Many of the position holders were absentee pluralists (i.e. they had other jobs, and Hackney just formed a part of their income).

The walls, with fenestration of c.1500, showed a variety of materials, as they did at the time of the church's demolition, when the exterior presented 'an incomprehensible jumble of dissonant repairs, without a trace of the original building, except the windows of part of it'.

The constant increasing of Hackney's population meant that galleries were added to the church, and by 1789 it was able to hold a congregation upwards of 1,000.

This was still inadequate to the needs of the parish, and on the advice of architect William Blackburn,[3] the vestry petitioned Parliament in 1790 for the church's complete rebuilding at an adjacent site to the north.

[2] Blackburn died suddenly in November 1790; James Spiller, a friend of John Soane, was chosen from six architect candidates to replace him as designer of the new church.

[2] The Tower was subsequently used as a public mortuary, and a tool shed for the gardens of St John.

[4] A grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund has made possible repairs and improvements and a permanent exhibition on the history of the Tower, and its church, is now open to the public on the last Sunday of every month.