Social History – Page 2 – Symbols & Secrets

My Old Bailey visit – ‘Take him down!’

On 8th June 2023

In Architecture, Imprisonment, Social History

The Central Criminal Court of England and Wales, known the world over as the ‘Old Bailey’, has opened its doors to the public for guided tours this summer and I visited last Saturday. You can book your own visit here and I highly recommend it.

The tour was conducted by two City of London Guides and an Officer of the Court and they gave us a comprehensive history of the building and its location from its time as a prison dating from the 1100s to the present day.

The site was originally the location of the notorious Newgate gaol – a terrible place of disease, death and despair. Here it is circa 1810 … …

The artist Gustave Doré captured its ghastly atmosphere in this portrayal of the exercise yard in 1872 …

On view in the tour are some gruesome artifacts from that time …

In 1783 the site of London’s gallows was moved from Tyburn to Newgate. Public executions outside the prison – by this time, London’s main prison – continued to draw large crowds. This painting by Thomas Rowlandson shows a public execution at Newgate in the late 18th century …

In the centre of the picture three people have been hanged. The area is crammed full of people who have turned up to watch. They even hang out of the windows, and are on the roof of, the building on the left. On the far right a street seller takes advantage of the crowds and is selling his wares from a basket. In the very centre foreground a woman sits on a man’s shoulders in order to get a better look. The last public hanging there was in 1868 and the last one behind its firmly closed doors in 1902.

There were courtrooms attached to the prison but as trials lengthened and the number of those seeking to watch increased in the late nineteenth century the courthouse building became increasingly inadequate. In 1877 a fire forced the City of London to act and proposals were drawn up for a new building. Owing to the dilapidation of Newgate Prison next door, which by the 1860s no longer held long-term prisoners, it was decided to demolish everything on the site to make room for a larger building.

After many delays, the new building, designed in the neo-Baroque style by E. W. Mountford, was finally opened by King Edward VII in 1907. It was lavishly fitted out and adorned with symbolic reminders to the public of its virtuous purpose. On top of the 67 foot high dome a 12 foot gold leaf statue was placed of a ‘lady of justice’ holding a sword in one hand and the scales of justice in the other; she is not, as is conventional with such figures, blindfolded …

Over the main entrance to the building figures were placed representing Fortitude, the Recording Angel and Truth, along with the carved inscription, ‘defend the children of the poor and punish the wrongdoer’ …

The entrance in 1910 …

You enter for the tour via the extension to the building built in 1972 and are then escorted to the old building by the guides.

The first thing you notice is the grandeur of the architecture. This is the circulating area on the ground floor …

Some of my images didn’t turn out as well as I would have liked so the following three are from an excellent blog published by Bryan Jones.

The main staircase …

The dome …

And the stained glass window …

My image from a different angle …

The building was significantly damaged by wartime bombing and subsequently restored …

These lovely murals were one of the results of the restoration work.

In the one above, reference is made to Edmund Hillary and the conquest of Everest. Here he is in the background …

And, guess what, the artist Gerald Moira has included himself as well. He’s the bald headed chap at the back holding his palette …

King John sets his seal to Magna Carta …

And my favourite …

And Gerald is here again, disguised as an old lady clutching a cup of tea!

Elizabeth Fry the prison reformer is commemorated with this statue …

She was a major driving force behind new legislation to improve the treatment of prisoners, especially female inmates, and as such has been called the ‘Angel of Prisons’. She was instrumental in the 1823 Gaols Act which mandated sex-segregation of prisons and female warders for female inmates to protect them from sexual exploitation.

Also commemorated is one of the most important trial outcomes in Britain’s judicial history …

In what came to be known as Bushell’s Case, a landmark ruling ensured the future autonomy of English juries. It also had consequences for jurisprudence in North America, where Penn (incidentally a Quaker like Fry) inspired by the trial, incorporated Magna Carta into the laws of his new colony.

The highlight of the tour was, of course, a visit to the famous Court Number 1 followed by a trip to the cells …

It may be a courtroom but it is pure theatre, and remarkably small and intimate. Unfortunately, photographs are not allowed, but I found this image of the court in 1911. The general layout hasn’t change that much …

Whilst standing in the dock (on the right of the picture), which we were allowed to do, I found it difficult not to think of the disparate people it has temporarily housed over the decades – for example, Ian Huntley and Maxine Carr, Dennis Nilsen, Peter Sutcliffe, the Kray Twins, William Joyce and Dr Crippen. Also poor Timothy Evans, wrongly convicted of murder, hanged in 1950, but eventually pardoned. And tragic Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be executed in the UK in 1956 …

Nowadays, given the evidence available of the abusive relationship she was in, she would probably have only been accused of manslaughter at most.

Defendants access the dock via hidden steps that emerge out of the bowels of the building and descend the same steps at breaks in proceedings or if found guilty – ‘take him down!’ the Judge declares, in all the best movies when sentence has been delivered.

Our guides related some interesting stories regarding famous trials and then we were ‘taken down’ ourselves to the warren of cells below where again pictures were forbidden. We were warned not to press the red buttons on the wall which are used if there is an ‘affray’. It automatically closes and locks all the cell doors and seals off the area – and keys are not kept nearby!

As you walk down the steps oak pannelling gives way to white lavatorial tiles and then white painted walls – there is no doubt you are now in custody even though you are still a ‘defendant’ and not a ‘prisoner’. Not surprisingly, it is a very disturbing experience, even for a temporary visitor. We then went on to visit a more modern court in the 1970s extension – there are 19 courts in all.

If you decide to take the tour I strongly recommend you buy this book beforehand and just have a browse even if you don’t have the chance to read it all …

Moving, thrilling and occasionally very funny, it was one of my most enjoyable reads over the last year.

Also underground on the site is the route taken by condemned prisoners on their way to the gallows …

Known as ‘Dead Man’s Walk’ I did smile when we were told that it was not open to the public due to ‘Health and Safety issues’!

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St Bartholomew’s Hospital is celebrating its 900th anniversary.

By The City Gent

On 18th May 2023

In Art, Social History, Wellbeing

To mark the occasion there’s a free outdoor exhibition in the City to showcase historic collections and tell new stories about the hospital’s history. It features art, photographs and historical documents from the Barts Health NHS Trust Archives and I visited the exhibition at Guildhall Yard where it will remain until 6 June.

Here are some of the images I took last Saturday.

Artists played a part in recording visual evidence of disease …

Not an exotic flower but a twisted intestine painted in the 1830s …

The famous Hogarth staircase …

The notorious Bartholomew Fair …

Nearby slums in the 1920s. Women were looked after by the Barts External Midwifery Service …

Multi-purpose head!

From the extensive archive …

Some examples …

A happy patient getting some fresh air …

The terrible plague of 1664/5 …

What people were dying from …

‘The Rules’ …

If you want to know even more about Barts and its history I highly recommend a visit to the hospital museum where, as well as fascinating exhibits, you can see Henry VIII’s signature and the Hogarth staircase. You can read more about it in my Little Museum blog.

After viewing the Guildhall Yard display, you can stroll along to the Guildhall Art Gallery …

Here you will find Pomp and Circumstance Adversus, a painting by Dan Llywelyn Hall (b.1980) depicting the recent Coronation …

In more detail …

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A wander around Whitecross Street and Old Street (plus my old record collection!)

By The City Gent

On 16th February 2023

In Architecture, Art, Commerce, Memorials, Religion, Social History

To start with I lingered among the street-food stalls that appear every weekday and seem to do a roaring trade now that City workers are back (even though many of them only come in Tuesdays to Thursdays).

My favourite stand …

Lots more to choose from …

Some are award winners!

Spring by Jimmy C – nice to see this mural without cars parked in front of it …

Miaow!

More street art …

One of my favourites ..

Made me smile …

The following words in italics come from the St Luke’s Conservation area document. The images are mine.

Central and pivotal to the conservation area St. Luke’s Church, dating from
1733, designed by John James and Nicholas Hawksmoor, is one of London’s
most important churches.

The church is now refurbished as a rehearsal,concert and education centre for the London Symphony Orchestra. The unusual obelisk spire is a major local landmark, with important views downWhitecross Street.

Surrounding the church is the churchyard and burial ground, now a public open space, with fine plane trees, railings and tombs.

Fronting onto these spaces are several important groups of Georgian and Victorian buildings which are of architectural and historic interest and which contribute to the setting of the church.

There is a tomb in the churchyard which is often described as the family tomb of William Caslon (1692-1766) …

He was the first major letter founder in London and, nearly three centuries later, remains the pre-eminent letter founder this country has produced. Before Caslon, there was little letter founding in Britain and most type was imported – even Shakespeare’s First Folio was printed with French type. But Caslon’s achievement was to realise designs and produce type which have been widely used ever since. And it all happened here, around the eastern fringes of the City of London. The Caslon family tomb stood just yards from where William Caslon started his first letter foundry in Helmet Row in 1727.

