A Walk in History

Friday 1st August - The Gordon Riots

2008-08-05T14:30:00.020+01:00

Thankfully the rain held off for our walk today, only sending raindrops as we came to the end of the walk.

Today's walk was all about the Gordon Riots, the most violent civil uprising in the history of London. After meeting up outside Holborn Tube Station, Aly led us down to our first stop in Sardinia Street, having paused at Twyford Place for a brief summary of today's subject. The Gordon Riots actually took place in 1780 but it was events two years earlier in 1778 that actually set things in motion. Sir George Savile has successfully introduced a Catholic Relief Act which was part of a Whig tradition of religious tolerance. The Act absolved Roman Catholics from taking the religious oath on joining the army (to help boost the size of the British Army at a time when we were involved in wars against America, France and Spain) and was passed by Lord North's government.

Burning of Newgate Prison

Two years later in 1780 Lord George Gordon, an extreme protestant set up the Protestant Association demanding the repeal of the 1778 Act. He made a speech which spread fear of 'popery' - that there was a conspiracy involving 20,000 Jesuits hiding in tunnels under the River Thames waiting for an order from Rome to rise up and attack London. He also suggested that the Roman Catholics in the army could join forces with the Irish, French and Spanish to attack England. He saw the Act as a threat to Anglicanism and as being a Roman Catholic was tantamount to being a traitor (because they could not be loyal to the monarch and to the pope at the same time) much anti catholic feeling was whipped up.

Lord George Gordon
(courtesy Trustees of the British Museum)

So at our first stop in Sardinia Street we look at was is now the new London School of Economics building but where on this site stood the Sardinian Embassy. At that time Italy was a series of individual states, hence Sardinia having it's own embassy and the name of the street!

Following Gordon's speech, mobs took to the streets, and their first target was the Sardinian Embassy, because there was also a Catholic Chapel situated here where Catholics could come to take part in mass although mass was still semi-illeagal at that time. Because it was a well known chapel however, it was always going to be a target. The building was attacked and destroyed. The Church of St. Anselm and St. Caecilia was later built on the site, but then moved further up Kingsway to it's current location near Africa House.

The Bavarian Chapel in Soho and Newgate Prison were also attacked. The latter in an effort to free prisoners and to increase the size of the mob. People became anxious for their own safety and began to write on the doors of their homes "No Popery" to prove they were not catholics.

The mob attack Newgate Prison
(courtesy City of London)

Plan of Watchman's Posts in Charing Cross during the riots
(courtesy City of London)

We now walked back up Kingsway and across into Southampton Row and then turned left and walked into Bloomsbury Square and stopped outside what was once No. 29. It was here that Lord Chief Justice Mansfield lived. On Tuesday 6th June 1780 his home was attacked by a mob and raised to the ground. He managed to escape through the back of the house on to what is now Southampton Row. The mob burned his precious Law Library. Whether coincidence or by design, Lord Mansfield presided over Lord George Gordon's trial.

A House in Bloomsbury Square

Lord Justice Mansfield

Three of the mob who attached the house, John Gray, Charles Kent and Letitia Holland, were hung in Bloomsbury Square as it was believed at that time that criminals were hung as close to the scene of their crime as was possible.

We now walked back to Southampton Row, headed north and then turned right through Cosmo Place into Queen Square, turning right again into Old Gloucester Street

Cosmo Place

At No. 44 we find a plaque which notes that Bishop Richard Challoner lived and died here. He was a prominent catholic who produced a revised edition of the Bible and a catholic prayer book. At the time of the riots he was nearly 90 years old. He managed to escape from his home before the mob arrived taking refuge in Finchley, north London, although at that time a rural area. When the riots died down he returned home but he never really recovered from the shock of having to escape and he died shortly thereafter.

Bishop Richard Challoner
(courtesy Bishop Challoners School)

44 Old Gloucester Street

The Plaque on No. 44

We now continued down to Theobalds Road, crossing over to Drake Street, then along the edge of Red Lion Square and into Proctor Street, before crossing High Holborn to stand outside the Chancery Court Hotel.

There was a climate of very severe punishment at the time and an example of this is shown by the following case.

George Bourton was a drunken cobbler. He was walking down High Holborn when he decided to try his hand at begging. Richard Stone was walking past him when Bourton held out his hand and said "Pray remember the Protestant religion" as a begging device. Stone offered him tuppence but Bourton being greedy demanded six pence. Stone reluctantly gave him the money but reported him - Bournton was arrested and hung.

On Wednesday 7th June 1780 the mob pillaged and set fire to the Black Swan Distillery on the site of Barnards Inn in Holborn. The drunken mob attacked the distillery because it's owner Mr. Langdale was known to be a catholic. The rioters poured alcohol on the flames which of course exacerbated the strength of the fire and in fact caused a number of deaths.

The novel 'Barnaby Rudge' by Charles Dickens is set during the riots. Lord George Gordon together with his secretary Gashford and a servant John Grueby stop for the night in the village of Chigwell before leaving for London and inciting anti-catholic sentiment along the way and recruiting volunteers for his cause. Dickens describes them as "sprinkled doubtless here and there with honest zealots, but composed for the most part of the very scum and refuse of London, whose growth was fostered by bad criminal laws, bad prison regulations and the worst conceivable police."

A scene from Barnaby Rudge

By the 8th June 1780 troops had been called in and the authorities gained the upper hand. King George III ordered his officers to exert "their utmost force" to repress the rebellion.

George III's Proclamation
(courtesy City of London)

As a result of the riots Lord George Gordon was charged with treason and was sent to the Tower of London. He spent 8 months in prison but was later cleared of blame. He later abandoned his Christian faith and became Jewish, changing his name to Abraham George Gordon. He died in Newgate Prison aged 42 having been incarcerated for libelling Marie Antoinette.

As a result of the riots:

285 people died

200 were wounded

450 people were arrested

25 people were hung

£200,000 worth of damage

£70,000 compensation paid to individuals

100 Roman Catholic buildings (including churches, presbyteries and private homes) were looted and/or burned.

I really enjoyed this walk, as it was about a period I knew very little about. The next walk is a longer evening walk on The Bloomsbury Group.

Friday 18th July 2008 - The Hunterian Museum

2008-07-21T13:49:00.020+01:00

The Coat of Arms of The Royal College of Surgeons 1822

(picture courtesy Royal College of Surgeons)

A cloudy damp today for our walk today - something a little different again with a visit to the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons in Lincoln's Inn Fields. (Click HERE for the Museum Website)

We met as usual outside Holborn Tube Station, and our guide Aly led us to Lincoln's Inn Fields and the Royal College of Surgeons. We collected visitor badges at reception and then made our way up the stairs to the entrance to the museum. We were welcomed and given a Museum Guide, and walked into the Crystal Gallery which is just amazing. Originally, we were to have split in two and had a 20 minute guided tour of the Museum, but due to number size instead we were given a wonderful talk by the Director of the Museum, Simon Chaplin who held everyone spellbound with his clear oration and amazing knowledge!

The Crystal Gallery

(photo courtesy Royal College of Surgeons)

So first some background. The Hunterian Museum is named after John Hunter who was a surgeon in the second half of the 18th century. At that time you needed no university education or to study medicine to become a surgeon. You would train under an apprenticeship starting at about 14 years of age and then spend the next seven years learning to be a surgeon. The practical side was good but it was no so good for learning anatomy and of course this was only open to men.

William Hunter
(picture courtesy Royal College of Surgeons)

One of the drawings by William Hunter

John Hunter was born in East Kilbride in Scotland in 1728. In 1748 he came to London to join his elder brother William who ran an anatomy school in Covent Garden. William Hunter (1718-1783) was already an established physician and obstetrician. Under his tutorlege John learnt human anatomy and quickly showed real aptitude in the dissection and preparation of specimens. William also arranged for him to study under two eminent surgeons, William Cheselden (1688-1752) and Percivall Pott (1714-1788).

John Hunter

In 1760 John was commissioned as an army surgeon and spent three years in France and Portugal. During this time he developed new ideas on the treatment of common ailments to be found in the army such as gunshot wounds and venereal disease, but he also spent time collecting specimens of lizards and other animals. Following his return to England in 1763 he became engrossed in scientific research and this came to characterise his approach to surgery.
He began to build up his private practice. In 1767 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society for his scientific work and in 1768 he was elected Surgeon to St. George's Hospital, then in Hyde Park. In the 1770s his home in Jermyn Street had become full of his collection of specimens so in 1783 he moved to a large house at No. 28 Leicester Square, and here, together with his wife the poet Anne Home, he entertained his friends and colleagues and it became a natural meeting place for the many artists, naturalists and philosophers of the time. Behind No.28 was a second house where his school of anatomy was based. This was also where his students lived. On the top floor were the dissecting rooms and one of his students, James Williams wrote to his sister :

"My room has two beds in it and in point of situation is not the most pleasant in the world. The Dissecting Room with half a dozen dead bodies in it is immediately above and that in which Mr. Hunter makes preparations is the next adjoining to it, so that you may conceive it to be a little perfumed. There is a dead carcase just at this moment rumbling up the stairs and the Resurrection Men swearing most terribly. I am informed this will be the case most mornings about four o'clock throughout the winter. There is something horrible in it at first but I am now become reconciled."

(This letter was written in October 1793. The originals of the letters were in a private collection but transcripts are in the library of St. George's Hospital Medical School. Thanks to Simon Chaplin for the quote)

Between these two houses was a third building which housed John Hunter's Museum and contained 13000 specimens, both human and animal. Hunter opened the museum to the public to try and explain his work to them every Saturday in May. Three Saturdays were for gentlemen and one Saturday for ladies. The pub The Moon Under Water in Leicester Square now stands on the site of No.28.

The Moon Under Water pub, Leicester Square

Hunter, who became Surgeon Extraordinary and then Surgeon General, died in 1793 and was regarded as one of the leading medical figures of his generation, and a pioneer of a new style of scientific surgery. An example of his pioneering work, is the story of the Coachmen's Leg. A coachman was treated by Hunter at St. George's Hospital for an aneurism behind his knee. Most surgeons at that time would have amputated the leg, but Hunter wanted to try a different solution. Remember at that time there were no anaesthetics, no antibiotics or antiseptics He used a ligature to tie off the artery high on the coachman's thigh. The man went on to live for another 40 years. When he died, his widow was asked if she would donate her husband's leg. You can now see the limb in the Crystal Room of the museum. This was typical of Hunter's approach to try and find ways of treating patients without operating.

The Museum in 1963
(photo courtesy Royal College of Surgeons)

His Collection was regarded as being of such importance that it was purchased by the government and presented to the Royal College of Surgeons. As well as human specimens there were animal bodies too including two elephants, from Queen Charlotte's Royal Menagerie and dissected by Hunter.

A Charicature of the Battle between the Barbers and the Surgeons
(picture courtesy Royal College of Surgeons)

And now a brief history of the Royal College of Surgeons :-
The College had it's beginnings in the union of the Fellowship of Surgeons and the Company of Barbers by Henry VIII in 1540 to form the Company of Barber Surgeons. They maintained a rather uneasy partnership until the 18th century, when with the number and importance of surgeons increasing through the development of an academic basis for surgical practice, and new anatomy schools such as the one run by William Hunter increasing in popularity, the Surgeons split off to form a separate Company of Surgeons which had it's hall close to the Old Bailey and Newgate Prison. This was of course very convenient for the delivery of fresh bodies for dissection! However, they decided to move to new premises in Lincoln's Inn Fields in the 1790s, but failed to inform their neighbours that there would be bodies delivered for dissection. The judges and lawyers resident in Lincoln's Inn were not happy with the idea of the bodies arriving, and raised a Bill in Parliament to force the College to move away. It was the gift of Hunter's Collection that helped to rescue the situation and a few years later in 1800, The Company of Surgeons were granted a Royal Charter and became the Royal College of Surgeons in London and later of England.

The Whale Skeleton - The Hunterian Gallery before the wars
(photo courtesy Royal College of Surgeons)

A new building was constructed in the 19th century and by the end of that century there was over one hundred thousand specimens in the collection. In 1941 the building suffered severe damage during the bombing of London, and most of the museum was destroyed. The College was rebuilt after the war, with the original inner hall and Library and part of the facade retained.
Although the museum specimens are not used as a practical resource any longer it is still an important place for scientific research today. The College is the leading institute of post graduate training for surgeons today.

The Royal College of Surgeons

I think we were all impressed with Simon Chaplin's talk - he managed to pack in an amazing amount into a relatively short period of time and was happy to answer questions afterwards.

After a brief look around, some of our group met up with Aly outside for a short walk around Lincoln's Inn Fields. Our first stop was in the corner of the fields where we saw a bust of John Hunter.

The Hunter bust in Lincoln's Inn Fields

We then walked out onto the west side of the square to see No.66, now the home of Farrar's Solicitors. The house was built just before 1700 for Lord Powis and was called at that time
Powis House. On 27h July 1694 the Charter of the Bank of England was sealed in this house.

No 66 - Now Newcastle House

In 1705 the house was acquired by the Duke of Newcastle and renamed Newcastle House. Part of the house was remodeled in the 1930s by Sir Edwin Lutyens.

We then looked a No. 3 Lincoln's Inn Fields . This was at one time the home of Ramsey MacDonald, who became the first Labour Prime Minister in 1924 for just a few months, and then again in 1929. He later formed a National Government together with the Conservatives, and was expelled from the Labour Party in 1931. He continued as Prime Minister for another four years until 1935 and died in 1937.

No 3 Lincoln's Inn Fields

We now moved to Whetstone Park which runs along behind the North side of Lincoln's Inn Fields. It was somewhere along here in what was always a rather dubious street, that the poet Milton (1608-1674)lived. At British History Online we find the following: -

Parallel to the northern side of the "Fields," and lying between them and Holborn, is an almost untenanted row of houses or buildings, now chiefly turned into stables, but formerly dignified by the name of "Whetstone Park." Two hundred years ago it was a place of very bad reputation, and was attacked by the London apprentices in 1602. The loose character of Whetstone Park and its inhabitants is a frequent subject of allusion in the plays of Dryden and Shadwell, and occasionally in Butler's "Hudibras" and Ned Ward's London Spy. But Whetstone Park is not without at least one distinguished inmate. At all events we read in Philips's "Life of Milton" that the author of "Paradise Lost" "left his great house in Barbican, and betook himself to a smaller (in Holborn) among them that open backward into Lincoln's Inn Fields. Here he lived a private life, still prosecuting his studies and curious search into knowledge."

Milton was a supported of the Parliamentarians and after the Restoration of Charles II a warrant was issued for his arrest. Even after a general pardon was issued, he was still arrested and had to rely on his influential friends to obtain his release from prison. His most famous work, Paradise Lost, written between 1658 and 1664 is based on that era. He also wrote many other poems including Paradise Regained in 1671.

I hope you enjoyed this walk, and if you get the chance please do visit the Hunterian Mueum - entry is free. Check the website for opening times.

Saturday 5th July 2008 - Architecture in Holborn - Then and Now

2008-07-09T14:32:00.030+01:00

Today's walk, was on a Saturday, (Wimbledon Ladies Final Day no less) which having started out rather damp, became warm and sunny. I was here in Holborn for a summer party, so I was able to sneak away for a couple of hours to go on this walk. Accompanying our usual guide Aly, was local architect Mary Thum. Todays walk was an official part of the London Festival of Architecture programme.

We set off as usual from Holborn Tube Station - a huge group of 85! This is a record for any of the walks and any further Saturday walks will have a lot to live up to. We walked down Kingsway then turned into Keeley Street to a new building designed for CityLit, (1-10 Keeley Street)which was completed in May 2005 and is the largest Adult Education Institute in Europe. CityLit has been operating for 88 years supporting adult education. The building designed by Allies and Morrison was designed to meet today's needs while still blending into the area and forming a bond with the local community. CityLit had been based ina number of properties scattered around the area. The large window visible in the picture below is the Dance Studio. There are 56 modern teaching rooms, a multi purpose theatre which seats 120, and a cafe with displays of art. The proportions of the building are cleverly staged so that on one side the height of the building is the same as the Masonic Temple and while on the other it is higher to reflect the tall building to the right on Kingsway.

We now returned to Kingsway to look at No.24 . This building is being redeveloped by the London School of Economics in a £46 million redevelopment by Nicholas Grimshaw & Partners, architects who have also designed the Eden Centre and the Eurostar Terminal at Waterloo. The design aims to incorporate modern teaching facilities in an historic facade. When finished it will allow double the number of students and includes an Atrium and a roof pavilion to reflect the open space of Lincoln's Inn Fields (as the building stretches down the length of Sardinia Street into Lincoln's Inn fields). Two huge red steel boxes eleven storeys tall were installed for the lift shafts - the first time something this large has been installed. Previously such structures were installed in sections on site. There is also a Roman artesian well deep beneath the foundations and this will be used to provide water for the building.

24 Kingsway

We now walked down Sardinia Street and into Lincoln's Inn Fields to look at a building I am very well familiar with - Nos. 59-60 Lincoln's Inn Fields, the site this sunny Saturday of our Chambers party which I had snuck away from. Bouncy castle, rodeo bull and ball pools and giant lego were being enjoyed to the full by the children and a steel band and a barbecue were also there, but hidden from view behind a tent. As I have talked about this building before, I will be brief. Lincoln's Inn Fields was London's first garden square and is the largest. No. 59-60 is the only remaining example of the original houses built here, and may have been designed by the great Inigo Jones, an early English renaissance designer. Aly pointed out the two stone vases atop the gateway. The front is stuccoed and painted, at present a pinkish colour. It is not original however, but dates only from 1975. English Heritage are now giving consideration to Garden Court Chambers request for permission to repaint the front in an appropriate colour which is historically correct.

59-60 Lincoln's Inn Fields

We now walked into the Fields and over to the bandstand. This is in fact part of the original Chinese Pagoda which once stood here, and again English Heritage are considering restoring the original design in full. In the past, the fields were home to grazing cattle, jousting and executions, and were laid out by Inigo Jones in the late 17th century.

The Bandstand

We then crossed to Sir John Soane's Museum, which covers Nos. 12, 13 and 14 Lincoln's Inn Fields and has a neo-classical style. Soane was a professor of architecture and a contemporary of Robert Adam. He also designed the Dulwich Picture Gallery and the old Bank of England. Soane purchased No. 12 in 1792 and over the next 32 years purchased Nos 13 and 14 which he demolished and rebuilt to provide not only his home but the office for his architectural practice.

Sir John Soane's Museum

The four column capitals on the front are 14th century, and there are two stone caryatids which are modelled on a temple next to the Parthenon in Athens. The roof lights have been restored to allow light to pass through all the way to the basement, and replaced coloured lights. The breakfast room has a ceiling domed with convex mirrors. There are even decorative coal hole covers at the front of the house.

