Britain and Ireland Hugenot History from c1560 
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An estimated 50,000 Protestant Walloons and Huguenots fled to England, about 10,000 of whom moved on 
to Ireland. French Protestants were inspired by the writings of John Calvin in the 1530s, and they 
were called Huguenots by the 1560s. In relative terms, this could be the largest wave of immigration
of a single community into Britain ever. A leading Huguenot theologian and writer who led the exiled 
community in London, Andrew Lortie (born André Lortie), became known for articulating Huguenot 
criticism of the Holy See and transubstantiation. Of these refugees, upon landing on the Kent coast, 
many gravitated towards Canterbury, then the county's Calvinist hub, where many Walloon & Huguenot 
families were granted asylum. 

Edward VI granted them the whole of the Western crypt of Canterbury Cathedral for their worship. This 
privilege in 1825 shrank to the south aisle and in 1895 to the former chantry chapel of the Black 
Prince, where services are still held in French according to the reformed tradition every Sunday at 
3pm. Other evidence of the Walloons and Huguenots in Canterbury includes a block of houses in Turnagain 
Lane where weavers' windows survive on the top floor, and 'the Weavers', a half-timbered house by the 
river (now a restaurant). The house derives its name from a weaving school which was moved there in 
the last years of the 19th century, resurrecting the use to which it had been put between the 16th 
century and about 1830. Many of the refugee community were weavers, but naturally some practised other 
occupations necessary to sustain the community distinct from the indigenous population, this separation 
being a condition of their initial acceptance in the City. They also settled elsewhere in Kent, 
particularly Sandwich, Faversham and Maidstone - towns in which there used to be refugee churches.

Huguenot refugees flocked to Shoreditch, London in large numbers. They established a major weaving 
industry in and around Spitalfields (see Petticoat Lane and the Tenterground), and in Wandsworth. The 
Old Truman Brewery, then known as the Black Eagle Brewery, appeared in 1724. The fleeing of Huguenot 
refugees from Tours, France had virtually wiped out the great silk mills they had built. At the same 
time other Huguenots arriving in England settled in Bedfordshire, which was (at the time) the main 
centre of England's Lace industry. Huguenots greatly contributed to the development of lace-making 
in Bedfordshire, with many families settling in Cranfield, Bedford and Luton.

Many Huguenots settled in Ireland during the Plantations of Ireland. Huguenot regiments fought for 
William of Orange in the Williamite war in Ireland, for which they were rewarded with land grants and 
titles, many settling in Dublin. Some of them took their skills to Ulster and assisted in the founding 
of the Irish linen industry, particularly in the Lisburn area. Numerous signs of Huguenot presence can 
still be seen with names still in use, and with areas of the main towns and cities named after the 
people who settled there, for instance the Huguenot District in York City. 

There is also a French Church in Portarlington, County Laois which dates back to 1696, and was built 
to serve the new Huguenot community.