Here is a specimen of his typefaces from 1734 …

There is a special edition of the *Spitalfields Life* blog devoted just to him – *William Caslon, Letter Founder*.

However, when I looked more closely at the tomb inscription, the name I saw was Thomas Hanbey …

A mystery!

But here’s a quote from The Typefoundry blog of December 2007 (my emphasis) …

‘T. B. Reed … wrote that the Caslon tomb was kept in repair by a bequest from Mary Hanbey, daughter of William Caslon I, who died in January 1797. In fact it is clear from her will that the present tomb, which she paid for, replaced the original monument of the Caslon family, and was dedicated to her husband Thomas Hanbey, who had been born in Sheffield and died in 1786. He was a Liveryman of the Ironmongers’ Company and Master of the Company in 1775 …’

In any event, hopefully the remains of the remarkable Mr Caslon are still there somewhere, so I shall keep my tribute to him in this blog.

The church spire was topped by an unusual weather vane depicting the head of a dragon with a fiery comet-like tail. Apparently this was misinterpreted locally as a louse, and by the mid-20th century had gained the church the nickname ‘lousy St Luke’s’ …

Parish Boundary bollard for ‘St Luke’s Middlesex’ …

Walking east along Old street, look up for the Salvation Army ghost sign …

‘Hostel for working men. Cheap beds and food’.

And finally, number 116, now appropriately renamed Stylus, used to be the Margolin Gramophone Company factory …

They manufactured the Dansette record player – a name very familiar to us baby-boomers …

I had a portable one just like this …

Cool!!!

In those days I could pop some of my vinyl collection into a handy little carrying case and take it when visiting friends. And, guess what, I still have it! …

And there are still records in it …

It was my mum who liked The Bachelors, honest.

This was a very controversial 1965 hit around the world …

Listen to it and you will see why. It was the time of the Vietnam War and the year when Martin Luther King organised a march from Selma to Birmingham, Alabama, which began on 7 March 1965 with around 600 marchers taking part. When the marchers reached the outskirts of Selma they were attacked by state troopers and local police.

Here’s a link to the recording along with video footage.

The Wikipedia link about the song can be found here.

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The Great Tooley Street Fire.

By The City Gent

On 26th January 2023

In Memorials, Social History

Last week I said I would write more about the man commemorated on this plaque and the terrible event that prompted his bravery …

Here’s the memorial in close up …

It records the death of James Braidwood, Superintendent of the London Fire Brigade and reads : To the memory of James Braidwood, superintendent of the London Fire Brigade, who was killed near this spot in the execution of his duty at the great fire on 22nd June 1861.

The inscription is inside a laurel wreath in front of a burning building. A hose snakes from the building over the top of the wreath and coils up at the bottom right while over at the left rests a fireman’s helmet. The imagery includes a fire engine wheel and an axe.

The words on the flat support read as follows : A just man and one that feared god, of good report among all the nation.
Erected by the M. or Southwark Division of the Metropolitan Police.
(Beneath the support)
S. H. Gardiner, New Kent Road

The quote is from the Bible, Acts 10:22.

James Braidwood (1800–1861) …

If you had been in London on Saturday 22nd June 1861, you may well have been tempted to make your way, with thousands of other sightseers, to watch the Tooley Street Fire burn its way from Cotton’s Wharf, which was eventually destroyed, through to Hay’s and other wharfs and warehouses to Tooley Street shops.

Omnibuses were packed: ‘Men were struggling for places on them, offering three and four times the fare for standing room on the roofs, to cross London Bridge‘ and: ‘...every inch of room on London Bridge was crowded with thousands and thousands of excited faces’. Also reported: “Peripatetic vendors of ginger beer, fruit and other cheap refreshments abounded and were sold out half a dozen times over. Public houses, in defiance of Acts of Parliament kept open all night long, and did a roaring trade‘.

It is estimated some 30,000 spectators came from all over the city. By late evening the fire stretched from London Bridge to Custom House. Properties destroyed included offices, an American steamer, four sailing boats and many barges as ‘..burning oil and tallow poured in cascades from the wharfs and flowed out blazing on the river‘.

The following print from the time gives an impression of the scale and ferocity of the fire. The southern tip of London Bridge can just be seen on the right edge of the print …

Image credit: London Metropolitan Archives, City of London: catalogue ref: p5354642

The river is full of boats carrying spectators, and I suspect the watermen of the river found it very profitable to give people a close up view of the fire, although this could be dangerous. Look at the larger boat on the left edge of the print. A fire has started onboard and a figure is seen jumping into the river from the vessel.

The fire as viewed from Tooley Street …

There were a number of casualties during the fire. Five men who were in a boat collecting tallow floating on the river were either burnt to death or drowned when their boat caught fire. A number of men working in the area of the warehouses fell into the river and drowned. Those suffering burns were taken to St Thomas’s Hospital, which also included a man who had his neck broken when the chain from a fire boat was caught around his neck.

The memorial in Tooley Street records the name of the most high profile casualty – the Superintendent of the London Fire Brigade Mr James Braidwood. The jury at the inquest heard that he had been in among his fire fighters handing out brandy and encouragement when the wall fell on him, killing him instantly.

The following report details the circumstances of his death:

‘Mr Braidwood, who had visited the men several times, was engaged in giving them some refreshment, when, all of a sudden, a terrific explosion occurred. In an instant it was seen that the whole frontage of the second warehouse was coming down, falling outwards into the avenue. Mr Henderson, the foreman of the southern district of the brigade, who was standing within a few paces of Mr Braidwood, shouted for all to run. The men dropped their hose branches. Two, with Mr Henderson escaped by the front gateway, and the others ran in the opposite direction on to the wharf where they jumped into the river. Mr Braidwood made an effort to follow Mr Henderson, but was struck down by the upper part of the wall, and buried beneath some tons of brickwork. His death must have been instantaneous. Several of his men rushed to extricate him, hopeless as the task was, but another explosion happening, they were compelled to fly. The sad fate of their chief had a most depressing effect upon all, and, to add to their trouble, the conflagration now assumed a most awful ascendancy’.

His funeral procession …

James Braidwood was buried at Abney Park Cemetery on 29 June 1861.

He left a widow and six children. His wife had already suffered a similar bereavement as a son from a previous marriage had died fighting a fire in Blackfriars Road in 1855 and Braidwood was buried next to him. The funeral procession was almost a mile and a half in length and, as well as the London Fire Brigade, there were members of the City and Metropolitan Police forces, members of the remaining private fire-brigades, along with many prominent persons of mid Victorian London.

As a mark of respect, every church in the city rang its bells. The buttons and epaulets from his tunic were removed and were distributed to the firefighters of the The London Fire Engine Establishment.

Braidwood was a truly remarkable man whose thoughts about fire fighting and, most importantly, fire prevention were way ahead of his time. For example, fire spread quickly throughout the warehouses as the iron fire doors, which separated many of the storage rooms, had been left open. It is believed if they had been closed, as recommended by Braidwood, the fire may have burnt out, avoiding disaster.

I have found researching this episode in London’s history to be absolutely fascinating. If you find yourself in Tooley Street, glance up at the memorial to remember the Great Tooley Street Fire and the Superintendent of the London Fire Brigade, Mr James Braidwood.

Here are my sources – I hope you find browsing them interesting :

A London Inheritance (excellent as usual).

The London Fire Brigade website.

James Braidwood – Pioneer of Modern Firefighting.

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Lots to see at the Guildhall Art Gallery – William the Conqueror, Peabody Buildings, the regulation of bread and Lord Mayors’ Shows.

By The City Gent

On 12th January 2023

In Art, Maps, Social History

Visiting the Guildhall Art Gallery is always a treat. Exhibitions change all the time and, tucked away near the cloakroom, is the small City of London Heritage Gallery, which is free to enter.

There are not many exhibits but they are usually all fascinating.

Seek out this little display. It contains the William Charter of 1067, the City of London’s oldest document, which tells us what happened when William I reached London after the Battle of Hastings …

Written on vellum (parchment) in Old English, it measures just six inches by one-and-a-half inches. It also comes complete with one of the earliest surviving seals from William the Conqueror’s reign …

Translated into modern English, the Charter reads as follows:

‘William the king, friendly salutes William the bishop and Godfrey the portreeve and all the burgesses within London both French and English. And I declare that I grant you to be all law-worthy, as you were in the days of King Edward; And I grant that every child shall be his father’s heir, after his father’s days; And I will not suffer any person to do you wrong; God keep you.’

City of London historians point out that one of the citizens’ primary concerns, as expressed by the words – “And I grant that every child shall be his father’s heir, after his father’s days” – was to ensure that their property handed down to the son and heir, rather than attracting the interest of the Crown.

