St. John's College, Cambridge



St John's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college's alumni include nine Nobel Prize winners, six Prime Ministers, three archbishops, at least two princes, and three Saints.

The full formal name of the college is "The Master, Fellows and Scholars of the College of St John the Evangelist in the University of Cambridge". The college was founded by Lady Margaret Beaufort. In constitutional terms, the college is an eleemosynary corporation established by Charter dated 9 April 1511. The aims of the College, as specified by its Statutes, are the promotion of education, religion, learning and research. The college is a charity under English law, being an exempt charity under the terms of Schedule 2 of the Charities Act 1993.

St John's College is well-known for its choir, for its members' participation in a wide variety of inter-collegiate sporting competitions, and for its yearly May Ball.

In 2011 the College celebrated its quincentenary, an event marked by a visit of HM Queen Elizabeth II and HRH Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

History
The College was founded on the site of the 13th century Hospital of St John in Cambridge at the suggestion of Saint John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester and chaplain to Lady Margaret. However, Lady Margaret died without having mentioned the foundation of St John's in her will, and it was largely the work of Fisher that ensured that the college was founded. He had to obtain the approval of King Henry VIII of England, the Pope through the intermediary Polydore Vergil, and the Bishop of Ely to suppress the religious hospital and convert it to a college. The college received its charter on April 9, 1511. Further complications arose in obtaining money from the estate of Lady Margaret to pay for the foundation and it was not until October 22, 1512 that a codicil was obtained in the court of the Archbishop of Canterbury. In November 1512 the Court of Chancery allowed Lady Margaret's executors to pay for the foundation of the college from her estates. When Lady Margaret's executors took over they found most of the old Hospital buildings beyond repair, but repaired and incorporated the Chapel into the new college. A kitchen and hall were added, and an imposing gate tower was constructed for the College Treasury. The doors were to be closed each day at dusk, sealing the monastic community from the outside world.

Over the course of the following five hundred years, the College expanded westwards towards the River Cam, and now has eleven courts, the most of any Oxford or Cambridge College. The first three courts are arranged in enfilade.

Buildings and grounds



 * The Great Gate (1516):St John's distinctive Great Gate follows the standard contemporary pattern employed previously at Christ's College and Queens' College. The gatehouse is crenelated and adorned with the arms of the foundress Lady Margaret Beaufort. Above these are displayed her ensigns, the Red Rose of Lancaster and Portcullis. The College Arms are flanked by curious creatures known as yales, mythical beasts with elephants' tails, antelopes' bodies, goats' heads, and swivelling horns. Above them is a tabernacle containing a socle figure of St John the Evangelist, an Eagle at his feet and symbolic, poisoned chalice in his hands. The doors date from 1665-6, and the fan vaulting above was constructed by William Swayne, the master mason of King's College Chapel.
 * First Court (1511–1520): First Court is entered via the Great Gate, and is highly architecturally varied. First Court was converted from the hospital on the foundation of the college, and constructed between 1511 and 1520. Though it has since been gradually changed, the front (east) range is still much as it appeared when first erected in the 16th-century. The south range was refaced between 1772-6 in the Georgian style by the local architect James Essex, as part of an abortive attempt to modernise the entire court in the same fashion. The most dramatic alteration to the original, Tudor court however remains the Victorian amendment of the north range, which involved the demolition of the original mediaeval chapel and the construction of a new, far larger set of buildings in the 1860s. These included the Chapel, designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott, which includes in its interior some pieces saved from the original chapel. It is the tallest building in Cambridge. The alteration of the north range necessitated the restructuring of the connective sections of First Court; another bay window was added in order to enlarge the College's hall, and a new building constructed to the north of Great Gate. Parts of First Court were used as a prison in 1643 during the English Civil War. In April 2011, Queen Elizabeth II visited St John's College in order to inaugurate a new pathway in First Court, which passes close to the ruins of the Old Chapel.


 * Dining Hall (1511–1516, extended 1863):The College's Hall has a fine hammerbeam-roof, painted in black and gold and decorated with the armorial devices of its benefactors. The hall is lined to cill-level with linenfold panelling which dates from 1528-9, and has a five-bay screen, surmounted by the Royal Arms. Above is a hexagonal louvre, dating to 1703. The room was extended from five to eight bays according to designs by Sir George Gilbert Scott in 1863. It has two bay windows, containing heraldic glass dating from the fifteenth to nineteenth centuries. In 1564, Queen Elizabeth rode into the College's Hall on horseback, during a state visit to Cambridge.