One of the column capitals

A decorative coal hole at Sir John Soane's Museum

We now walked back towards Gate Street, stopping to look at Little Turnstile, which together with Great Turnstile were just that - turnstiles to stop the cattle from wandering. We walked through Little Turnstile onto High Holborn to our next stop at the Chancery Court Hotel. This wonderful 5 star hotel kindly allowed us inside to look at some of the wonders inside. But first we stopped to crane our necks and look up to the cupola at the top of the building. From a distance this has been known to fool people into believing it is the dome of St. Paul's Cathedral. The hotel was originally built as the headquarters of the Pearl Assurance Company, and was vacated in the 1990s. The building was designed by H. Percy Monkton, of whom little is known, and begun in 1912. In fact the whole frontage was only completed in 1962 because, following bomb damage during World War II, buildings on either side were destroyed and damaged and these spaces were incorporated into the original building. The frontage is made of Scottish grey granite to first floor level and thereafter pearly grey Portland Stone is used throughout the remainder of the construction. These are solid blocks not just facing stones.

Looking up at the Cupola-The Chancery Court Hotel

The inner courtyard at The Chancery Court Hotel

We now walk through an arched entrance way into a courtyard. To our right as we enter is the main entrance and to our left a bar with tables and umbrellas. We then stop and turn to look back. Now to the left of the entrance arch stood the West Banking Hall - this is now a bar. On the right of the entrance arch stood the East Banking Hall - this is now a lovely restaurant. We now turn to our left and walk into the lobby through the main entrance. This is the largest hotel lobby in London. There are eight columns with bronze plinths and the floor is made of Portugese limestone inset with Scottish slate which has all been restored. The building is listed so of course everything must be done to preserve the original building as much as possible. We now turned to the right and through double doors to see the staircase. Frankly I was blown away! Up a flight of carpeted stairs and then left through more doors we come upon the most stunning staircase which leads eight floors to the top of the building and to the inside of the cupola. The staircase is made of Italian white marble with black staining from Pavanazo. Six years ago the staircase alone was insured for £40 million! The photo below can't really do it justice - if you ever get the chance you must visit this lovely hotel and see that staircase. I wandered back into the lobby by myself to get some more photos and I took these photos of the very helpful porters on duty. By the way, the restaurant serve the most gorgeous cupcakes for tea!

The Lobby(1)-Chancery Court Hotel

The Lobby(2)

The Lobby(3)

The Lobby (4) - The Porter's Desk

Gazing up the marble staircase to the interior of the Cupola

We now wended our way back out into the sunshine and on to High Holborn to look briefly at Mid City Place which was designed by Kohn Pederson Fox and completed in 2001. At the end of the 1990s Holborn was not the most desirable place to work, but with the Chancery Court Hotel coming to High Holborn property prices began to revive with Turnstile House at No. 90 High Holborn and then Mid City Place, suddenly the area became revitalised.

Mid City Place

We now turned down Great Turnstile. Our next building is another modern one - Great Turnstile House designed by Mary Thum Associates and developed by her company Cube City Properties. Great Turnstile is only three metres wide, and the building, which received a Camden Design Award, with high performance windows and insulated stone render, painted a bright yellow. The penthouse affords a wonderful view apparently.

Great Turnstile House

We now walked back to High Holborn and walked east crossing over Chancery Lane and stopped to look across at the Prudential Building at Holborn Bars a Grade II listed building, which fronts Waterhouse Square. The square was designed by Alfred Waterhouse and was built between 1879 and 1906, as they gradually acquired additional land to extend the square. The design was part of the Victorian Gothic Revival, and Waterhouse also designed the Natural History Museum and Manchester Town Hall. Waterhouse used moulded brick and unglazed terracotta, with glazed terracotta inside. Prudential moved away in 2002 and various companies including English Heritage are now based there.

The Prudential Building

We then walked on to No. 33 Holborn - This building was completed in 2001 by Foster & Partners, and is now the headquarters of J. Sainsbury. There is over 328,000 square feet on the ground floor alolne. There is a huge atrium and eight upper levels. If you look to the left of No. 33 along New Fetter Lane you can see a number of new developments which have contributed to the property boom in Holborn.

J. Sainsbury at 33 Holborn

Crossing over Holborn we walked back past Waterhouse Square and headed west along Holborn and eventually turned down Red Lion Street, turned left into Eagle Street and right into Dare Street and then down to Red Lion Square, to No. 12 Summit House. Now the home of top solicitors Mishcon de Reya who moved there in 2002 and restored and maintain the beautiful Art Deco building, which was designed by Westwood and Emberton who were one of the first firms to build in this style. The first occupants were a tailoring company and two of the original wood panels which decorated the old front doors still remain, a reminder of the origins of the original owners.

Summit House

Details of the remaining panels

Red Lion Fields was developed as a square and laid out in 1684 by Dr. Nicholas Bourbon. Nos 14 and 15 are part of the original 1680s development. The members of Grays Inn were very unhappy at the prospect of building taking place, as it would impinge on their views and a number of the lawyers came down and attacked the builders with bricks, in an attempt to prevent the development going ahead.

We now headed across the Square and up towards Theobalds Road and then along to Southampton Row to see our final building Victoria House. This magnificent Beaux Arts block was designed by Charles Williams Long and completed in 1932. It was originally the home of the Liverpool and Victoria Insurance Company. The columns at the front are three storeys high and the pediments describe industry and navigation. On the rear of the building there are similar sculptures depicting nature. The building was considered as a possible home for the Greater London Assembly, but in the end they chose Norman Foster's design on the south bank opposite the Tower of London. However the scheme for the interior by Will Allsopp did go ahead the main feature of which are gigantic hanging pods inside the mainn entrance hall. There is also an Art Deco ballroom and a fine staircase.

Victoria House

As we made our way back to Holborn Tube Station, we took a brief detour to look at Sicilian Avenue. which was built in 1905 from yellow terracotta and is lined with Corinthian columns, and is a delightful place to stop for a coffee.

We finally arrived back at Holborn Tube a little over two hours after we began, rather footsore and in need of a long cool drink, which I was quick to partake of on my return to Chambers summer party.

Friday 4th July - The Foundling Hospital

2008-07-07T13:40:00.000+01:00

It has been a while since I went on one of the excellent walks organised by inHolborn, so I was looking forward to this one. Today, unusually, we met our guide Aly outside the old gates of the Hospital at the junction of Guilford Street and Lamb's Conduit Street, and then walked around into Coram's Fields and on to the Foundling Museum. The railings and the stone work here are all part of the original hospital. Mother's could leave their infants, either by passing them through the gates or leaving them anonymously in the stone bay seen below.

Entrance to the Foundling Hospital

Now for some history - The Foundling Hospital was formed by Captain Thomas Coram, a sea captain, who noticed on his return to England in the early 18th century that there were no facilities for abandoned children - you could literally step over dead and dying babies on the streets. He campaigned for twenty years for something to be done. The authorities were reluctant to do anything because they took the view that if provision was made for these children, it would increase promiscuity among the population and lead to a vast increase in children being abandoned. There was a general apathy and a puritan morality which disapproved of illegitimate children. London was far behind other European cities of the time - Rome had it's Conservatorio della Ruota, founded by Pope Innocent III in the 13th century, and Venice had La Pieta, a 14th century orphanage for girls. Christ's Hospital, founded in London in 1552, had dealt with foundlings as well as legitimate orphans, but by 1676 illegitimate children were banned so there was a desperate need for somewhere to care for these children. Mortality rates were high - 74% of children died before the age of 5. In workhouses (the only other place where the children could be placed) the death rate was over 90% - they just died of neglect or disease.

Captain Thomas Coram

Finally in 1739 Thomas Coram established The Foundling Hospital for the "education and maintenance of exposed and deserted young children". He had petitioned the King on a number of occasions, and his perserverance was rewarded when a Royal Charter was granted on 17th October 1739, and subscriptions poured in. The governors met to receive the Charter at Somerset House on 20th October, and they included many of the important figures of the day. These included dukes and earls, merchant bankers, Dr. Richard Mead (the foremost physician of the day), William Hogarth (the painter) and of course Captain Coram himself.

The first children were admitted to the Foundling Hospital on 25th March 1741 into a temporary house located in Hatton Garden. I can only imagine the scenes as the mothers handed over their children, the tears and cries that must have been shed. It must have been heartrending.

A permanent site for the purpose built hospital was found in the area known as Bloomsbury Fields lying north of Great Ormond Street and west of Gray's Inn Lane. It consisted of 56 acres of land and cost £7000, £500 of which was donated by the Earl of Salisbury whose land it had been. The Hospital was designed by Theodore Jacobsen as a plain brick building with two wings and a chapel, built around an open courtyard. The western wing was finished in October 1745 and an eastern wing was added in 1752 "in order that the girls might be kept separate from the boys". It quickly became London's most popular charity.

The Foundling Hospital

In 1756 following a resolution in the House of Commons that all children should be received, and funds publically guaranteed, a flood of children poured in from country workhouses. In less than four years 14,934 children were presented. It was during this time that a vile trade among vagrants grew up. They would promise to take the children to the Hospital for a charge, only to either fail to do so or to treat the children with great cruelty. They were sometimes known as 'Coram Men'. Only 4,400 of those children lived to be apprenticed out and when the government saw the cost (£500,000) they came to the conclusion that indiscriminate admission should be abolished and they withdrew funding. Left to themselves, the Hospital adopted a system of receiving children with large amounts of money (£100 for instance) and this led to the children sometimes being reclaimed by their mothers at a later date. This practice was stopped in 1801 and a new rule that no money be received was introduced. All the children at the Hospital were those of unmarried women and they were also all first children of their mothers.

A lottery system was introuduced. Women would enter the secretary's office and putting their hand into a bag would withdraw a coloured ball. Depending on the colour of the ball, the child was either admitted or refused. The babies were baptised and given new names - they were never told their original names. Women could leave a small gift for their child, and if they wished to reclaim him or her at a later date, they had to describe the gift left. This was later replaced by a receipt system. When the child reached a certain age, they were apprenticed out to be manual labourers or admitted to the Army or Navy. Girls were placed into service. Following the tragic death of one of the girls, a Mary Clifford, who was whipped and maltreated by the midwife Elizabeth Brownrigg (1720-1767) as were all of her female apprentices, an investigation was held by the Foundling Hospital. Brownrigg was tried and convicted of murder and sentenced to hang at Tyburn. The Hospital instituted a more thorough check of prospective apprentice masters and mistresses from them on.

The Hospital was blessed with generous patrons - William Hogarth painted a portrait of Thomas Coram and donated other pictures. He encouraged his contemporaries to do the same and the hospital was the beneficiary of paintings by Thomas Gainsborough, Sir Joshua Reynolds and Francis Hayman. There is also a bust of Handel by Roubiliac and a picture of Christ presenting a little child by Benjamin West. This wonderful art collection can now be seen at The Foundling Museum.

We gather outside The Foundling Museum

Music was also important and George Frederic Handel frequently had The Messiah performed there, and donated a fair copy (a full score) to the Hospital. His involvement with the Hospital began on 1st May 1750 when he directed a performance of The Messiah to mark the presentation of the organ to the Chapel. This was a great success and Handel was elected a Governor. Music was deemed very beneficial to the children. In 1847 a successful juvenile band was started and the Hospital has provided many musicians to the bands of the Army and Navy.

The Foundling Hospital Chapel

In the 1920s the Hospital decided to move to a healthier location in the countryside. Originally the buildings were to be sold for university use but this fell through and they were sold to a developer called James White in 1926. His original plan to move Covent Garden Market there was successfully opposed by local residents. The original hospital building was demolished with the exception of one of two buildings and the children were moved to Redhill in Surrey and then to a new purpose built Hospital at Berkhamstead in Hertfordshire in 1935. When British Law in the 1950s moved away from institutionalisation of children to foster care and adoption, the Hospital ceased operations. The Hospital changed it's name to the Thomas Coram Foundation for Children and later to it's current name, Coram.

So after all that history on with the walk! We were met outside the Foundling Museum by our first guide. We were then taken inside for a very brief tour- we were a very large group and it was not possible to spend more than 10-15 minutes inside. The Museum was built in the 1930s to replace the original hospital and to provide administrative space for the Foundation and to provide a museum which would continue to encourage supporters and show the background to the Hospital and retain a connection with it's past. We were shown a wonderful model of the old Hospital which was constructed in the 1920s to ensure the old building was not forgotten. I would love to have had more time to really look at this exhibit. We then saw some of the wonderful paintings, including those by Hogarth that make up part of the Museum's collection. The finest parts of the old Hospital were dismantled and erected inside the Museum building. The staircase is from the old Boys wing and the magnificent Court Room on the first floor is where the Governors would have met.

For those who are interested in tracing an ancestor who may have been at the Foundling Hospital, the records are kept at the London Metropolitan Archive up to about 1920 and more recent records are held by Coram.

The Main Entrance to the Museum

After returning downstairs we went back outside to meet our next guide, who would tell us about Coram. We stopped to admire the statue of Thomas Coram, and then moved off to

Statue of Thomas Coram

walk to Coram. The sound of children filled the air - it sounded very much like sports day!

As we walked we looked at a print of the Hospital (see below). Our guide then then told us that the boys and girls had separate wings, and were kept apart even in death. The original Mortuary we now passed was split into Boys and Girls. There were 192 children in each wing of the Hospital - two to a bed.

A print of the Foundling Hospital

The Mortuary

Next to the Mortuary stand the remains of the old Swimming Pool. Both these buildings are due for demolition, as our guide said they are of no particular architectural significance. Personally I beg to differ - two historic buildings, one of which is admittedly Victorian , but part of the very first Foundling Hospital in this country, should be considered of importance, should be listed and preserved for future generations.

The old Swimming Pool

The other buildings surrounding us are all fairly new and house the offices of Coram. Coram is a childrens' charity which develops and promotes best practice in the care of vulnerable children and their families. They work with over 6000 children, young people and families each year, transforming their lives with practical help and support. They have an Adoption Service and other Education Services to support parents and children.

One of Coram's new buildings

This was a fascinating walk, and something different, in that we were able to go into an excellent museum, albeit briefly. I believe it will be well worth another visit at a later date. Charges apply to entry. Check out their website HERE.

Tomorrow I venture on another 2 hour walk around Holborn to celebrate he London Festival of Architecture.

Friday 13th June 2008 - Horrible Holborn

2008-06-16T08:55:00.000+01:00

A dry but cloudy day for today's walk - but BEWARE! If you are of a delicate sensibility be warned that today's walk has some very gruesome moments!

The bandstand in Lincoln's Inn Fields

After meeting outside Holborn Tube Station (another large group today of 62) Aly, our guide, led us off down Kingsway, and then turning left into Remnant Street, we came into Lincoln's Inn Fields. We walked to the centre by the bandstand where we had our first stop. It was here that public executions used to take place, and it was the site of the last public hanging, drawing and quartering that took place in this area. For those of you who want to know exactly what that means, I will tell you. NB Gruesome bits coming up! - Rather than being hung from a scaffold when the person is dropped, breaking their neck, a noose would be placed around the neck and the person would be raised from ground level in order to choke but not kill. A sword would then be used to slice open the prisoner from groin to neck in order to remove internal organs, whilst the prisoner still lived. The executioners were very skilled at their job and could keep their victims alive for some considerable time. Indeed Anthony Babington was still conscious when his penis was removed! Once the disembowelling had taken place, the bodies were then cut into four and posted to the four corners of the city as a warning to anyone who might be considering committing treason. The prisoners in this case were the Babington Plotters, led by the aforementioned Anthony Babington (24 Oct 1561 - 20 Sep 1586). The sentencing of the plotters read:

"From (the Tower of London) you shall be drawn on a hurdle through the open streets to the place of execution, there to be hanged and cut down alive, and your body shall be opened, your heart and bowels plucked out, and your privy members cut off and thrown into the fire before your eyes. Then your head to be stricken off from your body, and your body shall be divided into 4 quarters , to be disposed of at (the Queen's) pleasure. And may God have mercy on your soul." (From Daniel Diehl & Mark P Donnelly, Tales from the Tower of London, Sutton, Gloucestershire, 2006 p.118)

The Babington Plotters are executed

So who were the Babington Plotters? They were a group of men who were plotting to bring Mary Queen of Scots to the throne and assassinate Queen Elizabeth I. At this time there was a great deal of religious tension and paranoia about the prospect of a catholic monarch coming to the throne. Their leader, Anthony Babington, who was only 24 years old when he was executed was born into a wealthy catholic family. He came into contact with Mary Queen of Scots while working as a page boy in the Earl of Shrewsbury's household, who was at that time Mary's jailer. While travelling on the continent around 1580 he met the arch conspirator Thomas Morgan and he was persuaded to courier letters to Mary while she was still being held by the Earl of Shrewsbury. When Mary was moved to Tutbury his role as courier came to an end. On 6 July 1586 he wrote to Mary Stuart telling her he and a group of friends were planning to assassinate Elizabeth and she would succeed her as queen. He wrote seeking her authorisation which he believed she could provide as she was the legitimate heir to the throne. Catholics did not recognize Elizabeth as the rightful heir because they had never recognised HenryVIII's divorce from Catherine of Aragon and his subsequent marriage to Anne Boleyn, Elizabeth's mother. Mary's reply stressed the need for assistance from abroad but she left it to his conscience regarding the assassination. Sir Francis Walsingham, head of the Queen's security forces had many effective spies and he was informed of all that was going on. Babington and his friends were rounded up and on 18 September 1586 he and his 13 co-conspirators were convicted of high treason and sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered.

The Babington Postscript & Cipher
(courtesy The National Archives)

Because there were so many of them, and the manner of execution was a drawn out one, it was decided that the executions would take place over two days. Seven were to be executed watched by the second seven. Because the conspirators had been known to meet in the area of Lincoln's Inn Fields it was decided it would be an appropriate place for them to die. However, their screams of terror were such that the Queen ruled that the second group of seven should be executed in a more straightforward way. Among the first group were Anthony Babington, John Ballard and Chidiock Tichborne.

After this gory story we walked back out of the Fields and on to Whetstone Park. Today this is not much more than an access road for the Chancery Court Hotel and other buildings, but in the 16th and 17th centuries it was notorious as a 'red light' district. In was described by Francis Grose in his 'The 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue' as:

"A lane between Holborn and Lincoln's Inn Fields, formerly famed for being the resort of women of the town".

We now took our lives in our hands and walked through Holborn Place to High Holborn. I say this because taxis tend to whizz through here rather more quickly than the 5 miles an hour speed limit! We then turned right towards Chancery Lane and stopped near to the former site of the George and Blue Boar Inn. This was a medieval inn noted for being the stopping off point for prisoners on their way from Newgate Prison to the gallows at Tyburn (at Marble Arch). Those unfortunates on the way to their demise would stop for a last drink. Jonathan Swift who wrote Gulliver's Travels penned the following in his 1727 poem "Clever Tom Clinch".