Nearby there’s a cabinet dedicated to the great philanthropist George Peabody (1795-1869). In retirement he devoted himself to charitable causes setting up a trust, the Peabody Donation Fund, to assist ‘the honest and industrious poor of London’. The Peabody Trustees would use the fund to provide ‘cheap, clean, well-drained and healthful dwellings for the poor’ with the first donation being made in 1862. The exhibition contains an illustration of the estate at Clapham Junction …

My ‘local’ estate is the one on Whitecross Street and dates from 1883 – the design is very typical Peabody, with honey coloured bricks and a pared down Italianate style …

Here he sits, looking pretty relaxed, at the northern end of the Royal Exchange Buildings …

You can read more about him here in my blog City Living.

The Assize of Bread and Ale was a 13th-century law which regulated the price, weight and quality of the bread and beer. This medieval custumal (collection of customs) has drawings of bakers at work and others being punished for selling underweight loaves …

The punishment for the first offence was to be dragged through the city with the offending loaf around the person’s neck …

Incidentally, a second offence punishment was to be put in the pillory for an hour …

This may not sound like much but in addition to being jeered and mocked, those in the pillory might be pelted with rotten food, mud, offal, dead animals, and animal excrement. Sometimes people were killed or maimed in the pillory because crowds could get too violent and pelt the offender with stones, bricks and other dangerous objects.

On committing a third offence the baker’s oven was pulled down. This was the end of the person’s business, so unless someone bailed them out, they would be destitute.

The legislation was continually updated as this poster from 1905 illustrates …

At the Gallery there are films running showing, among other scenes, glimpses of the 1960 Lord Mayor’s show …

There are two paintings of a show near the main gallery entrance. This is 12:18 and 10 seconds (2010) by Carl Laubin …

The other is one of my favourites, William Logsdail’s painting entitled The Ninth of November 1888 …

Although it’s the Lord Mayor’s procession in this picture he is nowhere to be seen and the artist has concentrated on the liveried beadles (who he actually painted in his studio)…

… and the people in the crowd …

There is a minstrel in blackface with his banjo and next to him a little boy is nicking an orange from the old lady’s basket. On the right of the picture the man in the brown hat, next to the soldier with the very pale face, is Logsdail’s friend the painter Sir James Whitehead.

Naughty boy!

It’s a sobering thought that, not far away in the East End that afternoon, police were discovering the body of Mary Kelly, believed to be the last of Jack the Ripper’s victims.

By the way, the Heritage room also has on permanent display a back lit illustration of the famous Agas Map …

I have spent ages looking at it spotting street names that still exist today and open speces like Moorfields …

You’ll find an interactive version here, have fun exploring it.

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A wander near the Tower of London. Windmill Girls and Waterways.

By The City Gent

On 1st December 2022

In Architecture, City Symbols, Sculpture, Social History

Visitors to the Tower looking down towards the river probably don’t give a second thought to this little strip of sand …

Here it is as seen from the cruise boat access bridge …

People had walked on the Thames foreshore for thousands of years but Tower Beach, as it was known, was created in 1934 by bringing 1,500 barge loads of sand to the site. When it was officially opened, King George V decreed that the beach was to be used by the children of London, and that they should be given ‘free access forever’.

Take a look at these wonderful images starting with the lovely girls from the famous Windmill Theatre …

East end lads having a great time …

Sadly it had to be closed in 1971 because of the danger of pollution to bathers.

You can see more if you click on this link to the article the images come from in the MailOnline.

This exciting sculpture, Girl With a Dolphin, was created in 1972 by David Wynne …

It looks even better when its water fountain is working.

I know not everyone likes The Shard but I appreciate the way it mirrors the sky, especially on a stormy day …

That’s the well-camouflaged HMS Belfast in the foreground.

St Katharine Docks opened on the 25th October 1828 and this painting shows the first ships entering during the opening ceremony …

The docks as they appeared in full operation …

These formidable lock gates are still in place and fully functioning …

St Katharine, a 4th century aristocrat, refused to marry the Emperor Maximilian and was punished by being tortured on a spiked wheel before being beheaded. Her usual symbols are a wheel and a book, and may also include the more general symbols of the virgin martyr, a crown and a sword. The saint on this plaque has two appropriate extra symbols: the water and the Tower …

You will see her portrayed throughout the area …

Posh flats and yachts …

You can glimpse The Gherkin and The Scalpel in the background …

Ivory House, designed by George Aitchison & Son in 1853, is the only
original warehouse still standing in St Katharine Docks today. It gets its name because of the vast amount of ivory that passed through it. At its
peak in the 1870s, nearly 200 tons of ivory was stored annually. Apart from the ivory, other luxury imports were stored such as perfume, shells, marble,
carpets, spices and wine. The London docks were the world’s greatest concentration of portable wealth …

Note the thickness and height of the walls lining the street – serious security …

Across the river is Butlers Wharf, once used to store vast quantities of tea …

The sculptress Paula Haughney has a number of her works on display around the area which have as their theme the merchandise which used to be unloaded here. The stones used for these sculptures were part of the original dock. You’ll find a guide to where they are and their titles here …

This sundial was created by Wendy Taylor …

The work has reminders of the dock’s past. The chains which support it are reminiscent of anchor chains. The ring of the sundial is a giant washer. The central gnomon is an enlarged nail.

Get your souvenirs here …

As I left the area and walked towards Tower Hill Station I noticed this curious building …

The London Hydraulic Power Company was established in 1868 to install a hydraulic power network in London. This expanded to cover most of central London at its peak, before being replaced by electricity, with the final pump house closing in 1977. This is the entrance to the Tower Subway which was originally an old pedestrian tunnel the Company bought to carry power under the Thames …

Just before I reached the station I noticed the Armistice Day wreaths left at the Tower Hill memorial. It commemorates more than 36,000 Merchant sailors who have no grave but the sea …

I also paused by the site of the old scaffold …

I have written about both memorials before in a blog entitled The Tower Hill Memorials – wars and executions.

Finally, just around the corner is this site …

I peeped through the railings …

The Royal Mint in its heyday …

This will now be the site of the new Chinese Embassy since its purchase in 2018. This has proved controversial and you can read more here and view plans here.

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At the Museum of the Order of St John. How a drowned lady gained immortality.

By The City Gent

On 3rd November 2022

In Architecture, Art, Religion, Social History

Consider this lady’s beautiful serene face …

Known as L‘Inconnue de la Seine, read on further in the blog to discover her story and how she became world famous.

One has to acknowledge that, when walking through Clerkenwell, this building comes as a bit of a surprise …

The plaque reveals its history …

The museum that now occupies the building is a treat and entry is free. It tells the fascinating story of this famous organisation, from its origins in Jerusalem over 900 years ago to today’s modern St John Ambulance service. I only visited a small part of the museum so will be returning and aiming to take part in a guided tour.

The first exhibits you see…

The Order’s motto today is Pro Fide, Pro Utilitate Hominum – For the Faith and in the Service of Humanity. This duty of care is just as relevant today as it was 900 years ago in Jerusalem. The principles of the Order can be summarised in three words, which are inscribed on the central podium shown in the image above.

Faith – Like monks, the first Brothers of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem vowed to be poor, chaste and obedient …

Care – They took one other vow – to honour and care for the sick and the poor …

Valour – Most of the Brothers were Knights trained in the arts of war. They used these skills to defend the Holy Land …

From the earliest times, the Order had female members. St Ubaldesca joined at Pisa around 1150 and after her death in 1205 she was canonised for her lifelong devotion to the care of others. This painting, from the 1600s, depicts her in a pious pose wearing the robes of the order …

I really like this poster from the 1950s representing as it does the spread of the modern Order throughout the world, initially via the British Empire …

A 1955 portrait of a St John Ambulance Brigade Officer and Nurse …

There’s definitely even more of a hint of Florence Nightingale and her lamp in this painting …

These two examples of suits of armour date from the 1500s to the 1800s but they broadly represent the kind of protection worn by the opposing forces during the Order’s long struggle with the Ottoman Empire.

The Turks favoured mail shirts …

The plate armour worn by European knights offered better protection but it was heavy, inflexible and – under the Mediterranean sun – soon became uncomfortably hot …

Siege relics …

A magnificent 16th century banqueting table decoration that once belonged to the treasury of the Knights of Malta in Valletta ..

The Ashford Litter …

A breakthrough in the transportation of patients allowing them to be moved comfortably by a single person.