 * College Chapel (1866-9, Sir George Gilbert Scott):The Chapel of St John's College is entered by the north west-corner of First Court, and was constructed between 1866-9 in order to replace the smaller, mediaeval chapel which dated back to the 13th-century. When in 1861 the College's administration decided that a new building was needed, Sir George Gilbert Scott was selected as architect. He had recently finished work on a similar project at Exeter College, Oxford, and went about constructing the Chapel of St John's College along similar lines, drawing inspiration from the Church of Saint Chapelle in Paris.


 * The benefactor Henry Hoare offered a downpayment of £3000 to finance the chapel's construction, in addition to which he promised to pay £1000 a year if a tower were added to Scott's original plans, which had included only a small fleche. Work began, but Mr Hoare's death in a railway accident left the college £3000 short of his expected benefaction. The tower was completed, replete with louvres but left without bells. It is based on Pershore Abbey. The tower is 50 metres high, and is the tallest structure in Cambridge (followed by the Cambridge University Library and King's College Chapel). The Chapel's antechamber contains statues of Margaret Beaufort and John Fisher. Inside the building is a stone-vaulted antechapel, at the end of which hangs a 'Deposition of the Cross' by Anton Rafael Mengs, completed around 1777. The misericordes and panelling date from 1516, and were salvaged from the old chapel. The chapel contains some fifteenth-century glass, but most was cast by Clayton and Bell, Hardman, and Wailes, in around 1869. Freestanding statues and plaques commemorate College benefactors such as James Wood, Master 1815-39, as well as alumni including William Wilberforce, Thomas Clarkson and William Gilbert. The College tower can be climbed, and is accessed via a small door on First Court.


 * The Chapel is surrounded on three sides by large tabernacles which form part of the external butresses. Each contains a statue of a prominent College alumnus, alumna or benefactor. The persons commemorated are, beginning with the buttress next to the transept on the south side:


 * Sir William Cecil, Lord Burleigh
 * Lucius, Viscount Falkland
 * John Williams, Archbishop of York
 * Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford
 * William Gilbert, natural philosopher
 * Roger Ascham, instructor to Elizabeth I
 * Mary Cavendish, Countess of Shrewsbury
 * Richard Bentley, classicist
 * Edward Stillingfleet, bishop of Worcester


 * John Overall, Bishop of Coventry, Lichfield and Norwich
 * Peter Gunning, Bishop of Chichester and Ely
 * Sarah Alston, Duchess of Somerset
 * Thomas Clarkson, abolitionist
 * Brook Taylor, natural philosopher and mathematician
 * Thomas Linacre, founder of the Royal College of Physicians
 * Two plinths left vacant
 * Thomas Baker, historian




 * Second Court (1598–1602): Second Court, built from 1598 to 1602, has been described as 'the finest Tudor court in England'. Built atop the demolished foundations of an earlier, far smaller court, Second Court was begun in 1598 to the plans of Ralph Symons of Westminster, and Gilbert Wigge of Cambridge. Their original architectural drawings are housed in the College's library, and are the oldest surviving plans for an Oxford or Cambridge college building. It was financed by the Countess of Shrewsbury, whose arms and statue stand above the court's western gatehouse. The court's Oriel windows are perhaps its most striking feature, though the dominating Shrewsbury Tower to the west is undoubtedly the most imposing. This gatehouse, built as a mirror image of the College's Great Gate, contains a statue of the benefactress Mary Talbot, Countess of Shrewsbury, added in 1671. Behind the Oriel window of the north range lies the Long Gallery, a promenading room that was, prior to its segmentation, 148 feet long. In this room, the treaty between England and France was signed that established the marriage of King Charles I of England to Queen Henrietta Maria. In the 1940s, parts of the D-day landings were planned there. Second Court is also home to the college's famous 'triple set', K6.


 * Chapel Court: Located to the west of the Chapel tower.


 * North Court: Located to the north of Chapel Court.