"As clever Tom Clinch, while the rabble was bawling
Rode stately through Holborn to die in his calling.
He stopped at The George for a bottle of sack
And promised to pay for it when he came back"

Waiting at The Blue Boar

We now walked on down and turned right into Chancery Lane itself. It was here at what was the site of No.68 Chancery Lane that a family called Turner lived. They employed a 21 year girl called Eliza Fleming as a cook. One day the Turners had a dinner party, and everyone went down with food poisoning. A doctor was called and he found traces of arsenic in the dish which had held the dumplings. Eliza, who it was said had been involved with another employee Roger Gadsen, and who had been caught in a compromising position with him by Mrs. Turner, was , in an act of revenge by her mistress, implicated and charged with attempted murder.

The site of 68 Chancery Lane today

We now retraced our steps to High Holborn and crossing the road turned left and walked along to Red Lion Street. Turning right here were walked along to Eagle Street. This was where Eliza's family lived. Eliza was engaged to be married, and wrote several letters to her fiance protesting hr innocence. She was sent for trial and found guilty. To her horror she was sentenced to death. It was not until 1861 that there ceased to be a death penalty for attempted murder. On 26th July 1815, by unhappy coincidence the date she had been due to marry, Eliza was executed at Newgate. She went to her death wearing a white muslin gown and white kid boots, and it is assumed these were the clothes she had intended to wear at her wedding.

A week after her execution, her body was taken to St. George the Martyr church. Her funeral attracted thousands of people, and turned into a demonstation, as they believed she had suffered a gross miscarriage of justice. She had been made a scapegoat for the Turner family. It was some years later that a member of that family made a deathbed confession that it was he, angry at being cut out of Mr Turner's will, who had put the arsenic in the dumplings. As only one person heard this confession it is not possible to verify the truth, but it would seem Eliza was unjustly accused and executed.

St. George the Martyr

We now retraced our steps a short distance back up Red Lion Street to stop opposite the Old Red Lion pub. We now come to the Regicides or King killers - those men who were responsible for the death of Charles I. Principal among these of course is Oliver Cromwell, together with Sir Henry Ireton and John Bradshaw.

The Old Red Lion

Oliver Cromwell

Sir Henry Ireton

John Bradshaw

Following the restoration of the monarchy there was a vengeful atmosphere in the city - people demanded restitution and revenge against the men who had committed such a crime. The only problem was a number of them were already dead! Their bodies were exhumed and they were taken to Tyburn so be publicly cut up. The cart carrying the bodies stopped in Holborn over night and the bodies were placed in the cellar. One of the bodies, that of John Bradshaw had not been properly embalmed and was smelling foul. It left a most unpleasant stench in the pub.
There is a plaque outside the pub which highlights these events but unfortunately they have used the wrong date. The bodies stayed here on the night of 28th and 29th January 1661 NOT 1658. There is also a legend that supporters of the Parliamentarians crept in and stole the body of Oliver Cromwell, replacing it with another corpse, and then took it to Red Lion Square where they reburied him in an unmarked grave.

The plaque outside The Old Red Lion showing the WRONG date

We unfortunately didn't have time for the last stop, so our walk ended here. I trust you enjoyed it - until next time.

Friday 30th May - The Blitz

2008-05-30T16:45:00.000+01:00

Although it was overcast, today's weather was quite warm for our walk around sites in Holborn which suffered damage during the Blitz.

The Blitz was the bombing of London between 7th September 1940 and 11th May 1941, although there were of course sporadic attacks until the end of the war. In the old borough of Holborn, 650 buildings (that one seventh) were destroyed, 426 people were killed and 621 were seriously injured. This was the highest rate per capita in the whole of the country. A total of 282 high explosive bombs fell on Holborn and, in 19944 V1 and V2 rockets also fell here. There were no specific targets in the area, but because Holborn is very central, close to Kings Cross and Euston with their rail links to the north, and night bombing was not an exact science, Holborn suffered a great deal of damage. Theobalds Road, Red Lion Square, Red Lion Street and High Holborn suffered the worst of the damage, the worst two raids being on 16th and 17th April 1941 and 10th and 11th May 1941.

Bomb damage in Holborn (picture courtesy JAMD)

Buckea's Bakers on the corner of Boswell Street and Theobalds Rd

(by Reg Speller courtesy JAMD)

We met up as usual outside Holborn Tube Station with our guide Aly. Quite a large group today of about 40 people. We set off turning right into High Holborn and stopping outside Clintons Cards and Blackwells Bookshop. It was on this site that the Holborn Empire stood. The theatre was destroyed on the night of 14th and 15th October 1940. It was only because earlier on 14th October a time delayed bomb had fallen on the theatre but had not exploded, that the performance for the evening had been cancelled. If it had not, Vera Lynn who was due to perform there that evening, together with other artists and hundreds of patrons of the theatre would have been killed. Ms Lynn went to the Palladium instead.

We now crossed over to Proctor Street, and up to Red Lion Square. The square as we see it now has changed considerably. The one way system was built in 1962 and the square was more of a rectangle extending over to Drake Street. St. Martins Art School now stands on the site of St. John the Evangelist church. Built in 1878, the church was destroyed on Blitz Wednesday, by a parachute mine on 17th April 1941. Fisher Street was filled with little shops which were also destroyed that night. Over 40 people died in the raid, and in all over 1000 people died in London that night.

St. John the Evangelist Church

St. Martin's School of Art

The raid of 10th and 11th May 1941 devastated many buildings. Although Victoria House on Southampton Row was relatively untouched, the north side of Theobalds Road down to Lamb's Conduit Street was almost completely destroyed. A few houses on the south side of Theobalds Road remain, showing what was lost. Also destroyed that night were two pubs, The Hole in the Wall on the corner of Old Gloucester Street and The White Hart, together with the Bloomsbury Super, a huge cinema. The MediaCom Building now stands on this site.

The MediaCom Building where The Bloomsbury Super once stood

Surviving shops and houses on Theobalds Road (South Side)

During one raid, Marguerite Crowther was driving an ambulance to Great Ormond Street Hospital, carrying a woman in labour, when a bomb fell. Buildings began to collapse sending her ambulance spinning around and a recently deceased policeman was thrown onto her windscreen.

We now walked down Theobalds Road to and turned into Red Lion Street. walking south towards High Holborn. We stopped opposite Beaconsfield House, to look at the shops and flats, painted a delicate shade of pink, adjacent to it. These were all built in the 1950s following severe bomb damage to the houses and shops there following the raid on 10th and 11th May 1941.

Pink House built in the 1950s in Red Lion Street

This raid was the last major raid by the Luftwaffe before the invasion of Russia - one theory was that it was an attempt to remove rumours that an attack on Russia was imminent, another that if they could finally defeat Britain the war would be won.

We then walked back down into High Holborn. An air raid beginning at 8pm on 8th September 1940 and which lasted until 5.30am the next day and became known as 'Black Saturday' caused devastating damage. Where Mid City Place now stands was a lovely Georgian Terrace called Featherstone Buildings. It was hit by a 250kg bomb and completely destroyed. Another 250kg bomb landed close by (where Matsui now stands). Pictures of the area before and after the damage can be seen at Holborn Library. In one of the pictures a union jack can be seen flying defiantly at No 58 High Holborn (now Phones4u). In the same raid a bomb killed 29 people when it hit the building now known as Penderel's Oak pub by Great Turnstile.

Mid City Place stands on the site of Featherstone Buildings

We now moved further down east along High Holborn and stopped outside First Avenue House on the corner of Brownlow Street. Here stood a huge 300 bedroom hotel, the First Avenue Hotel which was destroyed on the night of 8th and 9th September. The same bomb also hit Lincoln House on the other side of the road, killing 7 people.

First Avenue House now stands on the site of the First Avenue Hotel

Continuing east we stopped outside Dorothy Perkins and Thorntons. Matsoni's Restaurant was destroyed on 8th October 1940 killing 21 people. This was the first and last daylight raid on Holborn. The slow German Heinkel 111 twin engined bombers could carry 13,000 kg of bombs and were being more and more easily caught by Spitfires and Hurricanes, so the Germans sent Messerschmitt 109s which were much faster and carried one large bomb to be dropped and then the plane would quickly turn for home.

Dorothy Perkins High Holborn (where Matsoni's once stood)

A Hurricane

A Messerschmitt 109

A Heinkel 111 flies over London during the Blitz

The Blitz came to an end on 11th May 1941. It failed because the Luftwaffe lacked enough bombers to wipe out an entire area. Never before had a country attempted to destroy their enemy entirely by bombing. Britain learnt from this and when the time came to invade France and Germany the Avro Lancaster would drop 40,000kg of bombs destroying many German cities, including Hamburg, Cologne, and Dresden. After May 1941 Hitler concentrated on the Russian front.

Avro Lancaster

Holborn Circus ablaze in 1940
(picture US National Archives)

The Blitz left a lasting legacy on the layout of both buildings and roads in Holborn.

I hope you found this interesting. Until next time when we look at Holborn's Horrible history.

Wednesday 28th May 2008 - Holborn at War

2008-05-28T15:29:00.000+01:00

Holborn Tube Station

Continuing the theme of war, we now move onto the Second World War, which began in September 1939, and today's walk, under the threat of rain which never came, was about Holborn during the Battle of Britain. The Battle of Britain officially started on 10th July 1940. There had been a number of successful bombing raids over southern England, focusing on airfields but in July the attacks spread to London. This eased the pressure on the airfields in the south east, which enabled the RAF to fight back until the Germans abandoned their invasion plans in the autumn of 1940 and the Battle of Britain came to an end on 31st October 1940.

We met outside Holborn Tube Station as usual. The tube station was of course used as an air raid shelter during the war, when hundreds of people would spend the night in the shelter which is still there, below the level of the current platforms. Aly led us across to the opposite side of the road and we walked down Kingsway towards Aldwych. Our first stop was outside 75 Kingsway. It was here Donald Soper, a Methodist minister would provide breakfasts for those people who had spent the night in Holborn Tube Station in the air raid shelter.

Donald Soper

Families shelter in the underground

We then walked on down Kingsway and crossed over to Bush House, which now houses the BBC. During WWII the nightly messages and propaganda were broadcast to Europe. Military music was followed by propaganda in German, and were aimed particularly at German soldiers. It was so successful that Joseph Goebbels, the German Minister of Propaganda actually praised it.

Bush House

We then looked back towards No.1 Kingsway. The Air Ministry was housed here. At the end of 1918 the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service joined forces to become the Royal Air Force. In 1919 the Air Ministry moved to No.1 Kingsway and using their motto of Per Ardua Ad Astra gave their new home the name of Adastral House. They remained there until 1952 when they moved to Whitehall.

No 1 Kingsway (formerly Adastral House)

An aerial observer scans the skies during the Battle of Britain

We now walked down through India Place to the Strand and along to Aldwych Tube Station which closed in 1994., Originally opened in 1907 as Strand Station, it later became Aldwych Station a spur of the Piccadilly line. As most tube stations were, Aldwych was used as an air raid shelter , but also housed treasures from the British Museum such as the Elgin Marbles, a collection of classical Greek marble sculptures. They even held concert parties there. The station has also been used for films and television programmes, and continues to be so even now. Some of the famous movies filmed here include 'The Battle of Britain' (1969) (rather appropriate really!) Patriot Games (1992); V for Vendetta (2006); The Good Shepherd (2006) and Atonement (2007). Its is also featured as a level in the video game Tomb Raider 3.

Aldwych Station (previously Strand)

We then walked towards Fleet Street and crossed over to St. Clement Danes Church , which is the central church of the RAF. Before going inside we stood before a statue of Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding who was the commander of RAF Fighter Command during the Battle of Britain. In the years leading up to the war, he introduced the 'Dowding System' an integrated air defence system of radar, raid plotting and radio control of aircraft which was a vital tool during the Battle of Britain. He also oversaw the introduction of modern aircraft into service such as the Hawker Hurricane and the eight gun Supermarine Spitfire. But perhaps it was his unwillingness to sacrifice aircrafts and pilots to aid allied troops during the battle of France, which turned the tide of battle in our favour. Sir Winston Churchill repeatedly requested he send precious squadrons to France. Any planes and pilots lost at this time would have had a severely detrimental effect on the RAFs ability to defend England during the Battle of Britain. Together with Air Vice-Marshal Keith Park he organised cover for the evacuation of troops from Dunkirk.

Air Chief Marshal Dowding

We then walked over to the church of St. Clement Danes. There has been a church on this site since the ninth century and the time of Alfred the Great. At that time Danes were expelled from England unless they had married an English wife. The church was rebuilt during the reign of William the Conqueror and then again by Sir Christopher Wren. During WWII the church suffered massive damage in May 1941 during the Blitz. It was restored in 1958 and reconsecrated and dedicated to the RAF.

St. Clement Dane at night

Inside the church there is a very peaceful atmosphere. Various RAF flags from different squadrons adorn the walls. To the left of the entrance are two photographs, one showing the church before the bomb and the other showing the damage inflicted. Under the pulpit is a chair donated by Sir Douglas Bader in memory of his wife Thelma, and to either side of the altar are plaques listing, on the left hand side all RAF personnel to win the Victoria Cross, and on the right all RAF personnel to win the George Cross. Included in the list of Victoria Cross winners are two well known names, Guy Penrose Gibson (of 'Dambusters' fame) and Leonard Cheshire who founded the Cheshire Homes. There are glass cases around the walls which hold large books inscribed with the names of all who have served in the RAF.

Interior of St. Clement Dane

I also found on a table the following famous nursery rhyme - although it included a number of lines which I had never heard before.

Oranges and Lemons

Oranges and Lemons say the bells of St. Clement's
Bulleyes and targets say the bells of St. Margaret's
Pokers and tongs say the bells of St. John's
Pancakes and fritters say the bells of St. Peter's
Two sticks and an apple say the bells of Whitechapel
Old Father Baldpate say the slow bells at Aldgate
Maids in white aprons say the bells of St. Catherine's
Brickbats and tiles say the bells of St. Giles
Kettles and pans say the bells of St. Anne's
You owe me five farthings say the bells of St. Martin's
When will you pay me say the bells of Old Bailey
When I get rich say the bells of Shoreditch
Pray when will that be? say the bells of Stepney
I'm sure I don't know says the great bell at Bow
Here comes a candle to light you to bed
Here comes a chopper to chop off your head
Chip-chop, chip-chop the last man is dead.

Well that's all for today. Do try and visit St. Clement Danes Church if you can - it's well worth a visit.

The next walk continues the war theme and will centre on the Blitz.

Friday 23rd May 2008 - Zeppelin Attack!

2008-05-27T15:25:00.000+01:00

Well this walk is back in Holborn where, thankfully, the weather although overcast, was quite warm. We met as usual outside Holborn Tube Station - Aly's walks are getting very popular and we always seem to have quite a large group now.

We set off down Gate Street and into Lincoln's Inn Fields, going into the central paved area of the fields. Our first proper port of call was in New Square, but Aly didn't want to been seen to disturb any of the many law firms or chambers situated there, so decided to give us a brief background to today's walk. World War I was the first war fought partly in the air. It began in 1914 and fighting on the Western Front was between Germany and Austria against England and France, much of which was fought in the trenches. Before this war balloons had been used during the U.S. Civil War in the 1860s for reconnaissance and also during the Franco-Prussian War of the 1870s, but in 1900 all this changed when the first dirigibles appeared (which could be steered via four engines, one of each side, in any direction).

It was Ferdinand Von Zeppelin, a German army officer, who began developing his ideas on airships in 1897. His first 'Zeppelin' flew on 2nd July 1900. In March 1909 the LZ-3 was accepted into army service and by the start of WWI the German army had seven military airships. A new ship designed in 1914 could reach a maximum speed of 136 kph and reach a height of 4250 metres. It carried five machine-guns and could carry 2000kg of bombs (that's 4,400 lbs!). The airships were filled with Hydrogen, which is of course highly flammable, and when during 1915-16 new biplanes with front guns and incendiary devices were introduced, the zeppelins became increasingly vulnerable to being shot down. After 1916 they were no longer cost effective and Germany turned to the new Gotha bombers. These were countered by the Sopwith Camels which were very adept at shooting down these bi-planes.

A Zeppelin

Graf von Zeppelin

Anyway, we now walked on across the Fields and through the large gateway to Lincoln's Inn and New Square, turning left towards Stone Buildings and stopping outside No. 10. Here we found a plaque which read as follows:

"The round stone in the middle of the roadway marks the spot where, on 18th December 1917 at 8 - 10pm a bomb from a German aeroplane struck the ground and exploded, shattering the windows in Stone Buildings and doing other material damage".

The round stone is no longer there, but the considerable damage to the stone of the buildings here can still be seen. It was thought that to leave the damage unrepaired would show a defiance to carry on in the face of war. Fourteen people were killed and eighty five injured in this attack, by a Gotha.

Outside No. 10 Stone Buildings

Damage to the stone of No. 10 Stone Buildings

We now walked up into Chancery Lane, across High Holborn and turning left continued on until we turned right into Red Lion Street and continued down to the Dolphin Tavern.

Originally a Victorian pub, approximately half had to be rebuilt following a Zeppelin raid on 9th September 1915. Inside on the wall is an old clock under which is a plaque which states:
"Hit by explosive bomb dropped from Zeppelin L.13 on 9th September 1915. 3 men were killed. The old clock was recovered with the hands stopped at 10.40 pm, the time the tavern was hit."
The raid dropped a series of bombs in a line from Euston to Liverpool Street and it was the same raid that also hit our next stop.

We walked on up to Theobalds Road turning left, and right down into Boswell Street and along to Queens Square.

Queen Square

Towards the far end of the gardens a plaque is set into the grass which reads:

"On the night of the 8th September 1915 a Zeppelin bomb fell and exploded on this spot. Although nearly 1,000 people slept in the surrounding buildings no person was injured."

During this raid a Leutnant Heinrich Matte was killed when his Zeppelin came down in Potters Bar. A piece of metal from the wreckage was used to make an altar piece for the Church of the Virgin and All Saints in that town.

We now left the gardens and walking through Cosmo Place came to Southampton Row. We crossed the road to the Bedford Hotel where we found another plaque. This one reads:

"24 September 1917. 13 people were killed and 22 injured near this spot on the steps of the old Bedford Hotel by a 112 lb bomb dropped by a Gotha in one of London's first night air raids. "
In this raid over London and the South East a total of 21 people were killed and a further 48 were injured.

Damage done during a Zeppelin Raid

The Germans used 115 Zeppelins and carried out approximately 150 Zeppelin raids during WW1. 77 of these were either destroyed or so damaged they could not be used again. Altogether Zeppelins caused 557 deaths, but the cost of building them was nearly five times as much as the cost of damage caused. No bombing raids using Zeppelins were carried out over London after June 1917.

The Zeppelin raids forced Britain to use Royal Flying Corps squadrons to protect London and so they were less actively involved in the war over the trenches. Holborn was one of the most densely hit areas during WW1.

This plaque is from Farringdon Road close to Holborn

Saturday 17th May 2008 - Pocahontas Promenade

2008-05-27T15:23:00.000+01:00

I have missed a couple of walks due to a nasty virus, but managed to go on this walk, in Gravesend, which was fascinating, although accompanied by constant rain. Our guide was Sandra Soder from the local Historical Society, who was a fount of knowledge!

