The Historic Churches of Prince Edward Island

David Mattison is a librarian with the B.C. Provincial Archives and
Records Services Library.

Churches are popular subjects for architectural surveys: there are only a finite number within any clearly defined geographic area and time frame, and ecclesiastical design is somewhat standardized within denominations. The majority of the floor plans sketched in Smith’s survey show little deviation from the convention of pews in rows facing an altar. Interior ornamentation as revealed in many of the photographs is what imbues each church with its own personality.

Aside from containing biographies of varying lengths of all PEI churches built before 1914, the survey includes chapters about PEI’s religious history, the different styles of church architecture on the island, the architects, and construction techniques.

There is an index which gives the location of each of the churches, but their descriptions are not presented in the order shown on an accompanying map. The construction history dates of each church are in the narrative rather than being summarized at the head of each chapter. The photographs are uniformly excellent, largely taken by Lionel Stevenson and the author; little use was made of historic images.

An important work useful to all students of Canadian architectural and ecclesiastical history, this volume is the first of promised books on other types of buildings found on PEI.