 * Forecourt: Located to the east of Chapel court, facing St John's Street. It is used partly as a car park for fellows, and also as a night entrance to the College.


 * The College Library (1624):The Old Library was built in 1624, largely with funds donated by John Williams, Bishop of Lincoln. Hearing of the College's urgent need for greater library space, Williams donated £1,200 anonymously, later revealing his identity and donating a total of £2,011 towards the library's total cost of £3,000. The Library's fine bay window overlooks the River Cam, and bears the letters ILCS on it, standing for Iohannes Lincolniensis Custos Sigilli, or John of Lincoln, Keeper of the Seal. The original intention of the College had been to construct an elegant, classical building supported by pillared porticos, but Bishop William insisted on a more traditional design. Thus, though the College lays claim to few examples of neo-classical design, the College Library stands as one of the earliest examples of English neo-Gothic architecture.


 * Third Court (1669–1672): Third Court is entered through Shrewsbury Tower, which from 1765 to 1859 housed an observatory. Each of its ranges was built in a different style. Following the completion of the College Library in 1624, the final sides of Third Court were added between 1669 and 1672, after the College had recovered from the trauma of the English Civil War. The additions included a fine set of Dutch-gabled buildings backing onto the River Cam, and a 'window-with-nothing-behind-it' that was designed to solve the problem of connecting the windowed library with the remainder of the court.


 * Kitchen or Wren Bridge (1696–1712, Robert Grumbold): This was the first stone bridge erected at St John's college, continuing on from Kitchen lane. The crossing's chief distinction is the use of illusory intaglio; Wren's bridge is carved from a limestone monolith incised to give the appearance of masonry. The crossing lies south of the Bridge of Sighs, and was a replacement for a wooden bridge that had stood on the site since the foundation's early days as a hospital. Though Sir Christopher Wren submitted designs for the bridge, it was eventually built on a different site by a local mason, Robert Grumbold, who also built Trinity College Library. As with the Library, Grumbold's work was based on Wren's designs, and the bridge has become known more famously as 'the Wren Bridge'.


 * Kitchen Court: This tiny court, formed within the walls of the old Kitchen Lane, is used as an outdoor dining area.




 * The Bridge of Sighs (1831, Henry Hutchinson): Though it bears little resemblance to its namesake in Venice, the bridge connecting Third Court to New Court, originally known as New Bridge, is now commonly known as the Bridge of Sighs. It is one of the most photographed buildings in Cambridge, and was described by the visiting Queen Victoria as "so pretty and picturesque". It is a single-span bridge of stone with highly decorative Neo-Gothic covered footwalk over with traceried openings. There is a three bay arcade at the East end of the bridge.


 * New Court (1831–1987, Rickman and Hutchinson): The 19th century neo-Gothic New Court, probably one of the best known buildings in Cambridge, was the first major building built by any of the colleges on the west side of the river. Designed by Thomas Rickman and Henry Hutchinson, New Court was built between 1826 and 1831 to accommodate the College's rapidly increasing numbers of students. Despite the College's original intention to get the architects to build another copy of Second Court, plans were eventually accepted for a fashionably romantic building in the 'Gothic' style. It is a three-sided court of tall Gothic Revival buildings, closed on the fourth side by an open, seven-bayed cross-vaulted cloister and gateway. It is four storeys high, has battlements and is pinnacled. The main portal has a fan vault with a large octagonal pendant, and the interior of the main building retains many of its original features including ribbed plaster ceilings in the mock-Gothic style. Its prominent location (especially when seen from the river) and flamboyant design have led it to be nicknamed "The Wedding Cake". Hutchinson was suitably proud of his creation, and it is said that he once dashed up a staircase to reprimand an undergraduate for spoiling its symmetry by sitting too near one of its windows.


 * The Master's Lodge and Garden (Sir George Gilbert Scott): St John's Master's lodge is located in a grassy clearing to the north of Third Court. It was built at the same time as the new Chapel was being constructed, and has Tudor fittings, wainscot, portraits and other relics from the demolished north wing of First Court. It has a large garden, and in the winter its westmost rooms have excellent views of the College's old library, the River Cam, and the Bridge of Sighs.