Firstly we discovered the origins of the name 'Gravesend' - and it has nothing to do with graves! It literally means 'at the end of a grove'. In Saxon times if you stood by the edge of the river and looked inland you would see a large grove of trees descending down towards you. There is of course the Victorian and Edwardian version - they believed it meant the home of the headman who collected tithes from the local villagers and tribes. In the 1300s there was certainly a local searcher for King Henry living here, and Gravesend has long been associated with the collection of taxes.

St. Georges Church, Gravesend

Pocahontas

We set off from Towncentric the local tourist information office and our first port of call was right next door - St. George's Church - the burial place of Pocahontas. This is the parish church of Gravesend although in medieval times the parish church was originally in the Pelham Road area, together with the Manor Farm. But as people moved closer to the river, they felt they needed a church in that area, it was too far for the old and infirm and pregnant women to walk so people began leaving money in their wills to a fund to build a new church and eventually in 1480 permission was granted for a new church to be built. There were obviously a number of people who were making a very good living from the river if they could afford to leave monies in their wills for the building a new church. A Chapel of Ease was built, but when the old parish church lost it's roof, and then following repairs was badly damaged in a fire, the parish status was removed to St. Georges. In 1727 during the great fire of Gravesend, the church was destroyed along with many homes. The current church was rebuilt between 1731 -1733 by the architect Charles Sloane, a well known architect who also worked on Rochester Cathedral. There is an engraved stone tablet near the entrance which has an unfortunate spelling mistake - instead of 'Here no envy dwells' it reads 'Here no envy swells'. In 1952 the church lost it's parish status to St. James and was closed. However, one of the church wardens moved in and built a flat in the north aisle to protect the building from falling into disrepair and to save it from vandals. In 1958 the church was re-opened as the Pocohontas Memorial Chapel and Gardens and then in 1962 was fully re-opened as a church when Holy Trinity church was demolished and then St. James was also demolished and so St. George's regained it's parish status.

As we stood in front of the statue to her we now heard more about Pocahontas. She was born in 1595, in what is now Gloucester, Virginia, the daughter of a chief - her birth name was Matoaka but her father gave her the nickname of Pocahontas which means 'dancing little princess'. At that time numerous explorers, leaving from Gravesend were searching for the infamous 'North West Passage'. One of these expeditions included Captain John Smith. He was captured by indians and Chief Powhatan ordered his execution - it was as he was about to be killed that a young girl ran out and placed her heard over his telling her father he must talk and make peace with the explorers or he must kill her too. That young girl was Pocahontas. John Smith was later gravely injured and returned to England - Pocahontas believed him to be dead. As relations between the two sides worsened Pocahontas was captured and used as a pawn. Whilst in captivity the Reverend Whittaker, converted her to Christianity, and she took the name of Rebecca. She met John Rolfe, fell in love with him and married him and gave birth to a son, Thomas. Pocahontas then travelled to London with her husband and son on what was effectively a publicity tour, to encourage new colonists. She became famous, and was presented at court. She also met John Smith again, at first refusing to speak to him, because he had never tried to contact her, and she had believed him dead, She did eventually become friends with him again. Just as she and her family were preparing to travel back to America, she became ill. She was brought ashore at Gravesend where she sadly died in 1617, aged just 22. She was afforded the honour of being buried beneath the chancel in St. George's Church, something only usually given to people of rank or note. In the burial register it notes Mrs. Rebecca Rolfe, a Virginia lady born lies buried here. Her husband was persuaded to leave his son Thomas behind in England to be raised by his family in Norfolk and to return to America. His father having died in about 1722. in his late teens or early twenties Thomas travelled to America and became a defender of the fort built by the first settlers at Jamestown, and ended up fighting against his own uncle and cousins. His uncle, Powhatan's brother, had never agreed there should be peace with the settlers, and when Powhatan died, he led his people in battle against them. Thomas Rolfe married twice and there a large number of people, including such famous names as Mrs Woodrow Wilson and Lady Mountbatten who claim descent, through Thomas, from Pocahontas.

Statue of Pocahontas
Marriage of John Rolfe and Pocahontas

Inside the church there are two Pocahontas windows - one is called the Rebecca window (where she wears a red dress) the cartouche in this window is a copy of a picture in the Capitol Building in Washington D.C. of her baptism. There is a plaque noting that she is buried here. Unfortunately no one now knows the exact spot, as the church she was buried in was destroyed in the fire of 1727. The replacement church has an extended chancel and is larger than the original church. There was also a small exhibition of Pocahontas memorabilia.

The Rebecca Window
The Pocahontas Plaque (apologies for poor quality)

St. Georges also has a memorial tablet for General Gordon who has many links with Gravesend, of which more later.

The Gordon Plaque

We now left the church and walked down towards the river, passing the end of the High Street and West Street. In the 1300s, there were many alleyways linking these streets. As we look from outside the church we can see Hole in the Wall Alley. Chapel Lane led down from the Church gate to the river, and it here was that the first Post Office stood.

We walked past the New Falcon pub - on it's side window is a sign etched into the glass for the Russells Brewery, one of the local Gravesend breweries of which there were a number at one time. We went down to the ferry crossing point, where you can still catch a ferry across the river.

Russell's Gravesend Brewery sign

We then walked back down past the pub and along the road towards the pier to where the ferry originally crossed in medieval times. Essex had the side rights for their side of the river, which went to Tilbury Fort, which was originally one of the five blockhouses built on this stretch of the river. The governor of the fort built a public house for the use of his men, and travellers and you can still see the white painted pub called The Worlds End today.

Gravesend had the side rights for this side of the river, but they also had another very important ferry - the long ferry - which took passengers between Gravesend and London. All ships would stop here and it could take ten days to get into London because of the tides and the amount of traffic. However, you could get off at Gravesend and catch the long ferry which could take you into London on the same day. This was a very lucrative means of income for the ferrymen of Gravesend. The ship would lay anchor, the passengers would come ashore , eat at the inn and then catch the long ferry into London. Even Henry VIII and Cardinal Wolsey made this journey albeit in their own boats. It is said Cardinal Wolsey's retinue consisted of 30 barges to bring him to Gravesend.

For centuries the men of Gravesend made a very good living from the river but then in the 1800s the introduction of steamboats and pleasure boats slowly killed off the long ferry - why pay to be rowed to and from London when a steam boat would be much faster. The steamer owners bought out the river rights from the men of Gravesend so bringing to an end hundreds of years of profitable employment. An example of how profitable can be seen from a case dating back to the 1200s. Some ferry men were accused of overcharging passengers (one penny rather than a halfpenny) and were found guilty. They were fined the then huge sum of forty shillings which they were able to pay immediately!

The High Street (looking towards the Pier)

As we walked towards the pier we stopped to look up the High Street. At one time the boundary between Gravesend and Milton next Gravesend ran right down the centre of the High Street, continuing up along Windmill Street and into Singlewell Road. The two parishes were brought together into one Borough by Elizabeth I.

Gravesend Pier

The steps where Pocahontas was brought ashore

We now turned towards the pier. There is a small square in front of the pier entrance. On the left hand side were shops providing fruit and vegetables for the ships and an Inn called The Christopher, where no less a personage than Sebastian Cabot stayed there albeit in his 80s. On the opposite side is the Riverside Inn built in 1490, and also called the Three Daws (originally Choughs) The shops were demolished in the 1800s and a gate was installed and then it was decided that a pier should be built. As you can imagine this did not go down very well with the riverboat men who charged to bring passengers and goods to and from the shops moored in the Thames - now ships would be able to stop at the pier for passengers to disembark. In the 1830s a million visitors a year were coming to Gravesend. An Act of Parliament was required to get permission to build a pier and although this was initially refused a temporary pier was built. The local watermen attacked the pier in 1832 and soldiers were called over from Tilbury Fort to read the Riot Act. To keep the pier in good order a charge was made for those landing and boarding. The charge was 4d per head, a proportion of which was paid into a fund to compensate the watermen for loss of earnings.

The Three Daws

Permission was finally given for a proper pier and this opened in 1834. It is now the oldest cast iron pier in the world. A day of festivities was organised to celebrate the opening led by Lord Darnley, with a huge banquet for 300 people and a fireworks display.

In 1835 another temporary pier. also originally of case iron, was built by some entrepreneurs and former councillors from Gravesend. They had bought up the land cheaply from the War Department, and as it was outside the area included in the Act of Parliament the corporation were unable to charge passengers and ships. The legally rivalry that ensued actually bankrupted the corporation. The mayor was actually chased by men with writs, hiding in the Old Falcon pub, and the mayoral finery and the Town Hall were taken and had to be leased back for civic events. The problems were not properly sorted out until 1875. The pier and the ferry were bought by the local railway company and became a railway station, with the ferry now running from the pier.

We now walked along to St. Andrew's Arts Centre which was originally the St. Andrew's Mission Church. Many people emigrating to Australia and New Zealand would often have to wait up to three weeks while a full complement of passengers were aboard. The Reverend Robinson decided to open a Seaman's Mission to prevent the sailors, whilst waiting to ship out, from spending all their money on drink and other pursuits. It was also helpful to the waiting passengers and many were baptised on board ship before leaving on their voyages. Revd Robinson later took over the Spread Eagle pub and General Gordon taught classes there. The widow of Rear Admiral Beaufort (the Beaufort Wind Scale) agreed to fund the building of the St Andrews Church if the town would fund the foundations. The roof resembles an upturned boat.
We were unable to go in as a meeting of the local embroiderers guild was being held, but hopefully I will get a chance to look inside at another time.

Gravesend played an important role in the defence of London at the time of Henry VIII. We now walked along to one of the blockhouses that was built as part of the defences. There were five altogether, two in Gravesend, one at Tilbury Fort, one at Higham and one at East Tilbury.
Here outside the old Royal Clarendon Hotel, now empty but currently the subject of possible redevelopment and restoration to a top class hotel, we can see studs in the road which outline the actual extent of the blockhouse, underground. The entrance is still visible and troops and guns would be stationed there to protect the approach to London.

An information plaque regarding Gravesend's blockhouses

The Royal Clarendon Hotel was originally built as a banqueting house which was then sold off to a gentleman from Rochester who turned it into a pub and hotel. It was enlarged and even had a ballroom at one time and was a popular venue many years ago, but in recent years had become run down. It closed a few years ago and now waits to be brought back to life.

We now moved on to the Royal Terrace Pier, which is a working pier run by the Port of London Authority who also have a large office building here. It was just across from here that the Terrace Gardens once stood. These pleasure gardens were very popular and a road was built especially for Queen Victoria's carriage to drive through them. You could walk up through the gardens and continue up to the attractions of Windmill Hill, where you could find fairs, silhouette makers, fortune tellers and other pleasures. Now all that remains of the gardens are two small pieces of a stone bridge.

The Royal Terrace Pier

This small portion of bridge is all that remains of Terrace Gardens

If you look towards the Customs House you can see an octagonal building which once housed lookouts - it is the only place you can now see this building from other than the river.
We then walked along The Terrace and came past Cox House which was built for the Customs and Excise officers. The Excise officers then moved across the road and built what is now the Customs House in 1817 - and were later joined the by the Customs officers. The house is listed and boasts a wonderful Adams staircase. Unfortunately it is not open to visitors.

The octagonal lookout post

We now reach our final destination, the oldest building in Gravesend, Milton Chantry. The Chantry (a place where prayers are said for the souls of the departed) was founded by Aylmer de Valence, the Earl of Pembroke. He employed the services of two chaplains to say prayers on behalf of himself and his family as they believed they could avoid ending up in purgatory. It was built on the site of an even earlier hospital (not the modern kind of hospital but a place for travellers to stay). On entering the door immediately to your right is a fine Jacobean staircase . As you continue into the reception area you enter what was the priest's house and this room dates from the 16th century. Passing through a small door way you enter into the old chantry where you can see the original chalk block foundations laid in 1320.

Milton Chantry (The New Tavern)

There are a number of rooms housing exhibits devoted to different aspects of Gravesend - the River Room houses items from the town's seafaring past, and charts the importance of the river in the development of the town over the last eight centuries. There is an Industrial Heritage Room based around chalk and paper, two important industries for the area.

The Civic Room references the two most famous residents, Pocahontas and General Charles Gordon. General Gordon was stationed here for six years, between 1865 and 1871 and left his mark on the town during his time here. He was a soldier of outstanding ability and it was his job to upgrade the fortifications of the New Tavern Fort. The military works and magazines will hopefully be opened to the public again in the near future. Gordon lived at Fort House, in Fort Gardens, but the house was badly damaged by a bomb in 1944 and had to be demolished. Even after he left the town he continued to pay pensions to people in the town from his own pocket.

A plaque in the Civil Room dedicated to General Gordon

The Roman Room is devoted to the excavations at Springhead (Vagniacae) which were carried out between 1950 to the mid 1980s. A huge number of coins and pottery were discovered over the years together with other small objects and some of these are exhibited here. A number of pagan temples and other buildings and shrines were discovered at this Roman posting station, which is recorded in the Antonine Itinerary as being nine miles from Rochester.

One of the exhibits in the Roman Room

There is also a 'Then and Now' Gallery with photographs of various areas in the town and surrounding area show how much has changed.

The building continued as a Chantry until the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII. The grounds of the Chantry were in Essex on the other side of the river and there was a causeway on the river, where boats could land with the crops. After dissolution the building was allowed to fall into disrepair and then in 1524 was let to a farmer, William Wilde of Milton. In 1697 it became an alehouse later renamed as the New Tavern. Bowls was played on the green. In 1778-1780 the War Department built earthworks and a fort here against a possible invasion by the French and the Chantry was encased in bricks becoming barracks. During building works in 1800 a number of bodies were uncovered which assumed to be monks. Soldiers were stationed here in the New Tavern Barracks for many years. In 1932 the area was opened as pubic gardens. The Chantry is open to the public and entrance is free - it is well worth a visit.

New Tavern Fort

Well I hope you found it interesting - there was a great deal to take in on the walk and I thoroughly enjoyed learning so much about the town of Gravesend.

Friday 2nd May 2008 - The Great Plague

2008-05-07T12:51:00.000+01:00

This is basically the same walk that I took last year, so I have just updated it and included some photos and illustrations.

London in the 1660s was a very different place - Large numbers lived in the City area, this was surrounded by 'The Liberties' and then there were poorer areas surrounding them. The parish of St. Giles where the plague broke out was a very poor area. London was still a medieval city - cramped, crowded and smelly. The plague was always around and tended to break out once every 15 years or so on a large scale. But the plague which hit London in 1665 was a much deadlier strain. It was believed the origins of this plague began in 1663 in the eastern Mediterranean and spread to Holland where there were 20,000 deaths, before coming to England in 1664. Flemish weavers who lived in Drury Lane were blamed as they unpacked 'contaminated goods' from Holland.

From a contemporary print in the Pepysian Collection

The great plague of 1665 started in a house on Drury Lane close to the junction with Long Acre, in late November/early December 1664 when two Frenchman died. Soon more deaths happened, and an Apothecary, Dr. William Boghurst, operated from a public house The White Hart (still on the same site) looking after as many people as he could. He actually wrote a treatise on the plague in 1666 which was the first ever observation, medically speaking, on the plague. He said "I commonly dressed 40 sores a day". The symptoms were a high fever, painful swelling of the lymph nodes, particularly in the armpits and the groin, blotches up to an inch across (hence the nursery rhyme 'Ring a Ring a Roses') and lastly caused damage to the nervous system, causing delirium. The screams from victims would strike terror into people nearby. Death usually followed 4 to 7 days after the appearance of the symptoms. Victims of the illness were boarded up in their homes, and tough luck on anyone not yet infected in the building - they were boarded up too! A large red cross was painted on the door. In Italy and France they built Plague Hospitals outside the cities, but here the victims were contained within the city which exacerbated the problem.

Daniel Defoe wrote a Journal of the Plague Year published in 1722. Defoe would only have been about 5 years old when the plague occurred so although it is written from a personal perspective which he couldn't actually have had at such a tender age, he did use proper historical resources and references. The following are some quotes from the journal.

"...the latter end of November or the beginning of December 1664 when two men, said to be Frenchmen, died of the plague in Long Acre, or rather at the upper end of Drury Lane"

And then people got even more alarmed:

"because in the last week of December 1664 another man died in the same house and of the same distemper. And then we were easy again for about 6 weeks, when none having died with any marks of infection, it was said the distemper was gone; but after that, I think it was about the 12th of February, another died in another house, but in the same parish and in the same manner."

In April/May 1665 the plague spread from the outer areas to the City itself: In Defoe's words: "to the great affliction of the city, one died within the walls. It was found that this Frenchman who died in Bearbinder Lane was one who, having lived in Long Acre, near the infected houses had removed for fear of the distemper, not knowing that he was already infected."

In the late summer of 1665 the plague was reaching it's peak. Defoe wrote:

"I went up to Holborn and there the street was full of people; but they walked in the middle of the great street, neither on one side or other, because, as I suppose, they would not mingle with anybody that came out of the houses, or meet with smells and scents from houses, that might be infected."

Daniel Defoe

And from Samuel Pepys diary 7th June 1665:

"This day, much against my will, I did in Drury Lane see two or three houses marked with a red cross upon the doors, and 'Lord have mercy upon us' writ there; which was a sad sight to me, being the first of the kind that, to my remembrance, I ever saw. It put me into an ill conception of myself and my smell, so that I was forced to buy some roll-tobacco to smell and to chaw, which took away the apprehension".

Samuel Pepys

The plague is spread by black rats (Rattus Rattus) - their fleas carry the virus from the rats to humans but people had no idea of the connection until the 1890s. At the time the government believed that cats and dogs were to blame, so set about killing 200,000 cats and 40,000 dogs. As cats and dogs are the natural predators of rats this was not the wisest move and consequently the plague spread to the centre of the city. At it's peak in September 1665, 26,000 died in that one month, and yet by October there was only 1000 deaths. The official response to the plague from the Church was that it was 'God's punishment' The wealthy left London as quickly as possible and the court moved to Oxford. All play, exhibitions and games were banned. Perhaps the winners here were the poor bears, freed from bear baiting.

Killing dogs to halt the plague

We walked to Newton Street next. It was here in a house on this site that an experiment was attempted to try and stop the spread of the plague. The government asked James Angier, an expert in infectious disorders to try fumigating the building. He used a mixture of saltpetre, brimstone and amber. Four people in the house had already died and two more were infected. Following the fumigation, no further infections occurred, but whether the fumigation was successful or because it just drove the rats away no one knows. No further experiments took place.

We then moved on to Bloomsbury Square - the site of a plague pit. When the cemeteries quickly became overcrowded the government decided mass graves were the only answer so large 'plague pits' were dug and one was sited here in Bloomsbury Square. It was discovered when, digging out the car park underneath the square, the workmen came across a large number of bodies!

