-water. The mode of procedure was as follows : they first erected their walling, cased the same on all sides, and then poured the liquid lime-mortar into the wall-work.

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