 * Cripps Building (1966–67, Philip Powell and Hidalgo Moya):This buildings, behind New Court, was built in 1966-67 to meet a post-1945 expansion in the numbers of students. It has two courts, and was designed by architects Philip Powell and Hidalgo Moya. The building was listed after receiving an award from the British Architectural Instituation, and is considered an exemplar of the later 20th-century architectural style. It is named after its benefactor, Sir Humphrey Cripps (see Sir Humphrey Cripps). The Cripps Building forms two courts, Upper River Court and Lower River Court.


 * The Fisher Building: The Fisher Building was named after John Fisher and was designed by Peter Boston and completed in 1987.


 * The School of Pythagoras: The School of Pythagoras was built around 1200, predating the foundation of the College (1511). It is the oldest secular building in Cambridge.


 * Merton Hall and Merton Court: Merton Hall is so called because from 1266 until 1959 both the School of Pythagoras and Merton Hall were property of Merton College, Oxford. Merton Court is the College's eleventh and westernmost court.


 * All Saints' Yard: Currently under construction, All Saints' Yard is located directly opposite the College's Great Gate. The complex is formed from the buildings of the so-called 'Triangle Site', a collection of structures owned by the College. The project has a budget of approximately £9.75 million, and should be completed by October 2009. The centrepiece of the Yard is Corfield Court, named for the project's chief benefactor, Charles Corfield. The site can be entered through one of two card-activated gates, or through the School of Divinity. The School of Divinity is the largest building on the site, and was built between 1878-1879 by Basil Champneys for the University of Cambridge's Divinity Faculty on land leased by St John's College. Control of the building reverted to St John's when the Faculty of Divinity moved to a new building on the Sidgewick site in 2000.

Choir


St John's College Choir has a tradition of religious music and has sung the daily services in the College Chapel since the 1670s. The services follow the cathedral tradition of the Church of England, Evensong being sung during Term six days a week and Sung Eucharist on Sunday mornings. The Choir is currently directed by Mr Andrew Nethsingha, who has previously been Director of Music at Gloucester and Truro Cathedrals. The boys of the choir are all educated at the St John's College School. During university vacations the choir carries out engagements elsewhere. Recent tours have taken it to places including the Netherlands, the USA and France. The choir has made a large number of recordings.

The Choir has an extensive discography dating back to the 1950s, when it was signed to the Decca/Argo label under George Guest. More recently, the Choir has completed a sequence of recordings of English 20th century choral for Naxos, which sold over 200,000 copies. The Choir now records with Hyperion Records, and has released four discs to date with the label: one of the music of Mendelssohn, a collection of music for Advent, Christmas and Epiphany, Christmas at St John's, a recording of the choral and vocal music of Jongen and Peeters and most recently, a collection of the music of Bairstow. The Choir has received invitations to perform throughout the world, recently touring in France, Austria, the Netherlands, Estonia, Hungary and America.

The men of the choir, or choral scholars, also form their own close harmony group, The Gentlemen of St John's. Their repertoire spans the 15th century through to the modern day, and concert tours have taken them to Europe, the USA and Japan. They provide a mixture of classical a capella music and folksongs, as well as covers of recently chart hits and light-hearted entertainment.

Motto
The College motto is souvent me souvient, supplied by Lady Margaret Beaufort, and written in Mediaeval French. It is inscribed over gates, lintels and within tympana throughout the college, functioning as a triple pun. It means 'I often remember', 'think of me often' and, when spoken (exploiting the homonym souvent me sous vient), 'I often pass beneath it' (referring to the inscriptions). The college shares its motto with Christ's College, Cambridge and Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford.

College Grace
The College Grace is customarily said before and after dinner in Hall. The reading of Grace before dinner (ante prandium) is usually the duty of a Scholar of the College; Grace after dinner (post prandium) is said by the President or the Senior Fellow dining. The Graces used in St John's have been in continuous use for some centuries and it is known that the Ante Prandium is based upon mediaeval monastic models. The Grace is said shortly after the fellows enter the Hall, signalled by the sounding of a Gong, and accompanied by the ringing of the College's Grace Bell. The Ante Prandium is read after the Fellows have entered, the Post Prandium after they have finished dining:

Eating Swan
Fellows of St John’s College are the only people outside the Royal Family legally allowed to eat unmarked mute swans. Swan traps were originally built into the walls of the college alongside the river, but these are no longer used. The Crown (the British monarch) retains the right to ownership of all unmarked mute swans in open water, but the Queen only exercises her ownership on certain stretches of the Thames and its surrounding tributaries. This ownership is shared with the Vintners' and Dyers' Companies, who were granted rights of ownership by the Crown in the fifteenth century, and was extended to the College via ancient Royalist ties.