The order played a pivotal role in caring for casualties in the First World War …

Just one of a number of display cabinets …

The triangular bandage is a staple component of first aid kits with many different uses. In the late 19th century the St John Ambulance Association started providing printed versions demonstrating how to use it …

Also in the cabinet there is an evocative painting from 1917 of a ward at the St John Ambulance Brigade Hospital, Étaples. The blanket of each bed is emblazoned with the eight-pointed cross of St John …

The insignia can be seen again on a red plaque above each bed, naming the donor who provided funds for it …

The Hospital in Étaples was the largest voluntary hospital serving the British Expeditionary Force during the First World War. It had a staff of 241, all from the St John Ambulance Brigade, and was considered by all who knew it to be the best designed and equipped military hospital in France, caring for over 35,000 patients throughout the war. On the night of the 19th May 1918, the hospital was hit by a bomb which killed five members of staff. Shortly after, on 31st May, a second bomb hit the hospital, resulting in eleven deaths and sixty casualties.

In April 1945, Ada Evelyn-Brown was one of a group of St John Ambulance nurses sent to care for newly liberated prisoners at the infamous Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in north-west Germany. Her photograph album is on display at the museum …

Finally, to a beautiful but tragic lady.

This is the face of a young woman found drowned in the River Seine in Paris in the late 1880s. No one could identify the body, but the pathologist reportedly became fascinated with her serene expression and commissioned a death mask. Soon multiple reproductions were on sale throughout Paris …

In the 1950s a Norwegian toymaker, Asmund Laerdal, was commissioned to produce a mannequin in which people could practise mouth-to-mouth and cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). Seeking a non-threatening model, he chose L‘Inconnue and when his mannequin was mass-produced she became world-famous for a second time, known to this day as ‘Resusci Anne’.

I loved my visit to the museum and highly recommend it.

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Waterloo Station – Arrivals and (final) Departures.

By The City Gent

On 29th September 2022

In Architecture, Memorials, Sculpture, Social History, Wartime

Whenever I am travelling anywhere by plane or train I am always ludicrously early and that was the case last week when I was catching a train at Waterloo. I therefore took the opportunity to look around and see if there was some material for the blog. There certainly was.

The station now hosts the National Windrush monument, designed by renowned Jamaican artist Basil Watson. It acknowledges and celebrates the Windrush generation’s outstanding contribution and has been created as a permanent place of reflection, to foster greater understanding of the generation’s talent, hard work and continuing contribution to British society.

The three figures – a man, woman, and child – dressed in their ‘Sunday best’ are climbing a mountain of suitcases together, demonstrating the inseparable bond of the Windrush pioneers and their descendants, and the hopes and aspirations of their generation as they arrive to start new lives in the UK.

There’s much more to see at Waterloo and I shall return to it next week and write more about these images …

My Waterloo research has led me to write about a very different type of station that operated nearby. Passengers departing from here were destined for eternity rather than the seaside.

In the first half of the 19th century, London’s population shot up from around a million people in 1801 to close on two and a half million by 1851. Death was commonplace in the 19th century and eventually the City’s churchyards were literally full to bursting. Coffins were stacked one atop the other in 20-foot-deep shafts, the topmost mere inches from the surface. Putrefying bodies were frequently disturbed, dismembered or destroyed to make room for newcomers. Disinterred bones, dropped by neglectful gravediggers, lay scattered amidst the tombstones; smashed coffins were sold to the poor for firewood. Clergymen and sextons turned a blind eye to the worst practices because burial fees formed a large proportion of their income.

This is Bunhill Burial Ground around that time …

You can also get some idea of how packed cemeteries were if you look at some of the existing City churchyards and observe how much higher the graveyards are compared to street level. This, for example, is the graveyard of St Olave Hart street as seen from inside the church …

Between 1846 and 1849, a devastating cholera epidemic swept across London resulting in the deaths of almost 15,000 Londoners and it became apparent that something had to be done.

Legislation proved ineffective but private enterprise stepped in and a series of huge cemeteries, in which Londoners could be laid to rest in lush, green spacious landscapes, sprang up outside the metropolis. One such enterprise was the grandly titled ‘London Necropolis and National Mausoleum Company’ (LNC), which was formed in July, 1852, with a mandate to develop the former Woking Common, at Brookwood, in Surrey, as one of the new cemeteries to serve London.

Carrying the deceased 23 miles by horse-drawn coach was obviously not practical and thus, in November, 1854, one of Britain’s most bizarre railway lines – the London Necropolis Railway – commenced operations, and daily trains were soon chuffing their way out of ‘Cemetery Station’ in Waterloo, ‘wending their way through the outskirts of London, and on through verdant woodlands and lush, green countryside outside the Metropolis, bound for the tranquil oasis of the new Valhalla in rural Surrey’.

*From The Illustrated London News. Saturday, 11th November, 1854 Copyright, Mary Evans Picture Library*

The Company obviously gave a lot of thought to its logo and motto. Here it is (the skull and crossbones isn’t exactly subtle, is it) …

The Latin translates as ‘Peace to the dead, health to the living’. Possibly a reference to the lack of security in the old existing graveyards and also their threat to health. Just inside the circle is the ouroboros, an ancient symbol of a snake or serpent eating its own tail, variously signifying infinity and the cycle of birth and death.

The history of the company is an absolutely fascinating story and if you want to know more just click on the link here to the excellent London Walking Tours blog.

A new building for the London terminus was completed on the 8th of February, 1902. Here are some contemporary images …

A class system operated. First and Second Class ‘passengers’, accompanied by mourners, were placed in the train first. Third class mourners were not allowed to witness their loved ones being loaded! …

The end of the line. A funeral train from Waterloo pulling into the north section station at the cemetery in the early 20th century …

On Friday, 11th April, 1941, the body of Chelsea Pensioner Edward Irish (1868 – 1941) left the London Necropolis Station en route for Brookwood. He was the station’s last customer.

Five days later, on the night of the 16th/17th of April, 1941, a German bombing raid on the area destroyed the company’s rolling stock, along with much of the building. The Southern Railway’s Divisional Engineer, having inspected the damage at 2pm, on April, 17th, 1941, reported starkly, ‘Necropolis and buildings demolished.’ Although the offices and the First Class entrance from Westminster Bridge Road had survived, the devastation effectively sounded the death knell for the Necropolis Railway, and, on the 11th of May 1941, the station was officially declared closed.

The First Class platform just after the bombing …

The site in 1950 …

By the time it was put out of business after 87 years the company had ferried over 200,000 bodies between Waterloo and Surrey.

The First Class entrance and the Company’s old offices on Westminster Bridge Road are still there today (SE1 7HR) …

Inside the entrance arch (I think those lamps may be part of the original building, they look suitably funereal) …

I caught this image as I walked home across Waterloo Bridge – the ever-changing City skyline …

Finally, by way of light relief, my favourite newspaper front page of the week – British journalism at its finest …

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Founders and Farmers, Ironmongers and Martyrs – another wander around Smithfield.

By The City Gent

On 8th September 2022

In Architecture, Memorials, Social History

I felt it was time for another wander around Smithfield.

The Founders Company is one of the 110 Livery Companies based in the City and was established in 1375. In its earliest form the Company was made up of craftspeople who specialised in brass and ‘latten’ (an alloy of copper and zinc resembling brass), including making ‘candlesticks, buckles, straps and other such like articles’. Membership is now much extended and even includes estate agents and wine merchants as well as bell founders. The Company motto is God, the only Founder...

Their hall is located in Cloth Fair with an entrance in Bartholomew Passage …

The planters outside are dated 1767 and contain what looks like a parish boundary mark. If they really are that old they are in remarkably good condition …

The coat of arms – a ewer or laver-pot and a pair of taper-candlesticks …

Just up the road in Cloth Street is the Farmers Hall which they share with the Fletchers (who made arrows). I do like the Farmers’ coat of arms and motto …

Agriculture can be said to be England’s oldest and most important industry, with the growth of the City dependent on the supply of food to support its growing population for centuries. Whilst evidence suggests some livery companies were active as early as 1155, it is thought farmers were not represented until much later (1946), since they operated outside the square mile, unlike the related trades of Bakers, Butchers, Poulters, Woolmen and Fruiterers.

There is another relatively new company in Bartholomew Close, only granted Livery status in 1992 …

This is its coat of arms which you can read more about here …

The motto, CITO, means swiftly suggesting the way in which technology speeds the capture, storage and retrieval of knowledge.

A hanging sign on Aldersgate directs you to Ironmongers’ Hall …

The Ironmongers’ received a grant of arms in 1455, describing them as the ‘Honourable Crafte and Fellasship of Fraunchised Men of Iromongers’, and a charter of incorporation from Edward IV in 1463.

Two salamanders form the crest of the Company’s arms; medieval salamanders reputedly being able to survive fire …

Two saints flank the entrance door …

Elegius crafted many gold and silver pieces before taking holy orders in 633. He was made bishop of Noyon and died on 1 December 659. Because of his master craftsmanship and unfailing honesty, he became the patron saint of goldsmiths, blacksmiths and metalworkers.

