London's first rail terminus

Forget Kings Cross, St Pancras, or Waterloo, Bermondsey was there before all of them. Spa Station, just across the road from St James Church, was the first London terminus, opening in 1836, just seven years after the church was consecrated, and just eleven years after George Stephenson's Locomotion 1 became the first steam locomotive to carry passengers on a public line.

St James itself features on the commemorative plaques (above) that have been installed along the route of the railway.

Here is the booking office of Spa Station:

 And here is a contemporary view of the railway with the church in the background (the inspiration, I believe, for the commemorative plaques):