College Ghosts
According to popular legend, St John's College is inhabited by a number of ghosts. In 1706, four fellows exorcised some ghosts from a house opposite the College by the simple method of threatening to fire their pistols at the positions the moans and groans were coming from. Second court is apparently still haunted by the ghost of the former undergraduate, James Wood. Wood was so poor that he could not afford to light his room, and would often do his work in the well-lit stairway.

New Court's Clock Tower
New Court's central cupola has four blank clock-faces. These are subject to various apocryphal explanations. One legend maintains that a statute limiting the number of chiming clocks in Cambridge rendered the addition of a mechanism illegal. No such limitation is known to exist. More likely explanations include Hutchinson's fear that the installation of a clockface would spoil the building's symmetry, and that the college's financial situation in the early nineteenth century made completion impossible. Other legends explaining the absence of clockfaces claim that St John's College and its neighbour, Trinity College, were engaged in a race to build the final (or tallest) clocktower in Cambridge. Supposedly, whichever was finished first (or was tallest) would be permitted to house the 'final' chiming clock in Cambridge. Trinity's Tower was finished first (or, in another version of the same story, was made taller overnight by the addition of a wooden cupola), and its clock was allowed to remain. In truth, the completion of New Court and Trinity's Clock (which is in King Edward's Tower) was separated by nearly two centuries. Trinity's famous double-striking was installed in the seventeenth century by its then-Master, Richard Bentley, a former student of St John's, who dictated that the clock chime once for Trinity, and once for his alma mater, St John's.

The College Shield and Arms


St John's College and Christ's College, Cambridge both bear the arms of the Lady Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond and Derby, mother of Henry VII. These arms are recorded in the College of Arms as being borne by right, and are described as: Quarterly: 1 and 4 azure three fleurs-de-lis gold (France, Modern); 2 and 3 gules three lions passant gardant or (England); all within a border compony silver and azure. In addition, both foundations use the Beaufort crest, an eagle displayed arising out of a coronet of roses and fleurs-de-lis all gold, but their title to this is more doubtful. When displayed in their full achievement, the arms are flanked by mythical yales.

College life


The buildings of St John's College include the Chapel, the Hall, two libraries, a bar, and common rooms for fellows, graduates and undergraduates. There are also extensive gardens, lawns, a neighbouring sportsground, College School and boat-house. On-site accommodation is provided for all undergraduate and most graduate students. This is generally spacious, and some undergraduate rooms comprise 'sets' of living and sleeping rooms. Members of the College can choose to dine either in the Hall, where silver service three-course meals are served, or in the buttery, where food can be purchased from a cafeteria-style buffet. College Catering is organised by Michelin Star Chef Bill Brogan, overseer of the intercollegiate Stewards' Cup.

The College maintains an extensive library, which supplements the university libraries. Most undergraduate supervisions are carried out in the college, though for some specialist subjects undergraduates may be sent to tutors in other colleges. The college owns its own punts which may be borrowed by students, dons and staff.

The college has two official combination rooms for junior members, which represent the interests of students in college and are responsible for social aspects of college life. Undergraduates are members of the Junior Combination Room (JCR). Graduate students have membership to the JCR, but also belong to the Samuel Butler Room, which is the name of the Middle Combination Room (MCR) of St John's College.

The fleet of punts is kept in a purpose-built punt pool behind the Cripps Building. The School of Pythagoras is now used as a drama space. It predates the College proper, and is said to be the oldest building continuously in use by a university in Britain. It was originally the private house of the Merton Family. In addition to its Nobel prize winners, St John's traditionally ranked highly in the Tompkins Table of undergraduate degree results, though its rating has fallen over the past four years.

