Archbishop of Canterbury Archbishop of Canterbury The Archbishop of Canterbury is the senior bishop and principal leader of the Church of England, the symbolic head of the worldwide Anglican Communion and the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Canterbury. The current archbishop is Justin Welby, who was enthroned at Canterbury Cathedral on 21 March 2013. Welby is the 105th in a line which goes back more than 1400 years to Augustine of Canterbury, the "Apostle to the English", sent from Rome in the year 597. Welby succeeded Rowan Williams. From the time of Augustine until the 16th century, the Archbishops of Canterbury were
Matthew Hutton (archbishop of Canterbury) 1728. Hutton became a royal chaplain to George II in 1736. In 1737 he was appointed Canon of the second stall at St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, a position he held until 1739. He became Rector of Trowbridge and of Spofforth, in Yorkshire, and held prebends at York and Westminster. In 1743 he became Bishop of Bangor, and in 1747, Archbishop of York, before finally, in 1757, becoming Archbishop of Canterbury, but died the next year without having ever lived in Lambeth Palace. In 2016, during the refurbishment of the Garden Museum, which is housed at the medieval church of