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The modern Order of St John in England was granted a Royal Charter by Queen Victoria in 1888. At the end of the eighteenth century, the Gate was used as a pub, The Old Jerusalem Tavern, where artists and writers, including Charles Dickens, used to meet. Samuel Johnson was given his first job in London at St John’s Gate, writing reports for The Gentleman’s Magazine. In the eighteenth century, the Gate was briefly used as a coffee house, run by Richard Hogarth, father of the artist William Hogarth. Thirty of Shakespeare’s plays were licensed here. During the sixteenth century, they were used as the offices of the Master of the Revels. The buildings in Clerkenwell were put to different uses in the years that followed. However, on the accession of her Protestant sister, Queen Elizabeth I, the Order in England was dissolved for good. The Order was restored briefly by Henry’s Catholic daughter, Queen Mary, who granted it a Royal Charter. When King Henry VIII split from the Catholic Church and established a new Anglican Church, the Order in England was dissolved and all its lands and wealth were seized by the Crown.

In the 1140s the Priory in Clerkenwell was set up as the English headquarters of the Order. The fortifications of Rhodes, by Tristram Ellis, watercolour on paper, c.1900 The Clerkenwell Priory It remains a sovereign entity in international law and is engaged in international charity work.

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The original Roman Catholic Order still has headquarters in Rome its full title is the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of St John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes and of Malta. The Order’s ships patrolled the Mediterranean and remained on Malta until 1798, when the island was surrendered to Napoleon. After a famous siege by Suleiman in 1565, which the Knights and the Maltese people survived, a new capital city, Valletta, was built. The Order remained on Rhodes until 1522, when the Turkish Sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent, conquered the island.įrom Rhodes, the Order moved to Malta. When Palestine was recaptured by Muslim forces in 1291, the Order moved briefly to Cyprus and then, in 1309, to Rhodes. They became known as the Knights of the Order of St John of Jerusalem. After the Crusaders captured Jerusalem, the Hospitallers also took on a military role. Known as the Hospitallers, they cared for anyone, without distinction of race or faith. The men and women who worked there were members of a new religious order, officially recognised by the Church in 1113. Its purpose was to care for the many pilgrims who had become ill on their travels to the Holy Land. Panorama of Jerusalem, by Tristram Ellis, watercolour on paper, 1897īy 1080, a hospital had been established in Jerusalem by a group of monks under the guidance of Brother Gerard.

Knights of lazarus