Sports and activities
The college has a rich sporting history, enjoying much success in most of the major sports on offer in cambridge.The Red Boys, St John's College Rugby Club, have won the Division One League title for the last nine years in a row and the cuppers trophy for the last six making it one of the most successful collegiate sports teams in Cambridge's history. The rugby club has produced several notable alumni including current RFU executive Francis Baron, former Newcastle and England fly-half and current RFU Director of Elite Rugby Rob Andrew, and Battlestar Galactica actor Jamie Bamber. The women's team (Red Girls) has also experienced success last year, securing the inter collegiate cup on the same day that the red boys won the double for the fifth year in a row. The college rowing club, the Lady Margaret Boat Club (LMBC), is the oldest in the University, and was founded in 1825. Despite many gruesome rumours concerning the name of the club, it was merely the most successful of the many boat clubs established in the College in the 19th century. In a similar fashion the traditional rival of the LMBC, the Boat Club of Trinity College, is known as 'First and Third' in a reference to its formation from two original clubs.

Scholarships and prizes
Every year the college awards scholarships to a handful of graduate students under the Benefactors' Scholarships Scheme. The scholarships include the Craik Scholarship, the J.C. Hall Scholarship, the Luisa Aldobrandini Studentship Competition, the Paskin Scholarship and the Pelling Scholarship. Competition for these scholarships is very fierce as students from any country reading for any graduate degree&mdash;not only members of the college&mdash;can apply. There is also the famous Adams Prize in mathematics, named after the mathematican (and alumnus of St John's) John Couch Adams for his discovery of Neptune - it is an annual competition and can be awarded to any mathematician resident in the UK, with an age limit of under 40.

May Ball
St John's hosts a large and typically spectacular May Ball, which is traditionally held on the Tuesday of May Week. In recent years, tickets have only been available to Johnians and their guests. Highlights include an extravagant fireworks display and a variety of musical acts - in 2008 including Dizzee Rascal and Lesley Garrett.

St John's and the abolition of the British slave trade
Several of St John's graduates were deeply involved in the efforts to abolish the British Slave Trade which culminated in the Act of 1807. In particular, Thomas Clarkson, William Wilberforce, Thomas Gisborne and Thomas Babington were active in the Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade and other abolitionist efforts.

As part of the commemoration of the bicentenary of the 1807 Act, and as a representative of one of the Ivy League universities offering American historical perspective on the Triangular Trade, President Ruth J. Simmons of Brown University (herself a direct descendant of American slaves) gave a public lecture at St John's College entitled "Hidden in Plain Sight: Slavery and Justice in Rhode Island" on February 16, 2007. St John's College hosted some of the key events relating to the commemoration, including an academic conference and a Gospel Mass in the College Chapel with the London Adventist Chorale.

Notable alumni
See also Category:Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge. See also Category:Fellows of St John's College, Cambridge. A more extensive list is located on the St John's website

The following is a list of notable people educated at St John's College, Cambridge. When available, years of attendance are provided as indicated in the College Register or in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Over 1000 former members of St John's College appear in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Students of St John's were the most heavily featured in Varsity's 2008 and 2009 lists of the hundred most influential people in Cambridge.

Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom

 * Frederick John Robinson, 1st Earl of Ripon, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1827–1828
 * George Hamilton-Gordon, 4th Earl of Aberdeen, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1852–1855
 * Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1855–1858, and 1859–1865

Politics



 * Roger Ascham, tutor of Elizabeth I and advisor to Edward VI and Mary I
 * Sir Francis Bell, Prime Minister of New Zealand
 * John Cheke, scholar, statesman and tutor of Edward VI
 * William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, chief advisor to Queen Elizabeth I of England
 * Michael Clark, Conservative Member of Parliament
 * Thomas Clarkson, abolitionist (1760–1846)
 * Nigel Dodds, Democratic Unionist Party MP, MLA
 * Thomas Fairfax, 3rd Baron Fairfax of Cameron, English Civil War General and Commander-in-Chief
 * Richard Hill of Hawkstone, diplomatist, statesman and public servant (1655–1727)
 * Suematsu Kencho, Japanese Minister of Communication and the Interior, statesman, journalist and historian
 * Sir Thomas Legg, senior civil servant
 * Dudley Ryder, 1st Earl of Harrowby, politician
 * Sir Michael Scholar, former Permanent Secretary at the Department of Trade and Industry, now President of St John's College, Oxford
 * Manmohan Singh, Current Prime Minister of India (2004–), Honorary Fellow. (See also: Dr Manmohan Singh Scholarship)
 * Robert Stewart, 1st Viscount Castlereagh, politician
 * Malcolm Moss, Conservative Member of Parliament for North East Cambridgeshire (1987-) (Parliamentary Under-Secretary Northern Ireland Office 1994-1997)
 * Sarah Teather, MP for Brent East, Liberal Democrat Education Spokesman
 * George William Frederick Villiers, 4th Earl of Clarendon, English diplomat and statesman
 * Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford, notable English statesman during the reign of Charles I
 * William Wilberforce, Member of Parliament, abolitionist
 * Professor Walter Woon, former Nominated Member of Parliament, Solicitor-General and Attorney-General of Singapore
 * John Williams, Bishop of Lincoln (1621–41), Lord Chancellor (1621–25), Archbishop of York (1641–50)