Opposite him is St Lawrence …

He holds the griddle on which he was roasted to death in 345 AD. Reportedly he joked at one point ‘Look, wretch, you have me well done on one side, turn me over and eat!‘. Quite appropriately, he was adopted as the patron saint of comedians.

A martyr to many was the Scottish hero and patriot Sir William Wallace who was hanged, drawn and quartered in Smithfield in 1315…

His memorial nearby often shows evidence that he is still remembered and revered to this day …

This slate triptych, also in West Smithfield, was unveiled by Ken Loach in July 2015 and commemorates the Great Rising of 1381 (more commonly known as the Peasants’ Revolt) …

The Revolt was led by Wat Tyler and on June 15th 1381 he had the opportunity to speak directly to the 14-year-old king, Richard II. Accompanying the King was the Lord Mayor of London William Walworth and, for reasons that are not entirely clear, Walworth ran Tyler through with his sword. Badly wounded, Tyler was carried into nearby St Bartholomew’s Hospital but, rather unsportingly, Walworth had him dragged out and decapitated. Poll Tax protesters were dealt with very ruthlessly in those days!

Of the 288 people estimated to have been burnt for heresy during the five year reign of Mary Tudor, forty eight were killed in Smithfield. ‘Bloody Mary’ was the daughter of Henry VIII and Katherine of Aragon and the burnings were part of her campaign to reverse the English Reformation.

The ‘Marian Martyrs’ are commemorated with this plaque erected by the Protestant Alliance in 1870 …

The gilding is a little faded in this picture. It reads …

Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord. The noble army of martyrs praise Thee! Within a few feet of this spot,
John Rogers,
John Bradford,
John Philpot,
and other servants of God, suffered death by fire for the faith of Christ, in the years 1555, 1556, 1557

One terrible occasion was on 16 July 1546 when Anne Askew was burnt at the stake along with John Lascelles (a lawyer and Gentleman of the King’s Privy Chamber), John Hadlam (a tailor from Essex) and John Hemsley (a former Franciscan friar). A great stage was built at Smithfield for the convenience of Chancellor Wriothesley, other members of the Privy Council and City dignitaries, to watch the burning in comfort …

*The execution of Anne Askew and her companions – 1563 woodcut* from *Foxe’s Book of Martyrs.*

Anne herself, having been illegally broken on the rack, was unable to stand, and was chained to the stake in a sitting position. You can read more about this fascinating, brave lady here.

Every burning was different; if the fire ‘caught’, it could be over relatively quickly, but on damp days, or when the wind persisted in blowing the flames away from the body, it could take up to an hour for the condemned person to die, an hour of excruciating agony.

The area is now being transformed by new residential developments along with the conversion of many old commercial premises into apartments.

I’m fascinated by some of the old buildings’ textures and features and will write more about this in future weeks …

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An Anglo-Saxon dock and another magical mosaic.

By The City Gent

On 25th August 2022

In Art, Commerce, Social History, Water

It doesn’t look like much but this could be the oldest Anglo-Saxon era dock in the world – it’s certainly the oldest in the UK. It’s also the last surviving inlet on the Thames in Central London …

It’s squeezed in between tall modern buildings because it’s protected as a scheduled ancient monument …

Nearby is a very informative plaque …

The hotel next door has a terrace you can walk around. Look down at the wharf and this is what you’ll see …

A wonderful collection of oyster shells (oysters once being a poor person’s food) and medieval (maybe even Roman) roof tiles and bricks …

There are also some lumps of white chalk. Large chalk beds were once laid down to provide a soft settling place for barges at low tide.

I’ve written about the Riverfront before in my blog Down by the River – wharves, beaches and desperate immigrants.

Another plaque gives the second reason for my visit …

It was designed by Tessa Hunkin and executed by South Bank Mosaics under the supervision of Jo Thorpe – and I recommend you take a stroll down through the City to the river and study the intricate and lively detail of this epic work for yourself. Tessa also supervised the splendid mosaic I wrote about two weeks ago.

Here’s the mosaic from start to finish. It’s a stunning piece of work and rewards detailed study …

Note the little seal waving you goodbye …

A striking archaeological theme is that archaeology was incorporated into the mosaic. Archaeologist Mike Webber led volunteers to retrieve finds of Roman, medieval and modern date from the foreshore and selected finds were embedded into the mosaic: archaeology becomes art …

And how appropriate that we can see The Globe across the River …

Trivia fact: A key sequence of the 1951 Ealing comedy The Lavender Hill Mob used Queenhithe as a location for filming: Mr. Holland, played by Alec Guinness, can be seen falling from a wharf into the Thames and being rescued by two actors dressed as police officers. You can watch the official trailer here. They don’t make ’em like that any more!

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St Martin Within Ludgate – Wren’s least altered church (containing some clever word games and the remains of a 17th century food bank).

By The City Gent

On 7th July 2022

In Architecture, Religion, Social History

One of the most striking aspects about St Martin Within Ludgate is its tall, sharp leaded spire which, when seen from the lower part of Fleet Street, is a deliberate foil to the massive rounded dome of St Paul’s Cathedral …

The slim Portland stone exterior facing onto Ludgate Hill was designed by Wren to be best seen from the side …

I think the church suffers a bit because people walking past are more likely to be focused on St Paul’s and therefore miss the modest entrance to St Martin’s. There is a large entrance lobby (designed to reduce traffic noise inside the church) and you then enter one of Sir Christopher Wren’s least altered interiors (1677-1686) with fine dark woodwork which largely escaped the Blitz.

Look up and you will see this beautiful chandelier or candelabrum which is still lit by candles …

As one commentator has noticed, it looks more like something you would find in a country house or a ballroom. The candles were not lit when I visited but I am sure that when they are, on a dark morning or evening, one must get a real feel for what it was like to worship here in earlier centuries. It came to the church via St Vincent’s Cathedral in the West Indies, probably in 1777: a reminder of the links between the City’s trading economy and the British Empire overseas.

And now to the very unusual font and the first word game …

The bowl is white marble and the wooden supporting plinth is painted to look like stone. It dates from 1673, predating the church, and was previously located in a ‘tabernacle’ used by the congregation during the rebuilding.

It contains a Greek palindrome copied from the Cathedral of St Sophia in Constantinople:

Niyon anomhma mh monan oyin
(Cleanse my sin and not my face only)

The second word game is associated a plaque that was originally housed in St Mary Magdalene’s on Old Fish Street which burned down in 1888. I am indebted, as I often am, to the blogger A London Inheritance who pointed out in his blog something I missed when I first visited the church.

The plaque records a charity set up by Elizabethan fish monger Thomas Berry, or Beri. He is seen on the left of the plaque, and to the right are ten lines of text, followed by two lines which describe the charity:

“XII Penie loaves, to XI poor foulkes. Gave every Sabbath Day for aye”

The plaque is dated 1586, and the charity was set up in his will of 1601 which left his property in Edward Street, Southwark to St Mary Magdalen, with the instruction that the rent should be used to fund the loaves. The recipients of the charity were not in London, but were in Walton-on-the-Hill (now a suburb of Liverpool), a village that Berry seems to have had some connection with. The charity included an additional sum of 50s a year to fund a dinner for all the married people and householders of the town of Bootle.

The interesting lines of text are above those which describe the charity. Thomas seems to have spelled his last name either Berry or Beri and these ten lines of anti-papist verse include his concealed name.

I am a big fan of helpful signage …

… and the communion rails …

There is magnificent carving on the pulpit …

It’s original to the church (1680), made of oak and hexagonal in shape. Each face has an oval panel inlay with rich swags of fruit and flowers carved at the angles …

The sword rest is 18th century wrought iron and is also from St Mary Magdalene like Berry’s plaque. It was seriously damaged in the fire that destroyed the church and is much restored …

Another refugee from St Mary’s is a set of 17th century bread shelves. They would have hung from one of the walls on the entrance porch. After morning service wealthy parishioners would place bread on the shelves for the poor of the parish to collect …

As you can see, they have now been repurposed.

Also on display is one of the bells from the post Great Fire rebuild. Resting on an iron chest, the bell dates from 1683 and was a ‘Gift of William Warne, Scrivener to the Parish of St Martin’s Ludgate’ …

There are four beautifully carved door surrounds illustrating the great skill of the craftsmen of the late 1600s – in this case joiner William Grey and carver William Emmett …

On this one they have (perhaps rather cheekily) included an open pea pod which was a mark commonly associated with the great Master Carver Grinling Gibbons …

Here we are sternly ‘admonished’ to imitate the virtues ‘for thine own sake’ of the late John Purcas and his ‘deserving partner’ Anna …

And finally, these made me smile. Presumably people had been nicking their coat hangers – you can’t trust anyone these days …

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Noël Coward at the Guildhall Art Gallery.