Bloomsbury Square

It has long been taught that the Great Fire of London stopped the plague in it's tracks - this is wrong - the fire didn't happen until 1666 and in a totally different part of the City. There is no certainty about what exactly did bring the plague to a halt but as it was brought to this country via the sea, from Holland and France, tighter controls and quarantines at the Ports are believed to have made the difference.

At the time of the plague London had a population of 500,000 - a massive increase from 1600 when it had been only 140,000. About 20% of the population died, and another 10% left the City. In fact about 15% of plague victims actually survived. Within a 3 to 4 years London had recovered and was once again a thriving city.

A Bill of Mortality for the year 1665

A point to bear in mind - even today there are about 1000 cases of bubonic plague every year! Thankfully the last outbreak of any kind in Britain was in the early 20th century, in Liverpool.

Wednesday 30th April 2008 - Media Culture & Sport

2008-05-01T16:43:00.000+01:00

It was a cold, wet and windy day for our walk around Holborn’ sites related to Culture Media & Sport. We met as usual outside Holborn Tube Station, with our guide Aly. We set off and turned into High Holborn and walked a short distance through the bustling crowds with umbrellas to stop outside Clintons Cards and Blackwells Bookstore. It was here on this site that a series of Music Halls and theatres stood. It began with an old tavern called the ‘Six Cans and Punch Bowl’, where from the early 1800s sing-songs and harmonic meetings were held in the parlour. In 1835 a new licensee took over. His name was Henry Weston. In the late 1840’s he acquired the Holborn National Schools which stood next door and transformed it into a large and elegant Music Hall which opened in 1857 and which he called ‘Weston’s Music Hall’. In 1868 it was renamed the Royal Music Hall. Later incarnations included the Royal Holborn Empire and the Royal Holborn Theatre of Varieties.

Weston's Music Hall
(picture courtesy Musicals101.com)

In 1906 the auditorium was further developed at a cost of £30,000 by Frank Matcham. By 1921 it had become known as The Holborn Empire and this last surviving variety hall in the West End of London was finally closed by bombing in 1941 although it was not until 1961 that it was finally demolished. If you look up above Pret Sandwich shop, although not identical the building style is very similar to that of the Holborn Empire.

We then crossed High Holborn to visit Templar House. It was on this site that the Royal Amphitheatre and Circus stood. Part circus part arena, in 1867 the very first boxing bout under the Marquis of Queensbury Rules was fought. Some of the new regulations included regulating the size of gloves, wrestling and hugging were banned, the 10 second rule giving a boxer 10 seconds to recover after going down was introduced and shorter three minute rounds were adopted.

The Royal Amphitheatre

We then struggled through the crowds and road-works to cross back over High Holborn and eventually came to the Princess Louise pub. It has had a ballad and blues club run by James Miller who is also known as Ewen McCall who is famous for his song ’Dirty Old Town’ about his home town of Salford. The pub was also the haunt of a number of the musicians who were recording at De Lane Lea Studios in Kingsway. Pete Townsend of The Who, who were recoding their album ’Sellout’ at the Studios in 1967, sketched out spoof ads for the album in the pub. He was in fact sued when he used a jingle from Radio London without permission.

The Princess Louise Public House

We then walked back towards Kingsway and stopped outside Boots, which as I mentioned in our Hendrix walk was the site of the De Lane Lea Studios. A number of well known groups recorded there, apart from Hendrix, including The Who, The Beatles and the Rolling Stones. The Beatles only appear to have recorded one track there - ’Its all too much’, but George Harrison recorded there on his own, including his first solo album Wonderwall Music. The Rolling Stones recorded a number of songs there in 1963 which included ‘Stoned’, ‘You Better Move On’ , ‘Bye Bye Johnny‘, ‘Money’ and ‘Poison Ivy’.

We then moved just a few metres further along to stand outside the building now housing The Foods Standard Authority. The cross at the top is a major clue to it’s original function however - it was of course a church. Originally the Little Queen Street Chapel, it was built in 1831, but during the building of the Piccadilly Line, the foundations were undermined and the Chapel was demolished in 1910. The church was rebuilt as Holy Trinity Church but this was badly damaged by fire in 1985 and was closed. In 1999 the building was renovated and turned into offices.

An old map of Holborn showing Little Queen Street leading north from Great Queen Street

Holy Trinity Church now Aviation House

Before the first church was built, this was the site of No. 7 Little Queen Street, which was the house where writer Mary Lamb stabbed her mother to death while suffering a breakdown. She was judged insane and eventually lived in the care of her brother Charles Lamb. Together they wrote a popular children’s book ‘Tales from Shakespeare’ and later collaborated on other books for children. On her own she wrote ‘Mrs. Leicester’s School’ which Samuel Coleridge believed should be “acknowledged as a rich jewel in the treasury of our permanent English literature.” Although critically acclaimed at the time, it has not outlived it’s era, however Tales from Shakespeare still remains in print.

Mary & Charles Lamb

We now walked down Kingsway then turned right into Great Queen Street to see The Connaught Rooms. Originally the Freemasons’ Tavern stood on this site, and it was here on 26th October 1863 that at a meeting between eleven representatives of football clubs The Football Association was formed. Prior to this meeting there were no universally accepted rules for the game, although the Cambridge Rules devised by members of Cambridge University in 1848 had been in use for some time and they were used as a basis for the new rules devised by the Football Association. The Sheffield Rules used by a number of clubs in the north were also incorporated into the new rules. The only original club of the eleven to remain in existence is Crystal Palace. The other clubs are now defunct or have become rugby clubs.

The Connaught Rooms

We now headed back to Kingsway and continued down towards Aldwych and then turned briefly into Wild Court. Now it is just a small back street it was once a much wider and more important street, but when Kingsway was built in 1905 Wild Court became cut off and lost a lot of it’s importance. One of it’s more famous residents was Susannah Mary Arne, also known as Susanna Maria Cibber (1714 - 1766) a famous English singer and actress and a sister of the composer Thomas Arne. She was a great favourite of George Frederick Handel, and he wrote parts for her in ‘Messiah‘ and ‘Samson‘. He patiently taught her parts note by note as she could not read music.

Susanna Cibber

She married Theophilus Cibber in 1734, who was reportedly abusive and profligate, he encouraged his wife to spend time with other men in the hope that they would shower her with presents of money and jewels from which he could benefit himself. However this plan misfired when Susanna became embroiled with one man, a William Sloper. A huge scandal ensued when Cibber accused them of adultery. Cibber was awarded £10 in damages. A year later he brought a second case accusing Sloper of “detaining”his wife. In fact Sloper and Susanna had run off together and had a child. This time Cibber was awarded £500. Susanna was forced to leave the country and went to Ireland, but in 1841 she joined the premiere performance of Handel’s Messiah. The scandal eventually died down and Susanna Cibber returned to London to follow a successful career as an actress at Drury Lane, which was managed by her father-in-law and she acted with David Garrick. She is one of the few actresses buried in Westminster Abbey.

We now crossed Kingsway and walked down Sardinia Street and into Lincoln’s Inn Fields towards the site of one of the first London theatres, The Duke’s Playhouse. Originally Lisle’s Tennis Court, a real tennis court built in 1656, it was used as a playhouse during 1661-1674 and then 1695-1705. Real Tennis courts were long high-ceilinged buildings with galleries for spectators and the dimensions (approx 75 feet by 30 feet) were similar to earlier theatres - far larger than modern tennis courts. The building was then demolished and a new purpose-built theatre opened and operated between 1714 and 1728. It was the first public playhouse to feature moveable scenery which would become a standard feature of Restoration theatre.

William Davenant

The theatre opened on 28th June 1861 by William Davenant and the first production was Davenant’s own opera “The Siege of Rhodes”. It was such a sensation that it brought Charles II to a public theatre for the first time. Davenant died in 1668 and the Duke’s Company, now managed by Thomas Betterton performed out of Lincoln’s Inn Fields until 1671, when they moved to the Dorset Garden Theatre. Following the fire of the theatre in Bridges Street, the King’s Company relocated to the theatre in Lincoln’s Inn Fields until their new Theatre Royal opened in 1674. It was converted back into a Real tennis court until having split from his partner Christopher Rich, Thomas Betterton refurbished the theatre in Lincoln’s Inn and performed there from 1695 until love for 1705. The New Theatre opened in April 1695 with William Congreave’s ‘Love for Love’ and was later the venue for his plays ‘The Mourning Bride’ and ‘The Way of the World’.

The building then went unused as a theatre between 1705 and it’s demolition in 1714. The man behind the construction of the new theatre was none other than Christopher Rich, but he died in 1714 and his son John Rich led a company in the theatre until 1728. On 29th January 1728 the theatre hosted the very first performance of John Gay’s ‘The Beggars Opera’ (making “Rich gay and Gay rich”). The theatre was finally abandoned in December 1732 when the company moved to the new Covent Garden Theatre.

John Rich

The old building was used as a barracks, an auction room, a warehouse for china and then was finally demolished in 1848 to make way for an extension to the Royal College of Surgeons.

The Royal College of Surgeons

Until next time...

Friday 25th April 2008 - Thespians

2008-04-28T00:24:00.000+01:00

Today’s walk 'Thespians' was about distinguished actors of the past associated with the Holborn area. We started as usual from Holborn Tube Station with our guide Aly, and crossing Kingsway we stopped briefly to hear about an excerpt from ‘The Players Scourge’ written in 1757 by William Law who described actors as follows:- “Play actors are the most profligate wretches, and the vilest vermin hell ever vomited out…they are filth and garbage of the earth, the scum and stain of human nature, the excrements and refuse of all mankind, the pests and plagues of human society, the debauchees of men’s minds and morals.” Obviously he wasn’t too fond of actors! In fact until the mid 18th century actors were considered no more worthy than vagabonds, and until the Licensing Act of 1837 all players, unless contracted in a company, could be subject to charges of vagrancy. A Mr. Hooper was one actor who fell victim when he was arrested in 1735.

The man credited with changing the way actors were perceived was David Garrick, (1717 - 1779) who transformed actors into the celebrities of the mid 18th century. Garrick was not only an excellent Shakespearian actor but also a playwright, producer and manager of the Drury Lane Theatre. He was also a pupil and friend of Dr. Samuel Johnson. He took over the patent to the theatre, in partnership with James Lacy, in April 1747 and they made a failing theatre a huge success. He retired from theatre management in 1776 and when he died three years later, was given a lavish funeral and he was interred in Poets Corner in Westminster Abbey. His legacy was perhaps best surmised by the Rev. Nicholas Tindal, the historian, when he said that “The ‘deaf’ hear him in his ‘action’ and the ‘blind’ see him in his ‘voice’". A monument to Garrick in Lichfield Cathedral bears Johnson’s famous comment: “I am disappointed by that stroke of death that has eclipsed the gaiety of nations, and impoverished that public stock of harmless pleasure.” Both Garrick Street and the Garrick Club are named after him.

David Garrick

We then walked down Kingsway and turned right into Kemble Street. This is named for Charles Kemble (1775 - 1854), the youngest son of Roger Kemble. A younger brother of John Philip Kemble, Stephen Kemble and the great Sarah Siddons, he was born in Brecon, South Wales. His first job was in a Post Office but he quickly resigned to become an actor. He lived close by in Great Russell Street. He was originally rather in the shadow of his more famous brother and sister, but gradually achieved independent fame. In comedy he was ably supported by his wife Marie Therese De Camp, whom he married in July 1806. He had a very successful tour of America with his daughter Fanny during 1832 and 1834. His later career was beset by financial difficulties caused by his joint proprietorship of the Covent Garden Theatre. Macready summed him up as “a first rate actor of second rate parts”.

Charles Kemble as Romeo
picture courtesy www.britannica.com

We then walked along Kemble Street and turned left into Kean Street, named for Edmund Kean (1789 - 1833) who was regarded in his time as the greatest ever actor. He was born in London the son of an actress Anne Carey, daughter of the 18th century composer and playwright Henry Carey and probably Edmund Kean, an architect’s clerk. His background has been less flatteringly described as “bastard son of Anne Carey, itinerant actress and Street hawker and Edmund Kean a mentally unbalanced youth" who committed suicide at the age of 22.

He made his first appearance on stage aged four in Nouverre’s ballet Cymon, playing Cupid. As a child his vivacity, cleverness and affection made his universally popular. A few benevolent people paid for him to attend school where he did well, but feeling restricted left to go to sea as a cabin boy. Life at sea however, was not to his taste. His acting abilities were already so skilful that he was able to fool the doctors in Madeira that he was both lame and deaf, and was so allowed to return to England. He sought the protection of his uncle Moses Kean, an entertainer who introduced him to the study of Shakespeare. He also received lessons in the principles of acting from Miss Charlotte Tidswell, an actress. He quickly showed his genius in his interpretations of Shakespearean characters which were entirely different from John Philip Kemble, then considered the greatest exponent of these roles.

Edmund Kean

At the age of 14 he obtained an engagement for 20 plays at York Theatre, and shortly afterwards came to the notice of King George III who commanded him to appear at Windsor Castle. He then joined a circus but fell from a horse and broke both legs which left him with swellings in his insteps for the rest of his life.

In 1814 he was given a chance by the Drury Lane Theatre as part of their effort to regain popularity. His performance as Shylock in The Merchant of Venice brought him great fame, and he moved to Piccadilly. He earned an astonishing £12000 per year, which was a huge sum at that time, but his profligate lifestyle damaged his reputation. In 1825 he was named in the case of Cox -v- Kean, for adultery with Charlotte Cox. His wife divorced him and the case aroused such bitter feelings, that he was booed and pelted with fruit on stage. He became dependent on drugs which led to a decline in his powers, and whilst playing Othello to the Iago of his son Charles Kean, he collapsed on stage on 25th March 1833 and fell into his son’s arms. He died two months later in Richmond.

We now crossed Drury Lane and walked into Tavistock Street, then up Gresham Street to the Theatre Royal Drury Lane. This is considered the oldest operating theatre in the world. The original theatre opened in 1663 in Bridges Street, now Catherine Street with seating for 700 people. All theatre had been banned during the Cromwellian period, but once Charles II was restored to the throne, he granted patents for legitimate theatre (meaning spoken plays as opposed to opera, dance, concerts or plays with music). One was for the Kings’ Company based at The Theatre Royal and the other was for the Duke’s Company who were based at the theatre in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. Thomas Killigrew built the first theatre and among his actors were Nell Gwynn, who became the mistress of the king and Charles Hart. Restoration Comedy was very popular with the public.

Theatre Royal Drury Lane

In 1672 the theatre was destroyed by fire, when footmen annoyed at the increase in prices set fire to the building. It was rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren in 1674 to seat 2000 people and it became the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane. It was here on 28th September 1745 that God Save the King was performed publicly for the first time, when Bonnie Prince Charlie was landing in Scotland and the country wished to support the English monarchy.

David Garrick became manager in 1747 and remained there until 1766. He introduced a ban of the then custom of spectators sitting on the stage during performances. If they chose to move during the performance chaos would often ensue. If you get the chance to look at the painting by William Hogarth “The Beggars Opera” you can see the audience sitting on the stage.

The interior of the The Theatre Royal in 1808

When Richard Brinsley Sheridan became manager the building was demolished to make way for an even larger theatre which opened in 1794, but this building only survived for 15 years before being destroyed yet again by fire in 1809. The building that stands here today was opened in 1812. It was designed by Benjamin Wyatt to seat 3060. The blue columns along the side of the building were added in 1831. The last major renovation took place in 1922 reducing the capacity to between 2200 and 2300 in four tiers. The theatre closed during World War II, suffering some slight damage and became the Headquarters of the Entertainments National Service Association. The theatre reopened in 1946.

The Theatre Royal Drury Lane is also believed to be one of the most haunted theatres in the world. The appearance of any of the ghosts is said to bring good luck for an actor or production. The 'Man in Grey’ is perhaps the most famous. He appears dressed as an 18th century nobleman with a powered wig beneath his tricorn hat, a dress jacket and cloak, riding boots and a sword. He is believed to be the ghost of the body found in a wall, discovered in 1848 with the knife that stabbed him still sticking in his ribs.

Another ghost is Joe Grimaldi, a comedian, who is a helpful apparition guiding nervous actors about the stage.

Then there is Charles Macklin, but more of him later.

We now walked back to Drury Lane and then turned into Betterton Street. Named for Thomas Betterton (1635 - 1710) he lived in nearby Russell Street. He was Samuel Pepys favourite actor and was considered by many to be the best actor of the entire Restoration period. He was the son of an under-cook to Charles II born in London. He was apprenticed to John Holden, a publisher and then possibly later to a bookseller called John Rhodes who had been wardrobe keeper at the Blackfriars Theatre. In 1659 Rhodes obtained a licence to set up a company of players at The Cockpit Theatre in Drury Lane and it was here that Betterton made his debut on stage. His abilities quickly brought him to prominence and he became a favourite with Charles II. He became a member of and later manager of The Dukes’ Company and then in 1695 set up a cooperative company in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. He retired with ill health but gave a benefit performance which raised £500. His last appearance on stage was in 1710 and he died shortly afterwards and is buried in the Cloisters of Westminster Abbey.

Thomas Betterton

We walked past The Fortune Theatre which stands today on the site of the Cockpit Theatre. It operated from 1616 to around 1665 when it could no longer stand the competition from the Theatre Royal Drury Lane. The Cockpit began life literally as a Cock pit or a place where cock fights were held. It was the first theatre in Drury Lane, but having suffered fire damage following riots was rebuilt and rechristened The Phoenix, although the old name still stuck. It closed under the Commonwealth and was used as a school but plays continued illegally. In 1660 with the restoration it could become a theatre once more, but it was shut out of ‘legitimate drama’ by the monopoly of the Kings and Dukes companies and could not compete. There is no record of a play being staged after 1665 and it is not known of what eventually happened to the building.

A plan of The Cockpit Theatre
(Picture: www.st-andrews.ac.uk)

We now walked on to Macklin Street, our final stop. This is named after Charles Macklin (1690 - 1797) an actor and dramatist born in County Donegal, Ireland. He was one of the most distinguished actors of his day, equally at home in comedy or tragedy. He was best known for his portrayal of Shylock in the Merchant of Venice, and introduced a more natural style of acting, He lived in nearby Bow Street. Two of the best known of his plays are The Man of the World (1781) and Love a la Mode (1759). He was a tempestuous character often involved in lawsuits, sometimes acting as his own lawyer as he did most successfully in his murder trial. He was charged with murdering Thomas Hallam in the Theatre Royal Drury Lane, after an argument over a wig. He is said to have shouted at Hallam “Goddamn you for a blackguard, scrub, rascal!” and thrust a cane into Hallam’s left eye, piercing it. Hallam died the next day. He was so skilful in his own defence that he was acquitted and given a fine. It is said he now haunts the spot in the theatre where Hallam died.

Charles Macklin

His exact age when he died is a slight mystery. His wife gave his year of birth as 1690, which would make him 107, however both 1699 and 1710 have been given as alternate dates. Macklin is still remembered today in his native Ireland, with the Charles Macklin Autumn School which is held each October in the village of Culdaff.

