In 2015 Oxford Archaeology discovered a Saxon burial site in the area close to the Thames east of Woolwich Ferry.

From the early 10th till the mid-12th century Woolwich was ruled by the abbots of St. Peter's Abbey in Ghent, probably as a result of a gift from Ælfthryth, daughter of King Alfred and Countess of Flanders.

In the early 16th century rector John Sweetyng assisted in building the Great Harry at Woolwich Dockyard.

The 34-year old clergyman had several architects work on designs for a new church, the most ambitious one in Gothic Revival style by James Brooks.

Nothing happened and Anson's successor, Samuel Gilbert Scott, prepared plans for a new chancel (including a crypt) and vestries, designed by his cousin J.O.

[7] The church suffered little damage during World War II, during which years Cuthbert Bardsley, later Bishop of Coventry, was a socially active rector.

Among the many changes, he had the aisles and galleries shut off with frosted glass panels to make a cafe and offices, before converting the crypt into a youth club.

The church is brick-built, with Portland stone plinth cappings, copings, window surrounds and the principal cornice.

The bell tower, protruding from the west front, is topped off rather bluntly, without a balustrade, spire or lantern.

The 1894 brick chancel features Bath stone buttress capping, band courses and a pedimented gable top.

[10] The church consists of a five-bay nave flanked by colonnades (similar to St Nicholas, Deptford), two side aisles with galleries and some 19th-century additions: the chancel, the Lady Chapel to the south (containing the rare iron-cast tomb of Henry Maudslay, designed by himself) and the organ chamber to the north.

A rail-mounted moveable pulpit (walnut, with inlays) was installed in 1899, funded by a public subscription on Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee.

A drinking fountain and several tombs were removed, the foremost of which was that of Woolwich-born engineer Henry Maudslay.