About St. John’s

Clergy, Staff, and Vestry

Our History

A short history of St. John’s Church and its place in Huntington.

Early Years in Huntington

For the eighteenth-century Episcopal Church—the established Church of England—Long Island and the other northern colonies were challenging ground. New England had been settled by dissenters, Puritans, and Separatists who viewed the established church with suspicion. Huntington, founded in 1653 by settlers from Connecticut, was a well-ordered town built around the village green in the New England manner, and its church polity was Presbyterian by the middle of the eighteenth century.

In 1701, Thomas Bray and other church leaders helped establish the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, creating a permanent source of support for missionaries in North America. St. George’s Church in Hempstead soon became a center for this work on Long Island.

The Founding of St. John’s First Church

In 1744, the Rev. Samuel Seabury Sr., rector of St. George’s, visited Huntington and found a small group of interested people. On June 21, he baptized Mary Bryan—the first recorded action in what would soon become St. John’s. By the following year, there was enough interest, most notably from Henry Lloyd and his associates, to organize a parish.

Henry Lloyd, Lord of the Manor of Queen’s Village at Lloyd Neck, wished to build an Anglican church in Huntington. Local authorities opposed him, but the new mission continued to grow. In 1748, Samuel Seabury Jr. was appointed Lay Reader and Catechist by the S.P.G. and placed in charge of the mission under his father’s direction. He later became the first bishop of the Episcopal Church.

By 1762, the congregation had grown enough to acquire a house and glebe to support an ordained minister. In 1767, the Rev. James Greaton became St. John’s first settled minister. He described a church so full that some worshippers were obliged to leave for want of room. His congregation included thirty or forty Black worshippers, enslaved or indentured, many attending with their masters and others permitted to come by dissenting households.

Greaton died in 1773 and was buried beneath the chancel. During the Revolutionary War, Huntington was occupied and the church building was used as a stable and barracks, suffering severe damage. Local families nevertheless held occasional services when a clergyman was available.

Post-Revolutionary Era and the Nineteenth Century

After the Revolution, the Episcopal Church struggled to reorganize. St. John’s saw only one recorded baptism between 1783 and 1838. Its fortunes eventually improved, and the parish was incorporated in 1838. The Rev. Isaac Sherwood became its first rector, and the original church—then ninety-one years old—was consecrated by Bishop Onderdonck of New York.

The Second Church

In 1860, the vestry agreed to build a new church on the original site. During demolition, three bodies were found beneath the church floor, one certainly that of James Greaton. Bishop Hobart consecrated the new building on May 6, 1862. In 1868, St. John’s became part of the newly formed Diocese of Long Island.

The parish flourished later in the nineteenth century, improving its building and establishing St. Andrew’s Chapel at Huntington Harbor. In 1905, a workman’s torch accidentally set the church roof ablaze, and the wooden structure was lost. Its furnishings were saved and remain in use in the current building.

The twentieth century brought rapid growth. Grace Chapel was established for families in Huntington Station, a Casavant organ was installed in 1928, and a new Sunday School building was erected in 1964. Through every chapter, St. John’s has remained part of the spiritual and civic life of Huntington.

What Is an Episcopal Church?

The Episcopal Church welcomes all who worship Jesus Christ and includes dioceses and mission areas across many countries and territories.

As the U.S.-based member of the worldwide Anglican Communion, The Episcopal Church belongs to the world’s third-largest group of Christians. We are denominational descendants of—and partners with—the Church of England and the Scottish Episcopal Church.

The mission of the church, as stated in the Book of Common Prayer’s catechism, is “to restore all people to unity with God and each other in Christ.” In step with that mission, The Episcopal Church follows Jesus into loving, liberating, and life-giving relationships with God, with each other, and with the earth.

We are the Episcopal branch of the Jesus Movement.