Well that’s all for this week. Hope you found it as interesting to read as I did to write!

Wednesday 23rd April 2008 - Hendrix's Holborn

2008-04-25T08:19:00.000+01:00

Today's walk was about the Holborn connections of Jimi Hendrix. Jimi was born on 27th November 1942 in Seattle, Washington and died on 18th September 1970 just before his 28th birthday. He is recognized as one of the most influential guitarists in rock music. Click HERE for a website dedicated to Jimi.

We set off as usual from Holborn Tube Station and crossed Kingsway to stand outside Boots - it was here on this site in a small recording studio belonging to De Lane Lea Music Ltd., beneath a bank, on 23rd October 1966 that Jimi Hendrix attended his first recording session.
He had arrived in London on 24th September 1966, having been talent spotted by Chas Chandler formerly of The Animals, and it was he who brought Jimi to London and together they formed the Jimi Hendrix Experience over the next few weeks, with Noel Redding (Bass Guitar) and Mitch Mitchell (Drums). It was here that they recorded Hey Joe and Purple Haze among other great tracks. It wasn't without problems however, as the noise from the music disrupted the bank's computers! In the CD reissue of Stone Free, is a copy of an invoice issued by De Lane Lea Music Ltd. to Chas Chandler which reads as follows:-

To: Recording Session with Jimmy (misspelt) Hendrix per Chas Chandler 21st December 1966:-
4 track recording 3hours at £18.0.0 per hour £54.0.0
600 feet Ampex tape (1/4") £ 1.0.0
1 x 7" Plastic Reel (five shillings and sixpence) 5/6
1 x 5" Plastic Reel (four shillings and sixpence) 4/6
Total: (Fifty five pounds and ten shillings) £55.10.0

We then walked down Kingsway to stand outside No1. Kingsway, formerly the home of Rediffusion Television. It was here that Ready Steady Go was recorded on Friday nights. Before 1965 groups would mime to their songs but from 1965 they performed 'live'.

No. 1 Kingsway

On 13th December 1966 in Studio 9, the Jimi Hendrix Experience appeared on Ready Steady Go, their TV debut, as part of the recording deal they had signed. Also appearing that night were The Troggs, the Mersey Beats and a very young Marc Bolan singing Hippy Gumbo. The show was broadcast across the UK on 16th December 1966 in black and white. Whilst the band were the talk of London they were not really known outside of the capital. This all changed when this programme aired. Unfortunately no recording survives.

We now turned up Drury Lane and eventually came to 135-149 Shaftesbury Avenue. Now the Odeon Cinema, this was once the Saville Theatre, built in 1931, it opened on 8th October that year with a play called 'For the Love of Mike' a play with music by H. F. Maltby. The front of the theatre has a wonderful sculptured frieze by Gilbert Bayes running along for almost 40 metres.

The Saville Theatre (now the Odeon)

It was here in the 1960s that Brian Epstein, manager of the Beatles, hired out the theatre for groups to play there. On 29th January 1967, the Jimi Hendrix Experience played there for the first time. They were not top of the bill, that spot was taken by The Who, but it was their most prestigious London gig to date and they had some famous faces in the audience. John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison were all present and went backstage both before and after the show. They played Hey Joe and a cover of the Troggs song 'Wild Thing' among others. They made a further appearance before the end of the month.

On 7th May 1967 they played another concert at The Saville but this time they were top of the bill. There is a story that a young David Bowie, who was in the audience, wrote a letter complaining about Jimi's appearance to the Record Mirror.

Their next appearance was on 4th June 1967, a concert that made the Jimi Hendrix Experience into a phenomenon. Again they topped the bill. The concert opened with Procul Harum who played their famous song 'A Whiter Shade of Pale'. The Chiffons and Denny Lane were also on the bill. Paul McCartney had been telling everyone that the Jimi and the band would make a great headline act for the Monterey Music Festival and it was this concert that was to guarantee them that booking.

Three days before this concert Jimi got a copy of The Beatles new album, released that day 1st June 1967 - it was Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Just thirty minutes before they were due to go on Jimi told Noel and Mitch that they were going to open with the first track. Noel thought he had 'gone daft'. They had had no rehearsal and even worse John, Paul and George were in the audience. However, Jimi emerged on stage in an orange velvet suit and they played a one hour set - including Sgt. Pepper and closed the show by smashing his guitar. It was a triumph. Paul McCartney said "the show was simply incredible, perhaps the best I have ever seen him play." And he added later that the cover version "was one of the greatest honours of my career".

It was at a further concert at the Saville on 27th August 1967 that Chas Chandler was told that the whole band were taking LSD. This was also the day that Brian Epstein was found dead in his flat. A second concert due that night was cancelled as a mark of respect.

Two further concerts at The Saville took place in October 1967, one of which ended with Jimi tussling with a reluctant Noel Redding, before he smashed his guitar and amps.

Jimmy went on to perform at the iconic Woodstock Festival in 1969 before his death in September 1970 at the age of 27.

Friday 18th April 2008 - Covent Garden

2008-04-23T08:30:00.000+01:00

It was a cold and windy day for our walk to Covent Garden. We set off from Holborn Tube Station as usual with our guide Aly. After crossing Kingsway we walked down towards Aldwych and then turned right into Great Queen Street. We stopped briefly at the corner of Drury Lane and Longacre for a brief history of the area.

Covent Garden was first settled in the 600s when the Saxons established a trading port to the west of the city, along Fleet Street and the Strand and up Aldwych (whose name may even mean ‘old port’) and across the area we now know as Covent Garden. The settlement, called Lundenwic, was abandoned when the Vikings came, and the land reverted to agriculture. In medieval times the monks from nearby Westminster Abbey used the area as their Convent Garden, a name which stuck and eventually was shortened to Covent Garden. With the dissolution of the monasteries by King Henry VIII the land was granted to John Russell, 1^st Earl of Bedford. The Earl lived on the north side of the Strand, an area that boasted numerous mansions built by noblemen and bishops.

In 1586 the 3^rd Earl decided to move and built Bedford House, on what was to become Southampton Street. In 1613 the former Convent Garden had a wall built around it and then in the 1630s the 4^th Earl of Bedford realised that 17^th century fashionable society was moving to the west end, and decided to do some speculative building. He asked the architect Inigo Jones to design him a residential square, based on the Italian piazzas. Jones has studied in Italy and was delighted to have the opportunity to build houses “fitt for the habitations of Gentlemen and men of ability”. It was in effect an experiment in town planning - creating the first public square. The project was supported by Charles II, and the designs Jones created would have a tremendous effect on later buildings in London.

Inigo Jones

We continued into Longacre which at one time had been the hub of the carriage building trade, and later car dealers. Even today you can still see signs saying ’Carriage Manufactory’ at the top of the building now housing Gap and across the road on the corner of another building Connaughts Coachworks.

'Carriage Maufactory' atop the Gap Store

Connaught Coachworks

We now turned into Rose Street, and came to The Lamb and Flag pub, This pub has been there since the 1600s but was originally called The Bucket of Blood (it was here that bare knuckled boxing took place and no doubt saw copious amounts of blood spilt!) There is also a small plaque which refers to an attack on John Dryden in 1679.

The Lamb and Flag

We then walked down to King Street and along to Inigo Place. Here we could see St. Paul’s Church, which was built as part of the new development, and is in fact older than St. Paul’s Cathedral. It was built between 1631 and 1633, the first Anglican church in London since the Reformation, and is now known as The Actors Church and has a number of memorials to actors from stage, screen and television . Its is a very interesting church and well worth a visit. Jones called it “the handsomest barn in England”.

St. Paul's Church from Inigo Place

Jones originally designed the church with the entry facing the Piazza but the Bishop of London objected, wanting the altar at the east end, so a new entrance was designed and built, and the church is entered from the rear. Unfortunately none of Jones’ original houses remain, all the buildings are now Victorian.

We then walked down through an archway on the right into Henrietta Street and turning left walked along to the Piazza to look at the front of St. Paul’s Church.

St. Paul's Church - like a 'Roman Temple'

Jones’ passion for palladian and roman architecture is at once evident . It was the first classical style building in London and looks rather like a Roman temple. The poet John Gay referred to the church in his poem ‘Trivia’ - “Where Covent Garden’s famous temple stands, that boasts the work of Jones’ immortal hands, columns, with plain magnificence appear and graceful porches lead along the square..” There is a large plaque on what would have been the main entrance describing how the church was rebuilt after a great fire in 1795 to Jones’ original design. A little to the left is an inscription carved into the stone which commemorates the very first Punch and Judy show witnessed by none other than Samuel Pepys in 1662 and recorded in his diary. This event is also commemorated in a different way, by the Punch and Judy bar in the market just behind us.

The plaque commemorating the fire
The Punch and Judy inscription

The market itself began in a small way in 1649 but expanded, particularly after the Great Fire of London destroyed the city markets in 1666. In 1670 the 5^th Earl and now 1^st Duke of Bedford decided to profit from the street sellers and obtained a Royal Charter ‘to hold forever a market’ selling flowers, fruit, roots and herbs. As the market expanded, the residents felt their loss of privacy, particularly as various underworld characters came to the square - thieves, hawkers, prostitutes intruding into their world, and as the private gated squares like Bloomsbury Square were built the residents moved out, leaving Convent Garden to less desirable residents.

During the Cromwellian period theatres had been banned but with Charles II’s restoration theatres were granted licences to open and quickly grew, together with coffee houses and gambling dens. By the 1760s the market occupied most of the Piazza and with the theatres which had sprung up nearby in Drury Lane and Bow Street together with the many public houses, the neighbourhood acquired a rather dubious reputation. The area teemed with all forms of low-life and illicit traders as well as the regular market traders.

When the Fleet market closed in 1826 Covent Garden became even more popular but was very disordered. In 1830 work began on a new market building which was described as ‘a structure at once perfectly fitted for its various uses; of great architectural beauty and elegance’ although at the that time it had no glass roof.

So the market changed character again and was once more a fashionable place. Charles Dickens was genuinely fascinated by the colour and atmosphere of the market and rented apartments on the corner of Wellington and Tavistock Streets where he said “I can slip out at my door in the small hours after any midnight and in one circuit of the purlieus of Covent Garden Market, can behold a state of infancy and youth, as vile as if a Bourbon sat upon the English throne.”

We then walked over to the Jubilee Market which was built in 1985. It was during the excavation of the site that archaeological discoveries were made - the settlement of Lundenwic, with significant Saxon remains, has greatly increased our scant knowledge of the Saxon settlement.

The Jubilee Market

In 1859 Flora Hall was built to house the flower market, but this was converted to a fruit market in 1887 and then in the 1980s became the London Transport Museum.

The Flora Hall now the London Transport Museum

Eventually the market expanded into the houses and shops in the surrounding streets. It became evident even before the second world war that the market could not remain in such a congested part of London but it was not until 1973 that the fruit and vegetable market moved to Nine Elms leaving empty market buildings and vacant premises.

Covent Garden Market then....
....and now

Planners wanted to demolish the whole area but thankfully a vigorous campaign by local residents and the general public prevented this and the market was gradually renovated to become the popular shopping centre it is today. And of course not forgetting the street entertainers who can still be found here daily.

We then walked back towards Russell Street to Bow Street and up to the Royal Opera House. The original theatre, the Covent GardenTheatre was first opened in 1732 by John Rich, who had inherited one of the two royal patents given by Charles II allowing official authorisation for the production of plays. The first patent was granted to Thomas Killigrew who opened the first Theatre Royal on a converted tennis court in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. Three years later it moved to it’s present site at the corner of Russell Street and Catherine Street. These two theatres, through fires and riots, held the monopoly of legitimate theatre until 1843.

The first play at the Covent Garden Theatre was ‘The Way of the World’ by William Congreave. In 1807 the theatre was destroyed by a terrible fire in which twenty fireman died, The manager producer at the time was George Frederick Handel, and many of his manuscripts were destroyed by the fire, together with his organ. The theatre was rebuilt but when the prices were increased there were riots by theatregoers who released pigs and pigeons into the auditorium causing chaos. The management admitted defeat and the prices were reduced again.

Fire at the Royal Opera House

A cartoon depicting the riots

In 1847 the Covent Garden Theatre was bought by the Italian composer Guiseppe Persian who presented operas and renamed the theatre The Royal Italian Opera House. It wasn’t until 1939 that it became the Royal Opera House. Queen Victoria was a frequent visitor to the theatre and her carriage would be parked in front of the Bow Street Magistrates Court. However, she did not think it proper for her to be seen pulling up outside a Police Station so she had the building disguised by altering the traditional blue lamps with clear glass lamps. The station still retains it’s disguise today so that it may continue not to offend any modern day opera goer.

A further fire damaged the theatre in 1856 so in 1858 the theatre was rebuilt once again, by E. M. Barry in classical style. He also built the Floral Hall next door in glass and iron, which was meant to be a rival to the Bedford’s flower market. Both buildings are now part of the rebuilt Royal Opera House complex, which was recently completed.

The Royal Opera House Complex

This brought to an end our walk for today, which I found fascinating. I have tried to expand on the subjects discussed to give a slightly more in depth history of the area, as I know Aly doesn’t have the time to include everything. I hope you find it as interesting as I do.

Wednesday 16th April - Masonic Holborn

2008-04-17T13:34:00.000+01:00

Today's walk is entitled Masonic Holborn

A bright but chilly day for our walk today around Masonic Holborn. Our Guide Aly decided a ‘Voice Extender’ was a necessity after the large crowd on our last walk, and although we were a little under 30 people this time, with the noise of the traffic it was much easier to hear what he was saying. A definite thumbs up for the Voice Extender.

Firstly, I think a brief word about Masons or Freemasons. Freemasonry is one of the world’s oldest secular fraternal societies. Members are taught the rules of Freemasonry by a series of ritual dramas that follow ancient forms and use stonemasons’ customs and tools symbolically. When, where and why Freemasonry began is not known. It is believed to have originated in England, descending from the craft of the medieval stonemasons. Lodges, or groups of operative masons began to accept non-practicing members who gradually took over and adopted the stonemasons’ tools and customs as allegorical teaching aids. Each member belongs to a Lodge. The word is believed to have derived from the shelters that the medieval stonemasons lived in during the winter months whilst working on great buildings such as cathedrals. Medieval stonemasons were ‘free’ men, able to travel wherever they wished to work, hence the term ‘free mason’.

The earliest record of the making of a freemason in a non-operative lodge in England is Elias Ashmole at Warrington in 1646. On 24^th June 1717 four London lodges came together at the Goose and Gridiron Ale House in St. Paul’s Churchyard to form the first Grand Lodge in the world. They called themselves The Moderns. Grand Lodge became the regulatory body for Freemasonry holding regular meetings any publishing regulations.

In 1751 a rival Grand Lodge, calling themselves The Ancients was formed. For 60 years these two lodges co-existed before finally they unified to become the United Grand Lodge of England in 1813.

Only men can become freemasons although there are some linked orders that allow women members. They follow three great principles Brotherly Love, Relief and Truth. From the earliest days they have also been concerned with the care of orphans, the sick and the aged.

Our first stop was The Ship Tavern at the corner of Gate Street and Little Turnstile. This is a very old pub dating back to 1549 and was rebuilt in 1923. It was here that on the last Monday in every month from the 1700s that freemasons would meet and in 1786 Lodge 234 was consecrated here by the Grand Master, the Earl of Antrim.

The Ship

Outside The Ship - a brief history

A few short metres away is the Lincoln Sandwich Shop in Gate Street. This was once The Sun public house. Lodge 234 moved briefly to the French Horn in Holborn, the exact location of which is somewhat uncertain, but could possibly be in French Horn Yard to the north of High Holborn. The lodge then moved to the Sun pub.

The Lincoln Sandwich Shop, formerly The Sun Pub

We now turn the corner into Lincoln’s Inn Fields and walk along to Sir John Soane’s house. Sir John was an architect who was asked to survey and value the land in Great Queen Street where the first of the Freemason’s Halls was to be built. Although not a member then, he soon joined and rose to become the Grand Superintendent of Works.

Sir John Soane's house

We now retraced our steps and returned to Kingsway. Although now a large modern building containing Sainsburys and Boots, 129 Kingsway was once The Holborn Restaurant. A huge building containing a vast dining room and a number of smaller private dining rooms and the restaurant was very popular with the local freemasons. In 1886 the Prince of Wales was made Grand Master, a position he held until he became King Edward VII in 1901. His successor was his younger brother the Duke of Connaught who became Grand Master on 3^rd June 1902. The Lodge met in the Kings Hall in the restaurant until 1939.

The Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) in Masonic Regalia

The Duke of Connaught

A short walk back down Kingsway towards Aldwych brings us to Great Queen Street, which is the very heart of Freemasonry in London, with shops, pubs and other buildings with links to freemasons.

The Freemasons Arms, Longacre

The Prince of Wales. Great Queen Street

Central Regalia

We first walk past the New Connaught Rooms. In 1908 The Connaught Rooms were named after the then Grand Master, the Duke of Connaught and became one of the most popular venues for social and corporte events . They were built upon the site of the Freemasons Tavern and in 1910 this building was replaced with the current structure.

The New Connaught Rooms

Next to the New Connaught Rooms stands Freemasons Hall. This magnificent structure is the only Grade II listed Art Deco building in London which has been preserved ‘as built’ both internally and externally. It was built between 1927 and 1993 and is in fact the third hall on the site. It was designed by H.V. Ashley and Winton Newman, following an international architectural competition chaired by Sir Edwin Lutyens.

The 'Inner Building' rises
(picture courtesy United Grand Lodge of England)

The Tower rises
(picture courtesy United Grand Lodge of England)

In 1775 the premiere Grand Lodge purchased No. 61 Great Queen Street, a house with a garden and a further house behind it. A competition was held to design a Grand Hall to link the two houses. The winning design was by Thomas Sandby. In 1820 the hall was extended by Sir John Soane but his work disappeared during the building of the second hall in the 1860s which was designed by Frederick Pepys Cockerill. Further property had been acquired to the west of the original and Cockerill managed to incorporate Sandby’s grand Hall into his design. In fact the grand Hall survived until 1930 when it had to be demolished as it was suffering from severe structural damage following a fire in 1883. Most of Cockerill’s Hall was also demolished to make way for Ashley and Newman’s Freemasons Hall although the eastern end survives as part of the Connaught Rooms.

Freemasons Hall today

Entrance to the Library and Museum

The Library and Museum of Freemasonry is open to visitors at Freemasons Hall.

Well that’s all for today. The next walk features Covent Garden.

Wednesday 9th April 2008 - Homes of Famous People

2008-04-14T08:15:00.000+01:00

Todays walk was entitled : Homes of Famous People

We had the biggest crowd of walkers ever today – 66! We set off as usual from Holborn Tube Station, down Gate Street and into Lincoln’s Inn Fields. Our first stop was No. 65 – the former home of William Marsden (1796-1657), (see HERE for more information) Surgeon and founder of both the Royal Free Hospital (in 1828) and the Royal Marsden Hospital (in 1851). He was born in Sheffield and studied at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital under the famous Surgeon John Abernethy. In 1818 he set up a small treatment centre in a house in Gray’s Inn Road which was later to become the Royal Free Hospital. Patients could be treated without paying a fee and with less formality, following his discovery of the problems the poor had in obtaining medical treatment of any kind.

