An extraordinary piece of capital history linking a former Lord Mayor of London to a high-stakes campaign to save the city’s ancient patron saint will reach a global audience in an upcoming podcast series finale.
The story takes centre stage in the conclusion of The Rest Is History podcast’s Tudor series, presented by historians Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook. Recorded on 29 July, the series finale spotlights discoveries detailing how one of London’s greatest civic leaders secretly preserved vital pieces of the capital’s heritage during a period of state destruction.
The breakthrough comes courtesy of researchers James D. Wenn and James Syrett of the Byrga Geniht consultancy. Through expert architectural analysis, the pair unpicked a centuries-old secret: how “Old” Sir Rowland Hill—a formidable former Lord Mayor of London and primary financial backer of the 1560 Geneva Bible—orchestrated a covert operation to rescue sacred treasures from state-sanctioned destruction.
Sir Rowland engineered his country estate, Soulton Hall, around precise geometric ciphers. These hidden measurements directly match the recorded proportions of the lost shrine of Saint Erkenwald—a 7th-century Prince of the East Saxons, Bishop of London, and celebrated patron figure of the medieval capital.
When Crown authorities ordered the total destruction of Erkenwald’s shrine at Old St Paul’s Cathedral during the Reformation, Sir Rowland used his wealth, intellect, and civic standing to step in. The former Lord Mayor arranged for sacred materials connected to the London patron to be quietly spirited out of the capital to Soulton Hall in the West Midlands. Active archaeological investigations have now identified ground signals and parch marks in the central courtyard at Soulton Hall suggesting these materials were covertly reinterred there.
Sir Rowland’s secret campaign to preserve London’s heritage went even further. When task forces were sent to dismantle the High Altar of Old St Paul’s Cathedral in 1550, the Lord Mayor quietly saved its central altar stone, smuggling it out of London to a hidden basement chamber at Soulton Hall where it remains preserved today. Hill’s reputation as a fearless protector of refuge echoes directly through English literature, as he served as the real-world inspiration for William Shakespeare’s character Old Sir Rowland de Boys in As You Like It.
The significance of these findings has received official recognition at the highest levels, earning a unanimous local council resolution and inclusion in Parliament through an Early Day Motion tabled by MP Helen Morgan. Lead researcher James D. Wenn noted that few historic sites hold “as many surprises per square foot.”