By The City Gent

On 25th November 2021

In Art, Social History

What a pleasure on a gloomy, cold day to approach the Guildhall Art Gallery with an air of anticipation …

Sir Noël Peirce Coward (16 December 1899 – 26 March 1973) was one of the twentieth century’s most prolific and successful playwrights, songwriters, actors and directors …

Entry to the exhibition is free (timed ticket required) and you are also handed a delightful pocket biography containing images of some of the exhibits …

It tells us that there was much more to Coward’s style than just chic costumes and décor. His humour was often a deflecting mirror that allowed him to probe deeply into social and emotional complexities. As a gay man (at a time when homosexuality was criminalised) who also surmounted significant barriers of class, he brought to his art the acute perceptions of an outsider and an anarchic comic edge. He pushed boundaries by dramatising sexuality with candour, and modelled an alternative vision of masculinity. He built a family around him of friends and collaborators, offering fantastic opportunities to women that was rare for his time.

I recall seeing many Noël Coward caricatures over the years, often portraying him in a luxurious dressing gown holding a long cigarette holder …

And, appropriately, the first exhibit you see on display is this dressing gown that belonged to him in the 1950s. ‘They’re so comfortable to act in’, said Coward ‘. ‘And they’ve got swing …’ …

Noël’s famous Las Vegas dressing gown from 1955 …

It became an international icon in its own right following his stellar Las Vegas performances, Coward posing in it with a procession of celebrity visitors such as such as Cole Porter, Judy Garland, Lauren Bacall and, of course, Frank Sinatra …

Labels at the Gallery are clear and informative and items beautifully displayed …

For his contemporary audiences his productions were also visual feasts and one gets a great sense of this in the exhibition. For example, this reconstruction of a 1930 costume for Gertrude Lawrence when appearing in Private Lives …

There are some iconic items and images …

There is sheet music … it’s 1941 and Londoners are going about their normal business despite the horrors of the Blitz …

And from 1923 …

Along with posters …

And costume and set designs …

You also get a sense of the glamorous audiences of the day …

There are some great, evocative photographs …

And the very personal …

Sir Noël after receiving his Knighthood …

It’s a great exhibition and I highly recommend it.

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Roman elephants and Suffragette bread – more fun at the Museum of London.

By The City Gent

On 28th October 2021

In Art, Roman London, Social History, Stained Glass

As regular readers of this blog will know, I love the Museum of London and it’s one of my go-to places if I feel I need a bit of cheering up (and, almost inevitably, I learn something new).

For example, it had completely escaped my notice that the Roman Emperor Claudius used elephants during his invasion of Britain in AD 43. Not far inside the entrance to the Museum is this totally bonkers mural illustrating their use in battle. The beasts look suitably angry at being dragged half way around the world just to stamp on a few ancient Britons …

There’s Claudius on the right on a white horse, possibly declaring ‘missio peracta’ (which Google assures me is ‘mission accomplished’ in Latin). Around the same time a young woman of the Iceni tribe called Boudica was aged about 30.

As Queen Boudica, she is now famous for her 60/61 AD uprising against the Romans. For resisting the appropriation of her property and that of her tribe, the local Roman procurator had her flogged and her daughters raped. Building on the fury of other tribes, she raised an army which went on to capture present day Colchester (Camulodunum) routing the Roman division there in the process. She then headed for Londinium.

Early London was a sprawling settlement, unwalled and defenceless since the Governor, Gaius Seutonius Paulinus, believing his troops to be disastrously outnumbered, made a tactical retreat (i.e. fled). On arriving, Boudica’s army burnt the place to the ground and slaughtered everyone they could find. These skulls on display in the Museum may be evidence of that massacre …

Primarily belonging to young adult men, a large number were found in the ancient Walbrook stream (although it must be said that there are alternative theories as to their origin).

The settlement of Verulamium – today’s St Albans – was next to feel the wrath of Boudica’s revenge as her, seemingly unstoppable, army sacked and burnt it en route to their inevitable confrontation with the now significantly strengthened Governor’s army.

The battle went badly and, rather than face the inevitable humiliation of capture, she is said to have poisoned herself and was buried by her people at a secret location. Some claim she’s buried beneath platform 10 of King’s Cross Station – maybe that’s why there’s a Boadicea Street nearby (N1 0UA)!

‘How’s my driving?’ Here she is with her daughters, driving her chariot, remarkably without the use of reins …

*Boudica at Westminster : picture by Paul Walter/Wikipedia*

Evidence of Boudica’s destruction of London lives on in a layer of burnt earth and debris known as the Red Layer that is occasionally uncovered during modern developments.

Not an elephant but the skull of a long extinct animal called an Auroch …

Up until the early 17th century you could still have encountered a live one (living in Poland). The one in the museum lived in Essex and was found in Ilford where it would have been part of a large herd. Incidentally, Aurochs live on today in the coats of arms of Romania and Moldova.

There’s a great temporary exhibition at the Museum illustrating the work of contemporary London makers.

I really like this stained glass work entitled Gorilla (2017) by Piotr Frac …

And what about this piece by James Shaw entitled Plastic Baroque …

And I love this witty Venus (2015) by Claire Partington …

Pregnant and casually dressed, she poses with a ciggie in one hand and the dogs’ leash in another.

Now some brave women from a different era, the Suffragettes. This is the banner of the West Ham branch of the Women’s Social and Political Union 1909-1910 …

Suffragette prisoners often removed loaves of bread from Holloway Prison as a souvenir of their incarceration. Now well over 100 years old, this loaf was carefully preserved and gifted to the Museum in 1950 …

Read more about the campaign for Votes for Women and those who fought it here.

What a great poster …

If you’d like to cast you mind back to the heady, optimistic days of the 2012 London Olympics, the Olympic cauldron is on display again …

When you are appropriately Sanitised, the Victorian Walk is always a nice way to complete a visit …

By the way, if you are passing through Temple Station and have a bit of time to spare, get off and make your way to the station roof where you will find this fabulous installation by London-based artist Lakwena Maciver. It’s entitled ‘Back in the Air: A Meditation on Higher Ground’. This is only a small part of it …

I shall have more images for you next week.

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Old Street – from spinal columns to record players. A walk along Old Street.

By The City Gent

On 9th September 2021

In Architecture, Art, Imprisonment, Social History

I do enjoy a wander along Old Street – remembering as I walk that it is, as its name suggests, an ancient thoroughfare that probably even pre-dates Roman times. The earliest records of the name are Ealdestrate around 1200, Eldestrete in 1275, and le Oldestrete in 1373. In other words, it was already known as the ‘old street’ when Edward I sat on the throne.

Starting at its Shoreditch end, I always admire the street art surrounding the gigantic spinal column that graces the Osteopathy and Sports clinic …

Across the road is some ‘work’ by the notorious ’10 foot’ character (or someone impersonating him) …

According to the My London blog the guy’s real name is Samuel Moore. In 2010 he was arrested over his work and bailed, but continued to create artwork in public places. He was eventually convicted for committing over £100,000 worth of criminal damage and sent to prison for 26 months.

I love the beautiful civic building that is the old Shoreditch Town Hall …

When it opened in 1866 it was one of the grandest Vestry Halls of its time and its ambitious founders wanted the building to embody their progressive values. Until the 1960s, the Town Hall operated as the centre of local democracy and civic life in the borough and now, after a somewhat rocky time when it was seriously at risk, it is a thriving event venue and community space.

Throughout the building the motto ‘More Light, More Power’ can be seen beneath the crest of Shoreditch. This motto, together with the statue of Progress on the front of the tower, commemorates the borough’s reputation for pioneering bold ideas such as the building’s revolutionary 1897 Refuse Destructor, which generated electricity and powered street lighting in the borough. You can read more about this extraordinary invention here.

Old Street Magistrates Court was transformed into a hotel in 2016 (previous temporary visitors included Reggie and Ronnie Kray) …

Originally known as a Police Court, it dealt with a wide range of business coming under the general heading of ‘summary jurisdiction’, i.e. trial without a jury. The cases heard were largely criminal and of the less serious kind. Examples included: drunk and disorderly conduct, assault, theft, begging, possessing stolen goods, cruelty to animals, desertion from the armed forces, betting, soliciting, loitering with intent, obstructing highways, and motoring offences. Non-criminal matters included small debts concerning income tax and local rates, landlord and tenant matters, matrimonial problems and bastardy (for example, fathers of illegitimate children failing to pay maintenance). There is a fascinating account of bastardy, and its associated tragedies, in the London Lives blog.

The eastern half of the building contained a police station …

It included accommodation for a married inspector on the first floor and for 40 single men on the second and third floors. There was a kitchen and mess room along with rooms for storing, drying and brushing clothes and boots. You really could say there was a ‘police presence’ in those days.