William Marsden

65 Lincoln's Inn Fields

He later turned his attention to cancer sufferers and in 1851 set up another hospital in Cannon Row, Westminster. This grew into the Brompton Cancer Hospital (now the Royal Marsden Hospital Fulham Road site).

Next we moved on to a very familiar building, No. 59-60 Lincoln’s Inn Fields. This was the home of Spencer Perceval KC (1762 – 1812) who was the only British Prime Minister to be assassinated. (More information HERE) He was Prime Minister at a controversial and difficult time (October 1809 to May 1812) with an economic crisis and industrial unrest (not a lot changes does it?) He introduced legislation which was considered by some to be draconian. In the winter before his assassination the Luddite riots were breaking out and he was forced to concede an inquiry by the House of Commons. It was as he was on his way to this enquiry that he was shot in the heart by a man of unsound mind, John Bellingham, who blamed his financial problems on Perceval. He died almost instantly, uttering “I am murdered”. Bellingham gave himself up and was hung a week later. Actually Perceval broke a law on his death – it is illegal to die in the House of Parliament!

Spencer Perceval KC

We now cross through the park to the home of Sir John Soane (1753-1837), an architect whose best known work is the Bank of England, although he also re-modelled the dining rooms of both Nos 10 and 11 Downing Street. His works are distinguished by their clean lines, simple forms, deceptive detailing and skilful use of light sources. His home is now a wonderful museum, which is well worth a visit, with a very eclectic collection of items. He was born in Goring-on-Thames and studied at The Royal Academy and later in Italy. He dies in London, a widower and estranged from his only son, and is buried in a vault of his own design in St. Pancras Old Church. The design of the vault was a major influence on Giles Gilbert Scott’s design for the famous London red telephone box.

Sir John Soane

The Sir John Soane Museum

We now walked through Little Turnstile, across High Holborn and into Warwick Court. Here we find a plaque to Sun Yat-sen (1866-1925) who is often known as the “Father of Modern China” – he lived in a house on this site whilst in political exile. He was instrumental in the eventual collapse of the Qing Dynasty in 1911 and was the first provisional president when the Republic of China was founded in 1912. He later founded the Kuomintang where he served as it’s first leader. Unusually, he is revered in both mainland China and Taiwan as a uniting figure in post-Imperial China. (see HERE for more information)

Sun Yat-sen

Onward then through Gray’s Inn to Theobalds Road to visit No.22. This was the birthplace of Benjamin Disraeli, 1^st Earl of Beaconsfield (1804-1881), (click HERE for more information) who was a conservative statesman and literary figure of some note. He served in government for three decades, and served as Prime Minster twice, 27^th February 1868 to 1^st December 1868, and from 20^th February 1874 to 21sr April 1880 . (the only person of Jewish parentage to do so thus far – although he was baptised into the Anglican church at the age of 13). His greatest achievement is seen as the creation of the modern Conservative Party, although he was also involved in the purchase of the Suez Canal and the extension of the Empire to include India.

He was also a noted author. He wrote romances mainly, of which Sybil and Vivian Grey are probably the best known today. Sybil was part of “The Trilogy” which also included Coningsby and Tancred.

Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield

We then turned along Theobalds Road to Great James Street. No. 24 was the home of one of my favourite authors Dorothy L. Sayers. (1893-1957). (See HERE for further information) She lived in the apartment here from 1921 to 1929 and it was here that she wrote her first novel ‘Whose Body’ which of course was the first appearance of her well known detective Lord Peter Wimsey. She herself was most proud of her translation of Dante’s Divina Commedia, which, unfinished at her death, was completed by Barbara Reynolds.

Dorothy L. Sayers

24 Great James Street

We now continued along Theobalds Road, and then on to No. 17 Red Lion Square. This house not only housed Dante Gabriel Rossetti, (1828-1882) the poet and painter but also both William Morris (1834-1896) poet and artist and Sir Edward C.Burne-Jones (1833-1898) the painter, though not all at the same time.

Rossetti, was a founder of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood with John Everett Millais and William Holman Hunt. He aspired to be both a port and a painter, attending The Royal Academy and then studying under Ford Madox Brown. He was always more interested in the medieval than the modern side of the movement and adopted the style of the early Italian painters. He also translated Dante and other medieval Italian poets. In 1850 he met Elizabeth Siddal, who became an important model for the Pre-Raphaelite painters and they married in 1860. When she died in 1862 he was so overcome with grief that he buried all his manuscripts in her coffin. However, seven years later, he regretted his impulse and had his wife’s coffin exhumed and recovered the manuscripts, which fortunately were still in reasonable condition.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti

William Morris was also associated with the Pre-Raphaelites and was one of the principal founders of the British Arts and Crafts movement, a pioneer of socialism and a writer of poetry and fiction. He is perhaps best known however for his wonderful designs of wallpaper and patterned fabrics. In the latter years of his life he wrote fantasy novels and was the first to set his stories in an entirely invented fantasy world. It is said J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis and James Joyce all drew inspiration from his work. Although never a practicing architect, his interest in the subject led to the founding in 1877 of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings which resulted indirectly in the founding of the National Trust.

William Morris

Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones (see HERE for more information) was also closely associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. He studied under Rossetti but developed his own style while travelling in Italy with Ruskin and others. Originally intending to become a church minister, under Morris’s influence he decided to become an artist and designer instead. He attended Oxford but did not take a degree. He married Georgiana MacDonald, one of the MacDonald sisters. She made her own woodcuts and was a close friend of George Eliot. Other MacDonald sisters married Sir Edward Poynter, Alfred Baldwin (and so became the mother of Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin) and another became the mother of Rudyard Kipling. As well as painting he also worked in a variety of crafts including ceramic tiles, jewellery, tapestries, book illustrations and stage costumes.

Cophetua by Edward Burne-Jones

Our final stop was just a few metres away. A plaque on the side of Summit House shows that John Harrison (1693-1776) lived and died in a house on that site. (see HERE for more information) He was the inventor of the Marine Chronometer which revolutionised and extended the possibility of safe long distance travel on the high seas. A more recent memorial was recently unveiled in Westminster Abbey.

John Harrison

John Harrison was born in Foulby near Wakefield in West Yorkshire and built and repaired clocks in his spare time. He built his first longcase clock in 1713 at the age of 20. The mechanism was made entirely of wood. Three of his early ‘wooden’ clocks still survive. His inventive genius brought about many advances in clock and watch manufacture. But it was a competition to find the solution to accurately measure longitude that was to bring him lasting fame. The British government offered a prize of £20,000, a huge fortune, (roughly £6 million in 2007 terms) to solve the problem. Although he was successful the government never actually paid out the prize although, when he was 80 years old, they did pay him the sum of £8750 for his achievements, but only after he had made an appeal directly to King George III. Two clocks were used – one fixed on London time and the other on local time. When the sun was at it’s zenith they seamen would look at the London clock then work out the time difference between the two to fix their position. His masterpiece was H4, an instrument of true beauty shaped like a large pocketwatch but actually the size of a soup plate. On it’s transatlantic trial in 1761, it was only 5 seconds slow on arrival in Jamaica, but the government believed it was a fluke and refused to pay the prize. On a second trial it was equally as accurate, but the government still believed it was just luck. After years of fighting he eventually petitioned the King and so finally won the day.

The Marine Chronometer

Well that’s all for this week. Hope you enjoyed it.

Friday 4th April 2008 - Sale of the Century (Shops Over 100 Years Old)

2008-04-11T14:15:00.000+01:00

Today’s walk is called ‘Sale of the Century’ - where we visit some of the shops around Holborn that are over 100 years old.

Our guide Aly began today’s walk with a brief mention of several businesses which opened their first shops or offices in Holborn and have become household names. Thomas Cook & Son, (Click here for more information of the history of Thomas Cook) travel agents opened their first office in London in 1862 in Great Russell Street and John James Sainsbury opened his first shop in 1869 with his wife Mary Ann at 173 Drury Lane. This was one of the poorest areas in London at that time and the Sainsburys' shop quickly became very popular for selling high quality products at low prices. Success meant further branches were soon opened in other market areas such as Stepney and Islington.

Thomas Cook

Sainsbury's was founded in 1869 by John James and Mary Ann Sainsbury. They opened their first small dairy shop at 173 Drury Lane, London. Drury Lane was one of London's poorest areas and the Sainsburys' shop quickly became popular for offering high-quality products at low prices. It was so successful that further branches were opened in other market streets in Stepney, Islington and Kentish Town.

The original Sainsburys

In 1878 Gamages ( see HERE for more information) opened in Holborn Road on the site of what is now W.H.Smiths and closed in March 1972. It was a department store founded by Mr. A.W. Gamage but prior to it’s closure it had been unusual inasmuch as it premises were away from the main Oxford Street shopping area, being on the edge of the City of London in Holborn.

Gamages

We walked down Kingsway , around into Aldwych and thence to the Strand to find Twinings Teas. In 1706 Twinings was one of the first companies to introduce tea drinking to Britain. They opened their shop at 216 The Strand where is remains to this day. In 1706 coffee was a more popular drink when Thomas Twining (1675-1741) opened Thoms Coffee House in Deveraux Court. But as tea grew more popular the emphasis changed and they moved to The Strand to The Golden Lion Shop which has the smallest shop front in London. The elegant entrance were designed by Richard Twining, Thomas’ grandson in 1787. There are lions and two Chinese figures who represent Chinese tea. Richard Twining was also involved in the Tea Duty Commutation Act of 1784 which reduced the tax on tea so spreading that great British tradition of drinking tea across the country as it became more affordable. There are some very interesting portraits inside the shop, and it is well worth a look. This claims to be the oldest shop in London continually run by the same family in the same location. (Find more information HERE)

From Twinings, we crossed over The Strand and walking past the Royal Courts of Justice we turned up Bell Yard and across Carey Street into Lincoln’s Inn Archway to find Wildy & Sons Legal Bookshop. It is ideally situated close to the Royal Courts of Justice and the Inns of Court. The shop was founded in 1830 and has always been a family business although the last Wildy died more than 30 years ago. The Simkins family have been partners in the business for over a century and John Simkins, the current proprietor is still maintaining the traditions and standards that have endeared Wildy’s to generations of legal practitioners. It is considered the best stockist of legal books anywhere in the world.

Wildy & Sons

A short walk across New Square to Star Yard brings us the back of Ede & Ravenscroft, bespoke tailors to royalty, the legal profession as well producing ceremonial robes for churchmen and academia as well as individual customers. The front of the shop faces Chancery Lane. Click HERE for more information.

Ede & Ravenscroft, Star Yard

The Shudall family, respected tailors founded the business which would later become Ede & Ravescroft in 1689 and were entrusted with the ultimate commission - creating the robes for the coronation of William and Mary. It is a testament to the skill of the generations of tailors that they have made the ceremonial robes for every coronation since that date. They are also famous for wig making providing wigs for the judiciary. Thomas Ravenscroft opened his first shop in Serle Street making wigs. It was following the marriage of Joseph Ede to Rosanna Ravenscroft in 1871 that brought the two famous families together and add wig making to the range of services.

Today the shop continues to produce the wigs and ceremonial garments that have made them famous and although Ede & Ravenscroft are thought to be the oldest firm of tailors in the world it is still as contemporary as it is traditional. They are the leading wig makers of forensic wigs in the world and still make the three main types - they are the Full Bottomed Wig worn by judges on ceremonial occasion such as the State Opening of Parliament, the Short Bench Wig worn by judges in court and the Bar Wig worn by barristers. They are still made from horsehair and the patent was originally issued in 1822.

From l to r: The Full Bottomed Wig; The Bench Wig and the Bar Wig

We then crossed Chancery Lane and through Staple Inn to High Holborn to Shervingtons Tobacco Shop which was founded in 1864. Called Ye Olde Tobacco Shop. A picture of the shop can be seen on the tins of Old Holborn tobacco. There used to be a tobacco factory in nearby Holborn Buildings which would supply the shop, but this disappeared many years ago.

Well that’s all for today. Hope you enjoyed it!

Photos of Twinings, Wildy & Sons, Ede & Ravenscroft and Shervingtons all copyright Orlicat

Wednesday 2nd April 2008 - Suffragette City

2008-04-11T13:25:00.000+01:00

Today’s walk is all about The Suffragettes. So onwards with Suffragette City

We set off as usual, from Holborn Tube Station and headed towards Bloomsbury Square. We were there to see Vernon Place, which is a very short road indeed! It was here that the headquarters of The Men’s Society for Womens Rights was founded in the 1860s. At that time women were politically excluded from so much - from studying at university, from taking up professions such as doctors and of course they had no vote. The society was founded by a group of enlightened gentlemen who believed women should be allowed all such rights. They also sought to combat sexual abuse of women and children. They even issued a publication , an extract of which stated that men were often “...sexually depraved degenerates who are spewed out nightly from Tap Rooms and the like...” my not a lot changes does it - just exchange Tap Rooms for bars, pubs and clubs!

In the years that followed many societies were founded in support of women’s suffrage (the right to vote) and these included the London Society for Women’s Suffrage and in 1889 the Women’s Franchise League.

In 1887 seventeen of these individual groups joined together to form the National Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). They held public meetings , organised petitions, wrote letters to politicians, published newspapers and distributed free literature.

Womens Freedom League

Women's Suffrage League

In 1897 Emmeline Pankhurst formed the Suffragists and then in 1903 she help to form a new organisation - the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU). This was a much more militant organisation who were not willing to restrict themselves to conventional methods previously used. It was at about this time that the Daily Mail coined the term ‘Suffragettes’ which was a very negative and derogatory term.

Emmeline Pankhurst
Christabel Pankhurst

Anyway, back to our walk - we next visited the parish church of St. George, Bloomsbury. It was here that the funeral of Emily Davison was held on Saturday 14^th June 1913. She was a famous suffragette who threw herself in front of the King’s horse, Anmer on 4^th June 1913. The service was held here because the Reverend Baumgarten was the only prepared to officiate at the service.

1913 Derby - Anmer and Emily Davison

The funeral was organised by the WSPU and 6000 women marchers, then brass bands played Chopin’s Funeral March m- there was a lso a banner showing Joan of Arc, and three laurel wreaths placed on her coffin with the words “She died for Women”. One protester, threw a brick at the coffin. The cortege moved on to King’s Cross Station and thence to Morpeth for burial in the family grave.

Our next stop is Barter Street where in 1907 the Women’s Freedom League was founded by Charlotte Despard, Edith How-Martyn and Teresa Billington-Grieg. They objected to the way that the Pankhursts, (Emmeline and her daughter Christabel) were making decision without consulting members. They also felt several wealthy women, such as Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence were having too much influence. Like the WSPU the WFL was a militant organisation that was willing to break the law. Over 100 of their members were sent to prison after refusing to pay taxes or taking part in demonstrations. However they were a completely non-violent organisation and opposed the WSPU’s campaign of vandalism against private and commercial property, and in particular opposed the WSPU’s arson campaign.

We then walked on to Bury Place where the WFL headquarters moved two years later. There was an Emily Davison Club there to protect her memory. In fact the WFL remained open until 1961.

We then walked back to Kingsway and stopped opposite what is now The Pitcher and Piano. However, apart from the ground floor the building is largely unaltered since October 1912 when the WSPU moved their headquarters there. They had to move from their previous headquarters following an argument with their landlord. There are three large windows across the building at first floor level. Below these windows were the words ‘Votes for Women’ and the letters WSPU above. It is in fact possible to see where the letters used to be although I am not sure where you are able to see that from the photograph below. This building also had a Emily Davison Club. Every inch of space was utilised in the building which was constantly raided by police. In 1913 all the senior staff were arrested and public opinion seemed to turn against them. In fact copycat attacks were made against other suffragette sites throughout the country.

Our final stop was down in Clements Inn. In a building on the site of which is part of the London School of Economics stood the previous headquarters of the WSPU, from 1906 to 1912. A plaque (seen below) commemorates this. In 1908 the Women’s Press was also situated in this building. They produced a large variety of items such as badges, scarves, books and pamphlets and were really the first organisation to effectively market themselves.

Emmeline’s other daughter, Sylvia Pankhurst was the designer who created the brand and image of the WSPU, but she was expelled from the society as she objected to her mother and sister ‘s anti Labour Party views.

Emmeline Pankhurst and Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence fell out over the violence. Frederick Pethick-Lawrence was considered the ‘grandfather’ of the suffragettes and stood bail for many of the suffragettes who were arrested. The question often asked was “Are you a ‘Peth’ or a ‘Pank’?”

In the end the WSPU disbanded during World War . Due to the labour shortage during WWI the government were forced to recruit women who proved their worth, working in factories and on the land. At the end of the war the Representation of People Act 1918 gave women over 30, who were householders or wives of householders the vote. It was a further ten years before universal suffrage gave everyone over 21 the vote.

28th March 2008 - Stoned Part II (Statues and Monuments South of High Holborn)

2008-04-11T08:36:00.000+01:00

Stoned - Part II

Today we had a much smaller group - mostly thanks to the rain, which was persistent and occasionally very heavy. Undaunted we carried on.

Our first stop was Africa house, in Kingsway. The building gets its’ name from it’s association with the British Empire. Above the main entrance are two magnificent lions, then at the top of four columns are carvings of African faces and finally a large montage of animals, surrounding a Britannia like figure and which include a wildebeest, a crocodile, a lion and a dead elephant and the hunter who killed him. The artist is Benjamin Clemens (1875-1957) and his other works include sculptures at the headquarters of the Women’s Institute, the entrance to the Burlington Arcade and two lions at Woburn Abbey.

Africa House

Our next stop a few short metres away is at Imperial Buildings, built in 1913. There are two monuments here, one at the corner of the building and the other over the entrance. The first, at the corner depicts two figures - a woman carrying a quill signifying education and a man dressed as a roman soldier signifying the British Empire. The other monument also features a man and a woman. This time the woman carries a ship signifying trade and the man carries a hammer signifying industry. Both figures have a central shield with I B engraved for Imperial Buildings. These figures were made by L F Roslyn in 1914.

We then walked down Kingsway and into Portugal Street towards the London School of Economics. (LSE) Mr. And Mrs. Louis Odette of Toronto, Canada gifted the following three delightful sculptures to the university in 2006.

The first, Baby Tembo is of bronze and was made in 2002 by Derrik Hudson. The second, Penguin, is of painted aluminum, was also made in 2002 by Yolanda Vandergaast and the third, at the top of the steps down to St. Clements Inn is an Eagle also of bronze and made in 2000 by A. Duquette of Toronto.