Nobel Prize Winners

 * Sir Edward Appleton, winner of the Nobel prize for Physics, for discovering the Appleton layer
 * Sir John Cockcroft KCB, Nobel prize-winning physicist, who first split the atom
 * Allan Cormack, Nobel laureate in Medicine or Physiology for the invention of the CAT scan
 * Paul Dirac, Nobel laureate in Physics and one of the founders of Quantum Mechanics
 * Sir Nevill Francis Mott, awarded Nobel prize for Physics for work on the behaviour of electrons in magnetic solids
 * Abdus Salam, Nobel laureate in Physics, for unifying the electromagnetic force and the weak force
 * Frederick Sanger, molecular biologist and one of only four double Nobel Prize winners
 * Maurice Wilkins, awarded Nobel prize for Medicine or Physiology with Watson and Crick for discovering the structure of DNA

Science, mathematics, and technology

 * John Couch Adams, mathematician and discoverer of Neptune
 * George Barnard, statistician known for his work on the foundations of statistics
 * John Browne, Baron Browne of Madingley, FRS; former Chief Executive of BP
 * Sir David Cox, prominent statistician
 * Sir Samuel Curran, physicist, inventor of the scintillation counter and proportional counter, and founder of Stratclyde University
 * John Dee, mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and consultant to Queen Elizabeth I
 * Fearon Fallows, astronomer
 * Thomas Fink, physicist and author
 * Johannes de Villiers Graaff, economist
 * William Gilbert, physician and natural philosopher, discoverer of the Earth's magnetic field and inventor of the word 'electricity'
 * William Gregor, discoverer of titanium
 * William D. Hamilton, evolutionary biologist who formalised the concept of Kin selection
 * David Harvey, Marxist geographer, social scientist
 * William Heberden, British physician, who gave the first clinical description (1768) of angina pectoris and demonstrated that chicken pox was different from smallpox
 * John Herschel, mathematician and astronomer
 * W. E. Hick, pioneer of cognitive science and discoverer of Hick's law
 * Robert Hinde, Professor of Zoology, and former Master of St. Johns
 * Sir Fred Hoyle, pioneering but controversial cosmologist who first used the term 'Big Bang'
 * Sir Harold Jeffreys, applied mathematician and geophysicist
 * Joseph Larmor, mathematician and physicist
 * Louis Leakey, archaeologist and naturalist credited with the discovery of Homo habilis
 * Professor John Marrack, immunologist
 * Alfred Marshall, economist
 * Sir Charles Algernon Parsons, inventor of the steam turbine
 * Sir Roger Penrose, mathematical physicist and philosopher
 * Cedric Price, architect
 * Vikram Sarabhai, father of the Indian space programme
 * James Joseph Sylvester, mathematician
 * Brook Taylor, mathematician
 * Sir Maurice Wilkes, one of the founding fathers of modern computer science, and inventor of the first stored program digital computer

