St. Anne's Church is the only Anglican church in Alderney island. Built to the design of the famous English architect Sir George Scott, it is one of the finest Victorian buildings in the Channel Islands. The cost of the building was financed by Reverend Canon John Le Mesurier, son of the last Hereditary Governor of Alderney.
Consecrated in 1850 it is part of the Deanery of Guernsey and supervised by the Bishop of Winchester. Like much of the island, the church suffered from the German Occupation and was used as a general store during the war. A machine-gun post was set up in the belfry and the walls still display gunshot scars. As most of the pews were also removed, a considerable amount of restoration work had to be carried out and completed in 1953.
The church has six bells which are rung for Sunday services. The bells were removed by the Germans and four were sent to Cherbourg to be melted down for munitions. They were subsequently identified after the War and returned to the island. They together with the two bells remaining in Alderney, were sent to England for re-casting and then re-installed.
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Visby Cathedral (also known as St. Mary’s Church) is the only survived medieval church in Visby. It was originally built for German merchants and inaugurated in 1225. Around the year 1350 the church was enlarged and converted into a basilica. The two-storey magazine was also added then above the nave as a warehouse for merchants.
Following the Reformation, the church was transformed into a parish church for the town of Visby. All other churches were abandoned. Shortly after the Reformation, in 1572, Gotland was made into its own Diocese, and the church designated its cathedral.
There is not much left of the original interior. The font is made of local red marble in the 13th century. The pulpit was made in Lübeck in 1684. There are 400 graves under the church floor.