Baby Tembo

Penguin

Eagle

We then walked back towards Lincolns Inn Fields to see the monument in the gardens to Margaret MacDonald. She was a noted feminist and socialist who lived from 1870 to 1911. She did a lot of work with children and was greatly loved by all who knew her. Born Margaret Gladstone, she was unrelated to William Gladstone, one of the famous British Prime Ministers of the 19^th century, but in fact married Ramsay MacDonald who, some 13 years after his wife’s death, became the first Labour Prime Minister of Britain. They lived at 3 Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and some consider this house to have been the first headquarters of the Labour Party although this is debatable. The monument is made of grey Scottish granite and is curved at the front to make an alcove with a seat. Atop sits a bronze memorial depicting Margaret herself reaching out to nine children. This memorial, made in 1914, is by Richard Goulden.

Memorial to Margaret MacDonald

Our final sculpture was at the far end of Lincoln’s Inn fields, a modern piece called The Camdonian. It was commissioned by Camden Borough Council and made in 1980 by Barry Flanagan. It is not one of my favourites by any means - in fact I have always wondered about it. Currently it is surrounded by roadworks, or in this case pavement works, as work continues to replace over one thousand miles of Victorian drains in central London,

The Camdonian

Next week we begin two walks a week. Hope you enjoyed it. Until next time.
All photos copyright Orlicat

14th March 2008 - Stoned Part I - Statues and Monuments north of High Holborn

2008-04-11T08:06:00.000+01:00

Now for this week's walk - 'Stoned!' or Monuments & Statues Part I - North of High Holborn

We started our walk as usual at Holborn Tube Station, with our guide Aly.

Our first two statues I have to admit I had never noticed - but thankfully I was not alone in that! The reason being they are perched up high above High Holborn on Kingsgate House. The statues were commissioned for the opening of Kingsway in 1905 and are by Richard Garbe (1876-1957). (See HERE for a biography)

The statues are both of Edwards - Edward I to the left and Edward VII to the right.

Edward I (1239-1307) or Longshanks as he was often called, reigned between 1272 and 1307. He conquered Wales and tried (and failed) to conquer Scotland although he was also called The Hammer of the Scots and ordered the disembowelling of William Wallace (also known as Braveheart). He also ordered the expulsion of Jews from England. See HERE for a more detailed history of Edward I.

Our next stop was at the site of two pieces of work by Peter Randall Page in Bury Place. The first, a statue called 'Beneath the Skin', is made from Kilkenny Limestone. The second, a frieze in two parts called 'Chain of Events'. It is made from Portland stone and black African granite.

Beneath The Skin

Chain of Events

Peter Randall Page was born in 1954 and attended Bath Academy of Arts - he has exhibited world wide.

We know come to another statue by Richard Garbe - of John Bunyan (1628-1688) (More information on Bunyan HERE)

Bunyan was a Christian write and preacher whose most famous work was The Pilgrim's Progress and after the Bible was the second most translated work by missionaries when they travelled abroad. The statue was made in 1903 and stands in a niche above the entrance of a former Baptist church, now closed.

If you look carefully, you can still see the words Baptist Church on the while stone beneath the statue.

Next stop Red Lion Square, where we saw firstly a statue of Fenner Brockway (1888-1988) who became Baron Brockway of Eton and Slough. He was a member of the Independent Labour Party and was imprisoned in various gaols including Pentonville, the Tower of London and a dungeon at Dover Castle for his protests against the first world war. He did in fact suspend his oppostion during the second world war. He was a founder member of CND and one of four original members of War on Want. The statue, in bronze, erected by the Greater London Council was made by Ian Walters b1930 who is also famous for statues of other political figures. Most famously, he carved the clay sculpture of Nelson Mandela, but died in 2006 so never lived to see his work cast in bronze and unveiled in Parliament Square. See HERE for more details on Ian Walters and the Mandela statue.

At the other end of the Square is the bust of Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) another famous pacifist also imprisoned for his views during WW1. He was the founding President of CND and a noted mathematician although one of his more famous (or should that be infamous) written works 'A Marriage and Morals' pub.1929 encouraged behaviour frowned upon at the time, such as sex before marriage and open marriage. He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1950. See HERE for more details on Russell. The statue is by Marcelle Quinton

Fenner Brockway

Bertrand Russell

Finally we returned to High Holborn to a sculture commissioned specifically for Brackton House - 'The Tennis Player' by Eduardo Paolozzi. Paolozzi was born in 1924 in Edinburgh of Italian descent. He was imprisoned at the age of 16 under a detention order during WW2 purely because of his Italian parentage. He become well known for his part in the 'Pop Art' movement during the 1960s and you can see several pieces of his work on display in London, notably the mosaics at Tottenham Court Road Tube station, and the bronze of Sir Issac Newton outside the British Library. He was also responsible for the cover of Paul McCartney's album Red Rose Speedway. Paolozzi was knighted in 1980 and died in 2005. See HERE for more details on his life and work.

The Tennis Player

Well that's all for this week. Part 2 of this walk is after Easter. I hope you have enjoyed it.

Friday 7th March 2008 - How Old Am I? or Guess the Age of the Building!

2008-04-10T15:54:00.002+01:00

Long time no write in my journal - so anyway the historic walks around Holborn have started again so I thought I would start my weekly write ups and hope you find them interesting and informative!

To start off the new season we had a quiz - How Old Am I? or Guess the age of the building - so have a look at the photos below and see if you can guess in what year these buildings were completed. You just may be surprised - I know I was!

We begin with:

From top to bottom: Holborn Station (the whole building not just the station); 57-58 Lincoln's Inn Fields; St. Anselms & St. Caecilias Church, Kingsway

From top to bottom: Africa House; Aviation House (both in Kingsway); and Victoria House (front and side views)

From top to bottom: Summit House, Red Lion Square; Tudor House; Mid City Place (2 views) High Holborn and finally First Avenue House, High Holborn.

I managed to get two spot on, two at least 50 years out and the remainder only a few years out.

I will post the answers in a couple of days - why not have a go (and no cheating!)

I will say at least one of the answers is somewhere in my journal!

All photos copyright Orlicat

Answers to How Old Am I Quiz

2008-04-10T15:54:00.001+01:00

Ok - here are the answers to the How Old Am I? buildings quiz.

Holborn Station - 1906

57-58 Lincoln's Inn Fields - 1730

St. Anselms & St. Caecilias Church - 1909

Africa House - 1921

Aviation House - 1957

Victoria House - 1932

Summit House - 1925

Tudor House - 1690

Mid City Place - 2001

First Avenue House - 1949

Apparently I came second in the competition (27 entries on the day of the walk), just being pipped at the post on the very last question. Oh well!

26th October 2007 - The Knights Templar

2008-04-10T11:42:00.000+01:00

As it is Friday it is history lesson day! lol Today was the last walk of the season and was entitled "The Knights Templar"

It was after the first Crusade that the Knights Templar were founded in 1119 by a French Knight Hugues de Payens, to protect the pilgrim route and the various religious sites in Jerusalem. Their full name was The Poor Knights of Christ and the Temple of Solomon, or "Templar" knights. The Order, with about nine knights, had few financial resources and relied on donations to survive. Their emblem was of two knights riding on a single horse, emphasizing the Order's poverty.

The Templars' impoverished status did not last long. A nephew of one of the founding Templars Bernard de Clairvaux, spoke for them and in 1129 at The Council of Troyes, the Order were endorsed by the Church and this meant they became a favoured charity across Europe. Now the Templars were given huge sums of money and land, and they built their round churches everywhere - they were round in honour of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. Their shields began to bear a red cross on a white shield. This was the origin of the flag of St. George.

We met as usual at Holborn Tube station - the weather was mild (about 18C) and sunny - a lovely autumnal day. We walked along High Holborn and our first stop was outside Southampton Buildings. On this site the first Grand Master, Hugue de Payens built the first Temple Church (or Old Temple) in England to raise money in 1128. Although by this time they were a wealthy order they decided to build on this site as it was cheaper, being outside the then City walls of London. In the 19th century when they were demolishing a building on the site, they discovered during excavations, the remains of the medieval church and other buildings. More recently when a new lift (elevator) shaft was being sunk in the current building the workmen discovered more remains of the church.

In 1161 the Templars' numbers had increased considerably so they decided to move to a new site . they sold the site to the Bishop of Lincoln, who founded Lincoln's Inn and Lincolns Inn Fields. Importantly, a document of sale was drawn up which still survives to this day. It stated that on the site of the Old Temple, stood a church, a cemetary, stables, a kitchen, a bakery, a brewery and a garden. Although not mentioned it is believed there was also a hall and a dormitory. The buildings survived until 1595 when they were demolished.

We then walked back to Chancery Lane and stopped opposite the Knights Templar Pub

This pub is named after the general association with the Templars rather than with anything to do with the actual site, although our guide Aly believes it is so named because of it's proximity to our next Site at Bell Yard

On this site stood the Bell Hostel, owned by the Templars, where guests could stay. The surrounding lands were used as a training ground for Templar Knights before they travelled to the Crusades.

It was at this point of the walk my ears really pricked up as you will see! In 1177 the Templars prestige was increased by victory over the Saracens, but just ten years later, the beginning of their decline came with the Battle of the Horns of Hattin. On 4th July 1187, the then Grand Master, Gerard de Ridefort, led his knights, whom he believed to be invincible as they had God on their side, into the desert from Jerusalem, without access to water or shade. Facing him was none other than Saladin whose men were supplied with water. There was only ever going to be one outcome - the knights and their soldiers were decimated. (Any of this begin to sound familiar? Replace Guy de Lusignan's name with that of Gerard de Ridefort and I'm sure you will know what we are talking about! Hint: Kingdom of Heaven ) This terrible defeat was made worse by the fact that de Ridefort, instead of committing suicide, as he was honour bound to do by the rules of the Templars, did nothing. The surviving templars were demoralised - why should they stick to the laws if their Grand Master did not. He subsequently lost control of Jerusalem to Saladin. The Templars began to lose their prestige, their wealth and their privileges began to cause resentment - they were seen as privileged people and people questioned their positions. It was at this point that Aly mentioned "there was a film that came out about 3 years ago about the Crusades.." "Oh Kingdom of Heaven" I said "a wonderful film!" - "Yes that's correct - how did you know?" Errr, well..... only one of my favourite films! lol

In the early 1300s King Phillip IV of France and the Knights Templar fought over money and the King decided to put them on trial. In 1312, the Order was dissolved by Pope Clement V.

As a matter of interest, on 25th October this year, the Vatican put up for sale 800 copies of the Templars Trial documents. The 800th was presented to the Pope - the other 799 were snapped up very quickly at a cost of 5900 Euros each!

Anyway, I digress - back to the walk. We then proceeded to the end of Chancery Lane, across Fleet Street, and down Middle Temple Lane to The Temple Church.

The Templars moved to their new site in 1161. They began building the new church in 1166 and it was completed in 1185, and a grand ceremony to officially dedicate the church was attended by Patriarch Heraculus of Jerusalem and King Henry II of England.

Temple Church is one of the few remaining round churches in England. Currently under renovation it is not possible to go inside at present, but is well worth a visit if you get the chance. Part of The Da Vinci Code was filmed here. Inside the church there are two parts - the round end is the original part of the church; the roof is supported by 6 Pirbeck marble columns and there are nine full size effergies of Templar Knights. There is also a little wooden door which leads to a penitential cell - when a Templar was to be punished he was put in here - the cell was not large enough for a man to stand yet it was impossible to sit down. The knight was left to starve to death. The rectangular Chancel was added to the main church about 50 years after the original church was built.

The magnificent Norman Door is seen below. Women would leave unwanted babies and children outside this door in the hope that the Templars would take them in and care for the children, which they always did. The children were given the surname of 'Templar'. Atop a handsome stone pillar in the area next to the church is the symbol of the Templars showing them as 'Poor Knights'

In an inventory in 1308, (the document still surviving today) it is shown that together with the church, there was a Cloister Court on the south side, together with cellars, stables, kitchens, a brewery, dormitories, a garden and an orchard, together with guest rooms for the Knights. The buildings were decorated colourfully, with carpets hanging on the walls as well as on the floors.

King Edward II took control of the Church when the Templars declined and he gave the site to the Knights Hospitallers who were the forerunners of the St. John Ambulance Service, who do such great service at public events.

The buildings were then handed to two Law colleges which eventually became the Inner Temple and the Middle Temple.

Well that is the end of the walk but I thought I would just add a few photos of Lincoln's Inn Fields which was looking lovely in her autumnal hues.

All photos (except The Knight Templar at top of page) copyright Orlicat . Please do not post these pictures elsewhere

A History of 57-60 Lincoln's Inn Fields

2008-04-10T11:19:00.000+01:00

Ok, as promised here is the history of the buildings that I work in.

HISTORY OF NOS. 57-58 AND 59-60 LINCOLN’S INN FIELDS AND ASSOCIATED GHOST STORIES

Nos. 59-60 were built by 1640 as part of London’s first garden square and is the only remaining example of it’s type from that time (although much copied)(i). The design has been ascribed to Inigo Jones. It has been written that it shows what he intended the whole square to be like (ii). However these sources are over 100 years after construction. The safest view is that it is in his style (iii). The land on the west side of the Fields had been used as rough pasture before, apparently for the coach horses of nearby inns. The barristers of Lincoln’s Inn had opposed development but in the 1630s (the period of the 1st Stuart tyranny) Charles I, eager to raise money and responsive to a genuine shortage of housing, sanctioned building here and elsewhere in London (iv). The exterior is virtually unchanged from completion – including the columns with the stone vases on top of the gates. A crowned female bust which once stood above the central window on the first floor had gone by the early 18th century. Built of brick, the front stuccoed and painted over, although it is suspected the current pink dates only from 1975. Internally, the oak floor in what is now the main reception is believed to date from 1640. The well staircase is also of oak.

The Well Staircase and one of the Conference Rooms on the ground floor

The ornamental alcove with the coat of arms in reception dates from 1759 (Issac Ware).

The fireplace in the same room comes from Spencer Perceval’s occupation (1791-1809). Sir John Soane carried out the limited works required to re-unite 59-60 for Percerval in 1802 after Issac Ware have divided them (v). Since then it has remained one building.

The present 57-58 (pictured below) was built about 1730, replacing a previous structure. Although it was intended to be the same design as 59-60, it attracted criticism(1734) for failing to be of the same quality and detracting attention from 59-60 because of the height (iii). With one exception the exterior, which is of stone, has changed even less that that of 59-60. Originally it was one house with one door. In about 1795 Soane divided the house into two (the reverse of what he was later to do at 59-60), created two doors, and masked them with the current Roman Doric porch (v). The elliptical staircase running from the basement to the top of No. 57 was inserted at this time and is one of the most attractive features of the building. It is one of only three known – another being in Sir John Soane’s Museum also in Lincoln’s Inn Fields.

The exteriors are Grade I listed.

History and Literature

Some sources say 59-60 was lived in by Robert Bertie, 1st Earl of Lindsey (Charles I’s general at the battle of Edgehill in 1642 – the first major battle of the English Civil War – at which he was killed. However, this association is probably a confusion with two Earl Lindseys who lived here after 1685 – and from whom its common description in the books of “Lindsey House” is derived. In 1683, during the 2nd Stuart Tyranny (1683-5), a friend of the family of the then occupier Lord Winchester, Lord William Russell was beheaded in Lincoln’s Inn Fields after having been convicted of treason by association with the Rye House plot – the aim of which had been to assassinate Charles II and James, Duke of York – the future James II-in order to prevent a Catholic accession to the throne. In a gruesome aftermath his body was brought into the house and his head sewn back on before being carried off for burial(iii)(vi). The blood stain can still be discerned on the main reception floor. Spencer Perceval has the distinction of being the only British Prime Minister to be assassinated – on 11th May 1812 in the lobby of the House of Commons – by a bankrupt who had a grievance against the government. The deep safe in which it is believed he kept his ministerial red boxes is in reception.

57-58 has a gentler history. Edward Montagu, the Earl of Sandwich – the creator of the comestible and a principal figure in organising Charles II’s restoration – was here between 1664-1666. He was patron of Samuel Pepys, the diarist and clerk to the Exchequer under both Cromwell and Charles II. Pepys visited that “fine house” on a number of occasions but notes the rent was “deadly dear” - £250 per year (iii). Tulkinghorn, the lawyer to the aristocracy from Charles Dickens’ “Bleak House” lived here. Dickens described it as “a large house, formerly a house of state. It is let off in a set of chambers, and in those shrunken fragments of its greatness lawyers lie like maggots in nuts”. (ii)(vii). Here Tulkinghorn was found one morning shot through the heart when on the point of revealing Lady Dedlock’s terrible secret to her devoted husband.(vii) There is a non-fictitious association with Dickens. On 22nd December 1844 he read one of his ghost stories “The Chimes” to a company of friends including the historian Thomas Carlyle in this building.

By the beginning of the 20th century the buildings had become the offices of Marks & Clerk, the Chartered Patent Agents, who acquired 57-58 in 1908 and 59-60 in 1918. They remained here until the transfer to Garden Court Chambers in December 2004.

Ghosts and Hauntings

To those who are ‘sensitive’ there seem to be certainly two presences in the buildings, with possible a third which is more indistinct.

It is Lord William Russell who is the most likely source of haunting in Nos. 59-60. They have been unable to remove the blood from the oak floor in reception.

During the renovations of the building in early 2005, the builders were constantly being ‘spooked’ by foot steps and doors opening and closing by themselves, and things being moved overnight. The basement and ground floor and the third floor can become icy – even with the heating on full – in specific areas and this iciness will move around. Even now we still have footsteps and doors opening and closing by themselves, and when people are in the building by themselves, they have heard their names being called…and things will disappear to appear later in really odd places. It is now always put down to the “ghost”. There is also another tale of a baby or young child who fell (or was pushed?) down the dumb waiter from the third floor to the basement. This could well be the third rather indeterminate ghostly presence that can be felt.

In Nos. 57-60 there is a story of the grey lady. She is usually seen appearing through a now disused and blocked-up doorway and standing on the landing above the elliptical staircase and then throwing herself over the banisters to her death. Unfortunately her identity remains a mystery.

Click HERE to see Garden Court Chambers Website. You can see a picture on the left hand side of the elliptical staircase, down which the Grey Lady threw herself.

Sources:

“A Guide to the Architecture of London” Jones & Woodward pub. Weidenfeld & Nicholson1992 para K-16c

Lincoln’s Inn Fields and the Localities Adjacent by C.W.Heckethorn pages 89/90 pub London 1896

Volume 3 of the London County Council’s Survey of London “The Parish of St. Giles in the Fields” Part 1 Lincoln’s Inn Fields pages 97,90,100,93 (cities Pepys diary entry for 10/2/1664) pub.LCC 1912

The Cromwell Association website – entry for Lindsey House

“Sir John Soane and London” by Ptolemy Dean pub. Lund Humphries 2006 pages 156-7

“A Student’s History of England” by S.R.Gardiner Vol.2 London 1900 pages 625-6

“Bleak House” by Charles Dickens Penguin edition 1983 pages 72 and 189

I hope you find it interesting!