Arts and Literature



 * Sir Thomas Wyatt 1503-1542, courtier and poet
 * Samuel Butler, author
 * William Wordsworth, poet
 * Patrick Brontë, curate, father of the Brontë sisters
 * Robert Greene, arguably the first professional English author of plays, poems and novels
 * Thomas Nashe, pamphleteer, satirist & playwright
 * Robert Herrick, poet
 * Louis Cha, famous Chinese novelist and newspaper editor
 * Frederic Raphael, screenwriter, novelist and journalist
 * Sir Cecil Beaton, photographer
 * Herbert Howells, English composer (college organist)
 * Geoffrey Paterson, conductor (college organist).
 * Tom Rob Smith, award nominee author of Soviet-era novels; erstwhile writer for Channel 5's defunct soap opera Family Affairs
 * Paul Sussman, author, archaeologist and journalist
 * Douglas Adams, author
 * Jennifer Egan, 2011 Pulitzer Prize

Religion

 * Peter Carnley, Archbishop of Perth 1981-2005, Primate of Australia 2000-2005
 * Frederick Donald Coggan, Baron Coggan, Archbishop of Canterbury 1974-1980
 * W. Owen Chadwick, church historian
 * D'Ewes Coke, clergyman and colliery master
 * Saint John Fisher, martyr (Fellow and Founder)
 * Saint Richard Gwyn, martyr
 * Edmund Hickeringill, churchman
 * Saint Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel
 * William Jowett, missionary
 * Edward Stillingfleet, British theologian and scholar
 * Verne Timms, Reverend of Greendale Church 1963-98

Other

 * Rob Andrew, England rugby footballer
 * Ab Banerjee, an entrepreneur who helped established the Dr Manmohan Singh Scholarship
 * Chris Brasher, Olympic gold medallist runner, founder of the London Marathon
 * Mike Brearley, cricketer, England Captain
 * Logie Bruce Lockhart, Scotland rugby footballer
 * Damon Buffini, head of private equity firm Permira
 * Andrew Carwood, Director of Music St Paul's Cathedral (2007), tenor and conductor
 * William George Constable, art historian
 * Kikuchi Dairoku, first Japanese graduate of Cambridge University
 * Paul Dempsey (presenter), TV Presenter
 * Hugh Dennis, Actor/ Comedian
 * Fra' Matthew Festing, Prince and Grand Master of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta
 * Andrew Gant, chorister and composer
 * Charles Sydney Gibbes, English tutor of Tsarevich Alexei Nikolaevich of Russia
 * Andrew Gilligan, controversial journalist
 * George Guest, Welsh choral conductor, college organist 1951-1991
 * William Hawkins, jurist and serjeant-at-law
 * Peter Hennessy English historian of government
 * Sir Harry Hinsley, historian and World War II codebreaker
 * Sir Derek Jacobi, actor
 * Edward Latymer, founder of both Latymer Upper School and The Latymer School
 * Donald MacAlister, physician and academic
 * Tshilidzi Marwala, academic and businessman
 * G. R. S. Mead
 * Dr Jonathan Miller, physician, theatre and opera director and television presenter
 * Sir Peter Noble, Principal of King's College London 1952-1968
 * John Scott, LVO, English organist, organ scholar 1974-78, organist of St Paul's 1990-2004
 * Prof Stephen Sykes, theologian, former Dean of St John's and Bishop of Ely, and principal of St John's College, Durham
 * Frank Thistlethwaite, Vice-Chancellor of the University of East Anglia (1961–1980)
 * Kenneth Thomson, of Canada's wealthiest family and Thomson Corp. (information services)
 * His Honour Judge Peter Thornton, QC, Senior Circuit Judge at the Central Criminal Court
 * Henry Wace (1853–1947), England international footballer and expert on bankruptcy law.
 * Sid Waddell, darts commentator
 * Professor Glanville Williams, Q.C. LL.D. F.B.A. described in 1997 by the New York Times, as the greatest lawyer of the 20th century

St John's College Royal Medal Winners
Three Royal Medals, known also as the Queen’s Medals, are awarded annually by the Sovereign upon the recommendation of the Council of the Royal Society, “two for the most important contributions to the advancement of Natural Knowledge (one in the physical and one in the biological sciences) and the other for distinguished contributions in the applied sciences”. The first Royal Medal was awarded in 1826 and previous recipients include thirty-eight Johnians.

Masters of St John's College
Dates for masters up to 13 Dec. 1952 are taken from 

Many of the later dates are taken from the college magazine, The Eagle

In popular culture
The video of High Hopes, one of Pink Floyd last songs, contains numerous scenes set in the St Johns College.