The building in 1974 …

I paused at the Old Street roundabout to admire the Bezier Building …

Unfortunately, I can’t get out of my mind the Gentle Author’s assertion that it looks like a pair of buttocks.

I have written about the west end of the street before, but I hope readers won’t mind if I revisit a few of the buildings again.

Look up and you will see the old Salvation Army Hostel ghost sign …

Number 116 used to be the Margolin Gramophone Company factory (the place is now called Stylus … get it?) …

They manufactured the Dansette record player – a name very familiar to us baby-boomers. During the years 1950-70 over one million were sold …

Dansette production ended in December 1969, following the introduction of relatively cheap and efficient Japanese and other Far Eastern imported Hi-Fi equipment. Margolin subsequently went into liquidation.

Look out for the now de-consecrated St Luke’s church. It was designed by John James, though the obelisk spire, a most unusual feature for an Anglican church, the west tower and the flanking staircase wings were by Nicholas Hawksmoor …

It was built between 1727-1733 to meet St Giles Without Cripplegate’s booming population.

The weathervane is actually a red-eyed dragon but for some reason locals thought it resembled a louse and nicknamed the church Lousy St Luke’s …

The church was closed in 1964 due to subsidence, but the previously derelict building has now been restored by the London Symphony Orchestra as a beautiful space for performances, rehearsals, recording and educational purposes.

William Caslon the Elder is buried in the churchyard. …

A typefounder, the distinction and legibility of his type secured him the patronage of the leading printers of the day in England and on the continent. His typefaces transformed English type design and first established an English national typographic style. Here is a specimen sheet of his typefaces from 1728. In its own way I think it is beautiful …

Caslon’s first workshop was in Helmet Row, next to the church. It has some Grade II listed early 19th century terraced houses, a few of which later had their ground floors converted into shops …

At 12 Old Street is the building that once housed The Old Rodney’s Head public house …

George Brydges Rodney, 1st Baron Rodney (1718-1792) was a famous Admiral best known for his victory over the French at the Battle of the Saintes in 1782 which ended the French threat to Jamaica. The building dates from 1876 and Rodney still gazes down on Old Street …

Some commentators mistakenly attribute the likeness to Lord Nelson.

Sadly the Hat and Feathers, on the corner of Clerkenwell Road, has not reopened after a short time operating as a restaurant …

British History Online tells us that the building dates from 1860 and the facade – ‘gay without being crude’ – is decorated with classical statues, urns and richly ornate capitals and consoles. There are quite a few ghost pubs in the City and you can read more about them here.

I love this old photograph of tram lines being laid at the same junction …

You can find out more about Old Street and its history using the following links:

The Londonist : How old is Old Street?

The Gentle Author : Along Old Street

My earlier blog : Secrets of Old Street – who remembers the Dansette record player?

Don’t forget, there’s an exciting new installation created by my friend Natalie Robinson now set up for you to visit. The display is based on her body of work ‘Reflection: what lies beneath – new maps’ and will be part of the Totally Thames 2021 Festival until the 30th.

You’ll find Natalie’s banners on the Thames Path at Walbrook Wharf. Here are a few images to whet your appetite …

You can find more details of her display here and its digital counterpart here

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Severed heads and serene ladies. Some Museum of London faces.

By The City Gent

On 5th August 2021

In Art, Roman London, Social History

Oh, bliss, the Museum of London is easily accessible again and I paid a visit last week. It wasn’t at all crowded (Monday afternoon) and I was looking for a theme that might be interesting. I chose faces.

Let’s get two gruesome ones out of the way first.

Thousands of Londoners flocked to witness the execution of Charles I on 30th January 1649. This curious painting represents Charles as saintly martyr, his head re-attached to his body with stitches around the neck. The three lamenting women represent England, Scotland and Ireland …

*British School; Charles I (1600-1649). Artist unknown but reckoned to date from circa 1660.**

Also commemorated in the museum is the most famous regicide, Oliver Cromwell, only instead of a portrait it’s his death mask* …

When he died on 3rd September 1658, aged 59, a wax mould was made of his features and was most probably kept by its maker, Thomas Simon. Plaster-casts were made from this original and many now exist in museums both in this country and abroad. Cromwell was buried with great ceremony in the burial place of the Kings at Westminster.

*Oliver Cromwell, detail from a painting after Samuel Cooper, 1656, in the National Portrait Gallery, London.*

He was not destined to rest in peace for long. On the morning of 30 January 1661, the 12th anniversary of the execution of King Charles I, his exhumed body, and that of two other regicides, was dragged in an open coffin on a sledge through the streets of London to Tyburn gallows. There each body was hanged in full public view until around four o’clock that afternoon. After being taken down, Cromwell’s head was severed with eight blows, stuck on a 20-foot pole, and raised above Westminster Hall …

*His head is number 1, the pole on the left above the building.* *Fellow regicides also exhumed were* *John Bradshaw (head number 2) and Henry Ireton (number 3).*

There are different theories as to what became of his remains – you can read about them here.

And now to a beautiful Roman lady who died young …

*Facial reconstruction by Caroline Wilkinson of the Museum.* *The Museum Curator, Rebecca Redfern, describes her as ‘five foot three and delicately built, petite like a ballet dancer’*.

In March 1999, builders working on the redevelopment of Spitalfields Market made a remarkable discovery – a beautifully carved stone sarcophagus, unopened, and obviously holding the remains of someone of exceptional wealth and status. When examined at the Museum of London, the lead coffin inside was found to contain the body of a young woman. Further analysis revealed that her head had rested on a pillow of bay leaves, that she had been embalmed with oils from the Arab world and the Mediterranean, and that she was wrapped in silk, interwoven with fine gold thread. Isotopic analysis of her teeth revealed, not only that she came from Italy, but from Imperial Rome itself. What we do not know is who she was, and why she was so far from home when she died in about AD 350.

There were two paintings I really enjoyed studying. The first is entitled Eastward Ho! and was painted by Henry Nelson O’Neil in 1857. It became his most popular work …

Soldiers are shown boarding a ship at Gravesend, leaving to fight in the ‘Indian Mutiny’ – the first Indian war of independence. In a poignant scene they are saying farewell to their loved ones and it is a very emotionally charged picture. For the men we can only see in their faces optimism and patriotism whilst in the faces of the women we see fear and a sense of foreboding …

The Times newspaper commented …

Hope and aspiration are busy among these departing soldiers, and if mothers and wives, and sisters and sweethearts, go down the side sorrowing, it is a sorrow in which there is no despair, and no stain of sin and frailty…

A year later he painted Home Again …

The soldiers are seen coming down the gangway of their troop ship. The main character appears to be the bearded soldier in khaki uniform with his Kilmarnock ‘pork-pie’ cap under a white cotton Havelock, which was worn to afford the wearer’s neck protection from the blazing and merciless Indian sun. I again looked particularly at the women’s faces …

When the paintings were exhibited together in London thousands of Victorians queued to see them.

The Times had this to say about Home Again …

The crowd round the picture delight to spell out the many stories it includes – its joyous reunitings, its agonies of bereavement; the latter kept judiciously down …

Referring to a giant who was supposed to have lived in the building, this figure, known as Gerald the Giant, stood in a niche on the front elevation of Gerard’s Hall in Basing Lane and dates from around 1670. He’s not what you’d call handsome …

But I like his daintily decorated shoes …

In this tobacconist’s shop sign from circa 1800 a Scottish Highlander figure is signalling that snuff is sold there. He would usually be holding a snuff mull of horn in his left hand and a pinch of snuff in his right …

This version has been nicely restored. I think he looks a bit scary …

I like this lady’s cheeky grin, like she knows something we don’t. She wears a fashionable ‘wimple’, or neck cloth, under her chin …

Over 700 years old, she once decorated a London building. Do you think she looks a bit like Anne Robinson?

This is one of the Civic Virtues who enriched the medieval Guildhall porch around 1480. These virtues were Temperance, Fortitude, Justice and Prudence but we don’t know which one she is …

What we do know is that she was discovered in a garden in North Wales in 1972.

This painting, John Middleton with his Family in His Drawing Room, was painted circa 1796* …

Middleton turns towards an unknown woman and the room contains a ‘square piano’, a flute and a landscape painting above the fireplace. He holds what is probably a sample book since he claimed that he ‘served the principal Artists with their Cloths, Oils, Colours’. The family lived above his shop at 80-81 St Martin’s Lane.

In the picture his four children, Jesse, Anna, Sarah and Joshua pose appropriately. I like the serene expressions on the girls’ faces with the older son paying respectful attention to what his father is saying …

And finally, this cotton dress, emblazoned with the faces of the Fab Four, was available from C&A, a high street clothing shop. It testifies to the way young Londoners embraced the new music and fashions of the ‘Swinging Sixties’ …

Some true fans wearing images of their idols (note the wallpaper too!) …

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*Picture credit Museum of London – I couldn’t get a good image because these items are behind glass.

Why are some buildings on Fleet Street so skinny?

By The City Gent

On 11th March 2021

In Architecture, Social History, Water

I was going to write about the unusually narrow frontage of some of Fleet Street’s buildings but ended up writing a short history of the area. I found doing the research fascinating and I hope you enjoy reading what I discovered.

The street is, of course, named after the ancient River Fleet that flows from its sources in the hills of Highgate and Hampstead down to the River Thames at Blackfriars. A major river in Roman times, it gradually deteriorated into an open sewer and even as early as 1290 the Carmelite monks of nearby Whitefriars Abbey were complaining to the King of the ‘putrid exhalations of the Fleet’ which overpowered the incense at Mass.

I have found two very early maps showing Fleet Street and the surrounding areas. The first by Braun and Hogenberg (1560/72) …

The street is not named on the map but it is the main road in the middle of the picture running west to east. You’ll see fields, gardens and orchards to the north and south west but the street itself is already lined with buildings. It proved a convenient link between the Court at Westminster and the commercial City as well as being an ideal location for printing with the growing number of legal and teaching establishments nearby. The wonderfully named Wynkyn de Worde, a colleague of William Caxton’s, moved to the Sign of the Sun near Shoe Lane around 1500 and printed approximately 800 works until his death in 1535. Many more printing enterprises were founded as the century progressed.

Also fascinating is the Agas Map from 1561 (as reproduced in 1633). To the east you can see the Fleet as it continues its flow south to the Thames entering it at Bridewell. Also on the Thames, between Bridewell and The Temple, is the Whitefriars Abbey but the monks were no longer there to complain about the smell. They had been thrown out during Henry the Eighth’s dissolution of the monasteries in 1538 …

The Great Fire in 1666 obliterated two-thirds of the street and its environs but was halted at Fetter Lane to the north and the Temples to the south. The street layout survived the Fire, with rebuilding following the same medieval plots as before, which explains the skinny nature of some of the buildings here in the 21st century. The plot narrowness is very apparent from the 1873 Ordnance Survey Map …

Here are some of the buildings you can see today that have been squeezed in ….

The one on the right was the Kings and Keys pub where the journalists from The Telegraph newspaper next door used to hang out. It closed in 2007.

By the 17th century the area was more urbanised and much of the remaining open space had been developed. To the north the surviving system of alleys and courts came into being, while to the south riverside land was parcelled up into tenements. You can see the growth of developments in the 1676 map by Ogilby and Morgan …

Already a notorious, stinking open sewer, in later years waste from slaughterhouses and tanneries made matters far worse. Observing a flood during a storm in 1710 Jonathan Swift penned the following lines …

Sweepings from Butchers Stalls, Dung, Guts and Blood,
Drown’d Puppies, stinking Sprats, all drench’d in Mud,
Dead Cats and Turnip-Tops come tumbling down the Flood.

The southern end of the Fleet was finally completely covered over in 1766. I must say, however, that this picture of circa 1750 by a follower of Samuel Scott (1702-1772) makes its entrance to the Thames look positively Venetian. You can see the obvious influence of Canaletto …

A few buildings survive from the massive rebuilding that took place after the Great Fire.

The Tipperary pub, circa 1667, on its narrow plot …

The rear of The Old Bell Inn, circa 1669 …

Numbers 5 and 6 Crane Court, circa 1670 (but largely reconstructed after a fire in 1971) …

The Cheshire Cheese pub, a merger of two 17th century houses …

The entrance is down the alley on the left of the picture …

The house built in 1700 where Dr Johnson lived from 1748 to 1759, 17 Gough Square …

Incidentally, Dr Johnson’s favourite cat, Hodge, gazes at his old home from across the Square. He’s sitting on his owner’s famous dictionary having just eaten an oyster …

No history of Fleet Street would be complete without mentioning another survivor from the 17th century, St Bride’s church. Built by Christopher Wren between 1671 and 1678, the famous ‘wedding cake’ spire was added 1701-3 and rebuilt after a lightning strike in 1764 …

*It’s still known as ‘The Journalists’ Church’. Photo credit : Pinterest.*

The entrance to Crane Court has a plaque celebrating the publishing of the first British daily newspaper, the Daily Courant, on 11 March 1702 …

It consisted of a single page with advertisements on the reverse …

It lasted until 1735 when it merged with the Daily Gazetteer.

Over the next century Fleet Street gradually became more and more commercial and in 1855 the repeal of stamp duty resulted in an immediate drop in the price of newspapers. Readership boomed. New printing works opened up and taverns and ‘gin palaces’ flourished of which the Punch Tavern (built 1894-7) is a good example that is still around today. This is an image from Tripadvisor since the pub is closed at the moment …

Here’s how the Street looked just before Punch’s construction started …

There’s a great ten minute documentary on Fleet Street’s newspaper architecture here, especially worth viewing because it takes you into the magnificent Art Deco interior of the Daily Express building. This has been hidden behind curtains since Goldman Sachs took over the building.

‘Read all about it!’ – 7th May 1937, the day after the Hindenberg disaster. That’s the headquarters of The Daily Telegraph in the background …

The 1980s and ’90s saw the dispersal of the newspaper industry to sites in the Docklands and in other parts of London but some of the old signage remains, next door to St Dunstan-in-the-West …

The last journalists left in August 2016 – they worked for the Sunday Post in the office shown in the photograph.

Do pause at the east end of Fleet Street and look up Ludgate Hill. You’ll be enjoying a view that would have been familiar to every denizen of the City since 1710 – the spire of St Martin within Ludgate piercing the sky between the western towers of St Paul’s Cathedral (although the view was obstructed for a while by a railway bridge!) …

I am indebted to the City of London Corporation’s Fleet Street Conservation Area document for many of my sources and will end with a quote from it, written pre-Brexit …

Today, Fleet Street is a vibrant street enhanced by past religious, ceremonial and institutional associations and its links with the newspaper industry, with one of the longest ensembles of pre-war buildings in the City. It is part of the established processional route and the route of the Lord Mayor’s show.

Let’s hope that its full vibrancy will one day return.

I have written about Fleet Street before and here are links to the blogs:

Fleet Street Ghosts – people, buildings and places from the past.

Fleet Street Legends – great newspapermen.

Fleet Street’s Courts, Lanes and Alleys – lots of snippets of City history.

I have also written at some length about the Fleet River under the title Secret & Sacred Rivers.

If you would like to follow me on Instagram here is the link …

https://www.instagram.com/london_city_gent /

Potato Heads on Whitecross Street (and some Street history)

By The City Gent

On 4th March 2021

In Art, Social History

It was a lovely sunny day last Saturday so I wandered along Whitecross Street to gaze at some of the wonderful art works. Many of these have been produced over the years at the famous Whitecross Street Party. Who wouldn’t smile at this splendid pair of potato heads …

Then there’s a crazy cat with a bird standing on his paw tweeting his love …

A pretty green-eyed lady being created …

And now finished and ‘hung’ …

Laughing heads … Ho ho ho ho ho!

I love the colours in this abstract work …

Spot the bee …

A young girl holding a spirit animal over her head and shoulders by Goya Torres (based on her Children of the Sun series). Read more about this fascinating artist here …

Not sure what this represents but I still like it, dynamic and colourful …

Looking north up the street you get a good view on the right of a mural by Conor Harrington, an Irish artist living and working in London. Incidentally, the church in the background is St Luke Old Street and the unusual obelisk spire is by Nicholas Hawksmoor …

Here is Harrington’s work in more detail. It has weathered quite well considering it was created in 2012 …

Below is a pretty, tattooed winged angel

‘Oi, are you lookin’ at my bird?’ …

You can view more pictures and activity here on Instagram.

This year’s party is scheduled for 10th and 11th July, mid-day to 6:00 pm. Read more on the official website.

The street boasts a number of blue plaques placed there by ‘English Hedonists’ and ‘Mad in England’ …

I have written about the Debtors Prison before but here it is again for those of you who missed it the first time around.

British History Online confirms the Nell Gwynne story mentioned on the plaque but I cannot find another source. It also tells us that …

A man may exist in the prison who has been accustomed to good living, though he cannot live well. All kinds of luxuries are prohibited, as are also spirituous drinks. Each man may have a pint of wine a day, but not more; and dice, cards, and all other instruments for gaming, are strictly vetoed.”

A pint of wine a day doesn’t sound too bad.

The prison was capable of holding up to 500 prisoners and Wyld’s map of London produced during the 1790s shows how extensive the premises were …

Prisoners would often take their families with them, which meant that entire communities sprang up inside the debtors’ jails, which were run as private enterprises. The community created its own economy, with jailers charging for room, food, drink and furniture, or selling concessions to others, and attorneys charging fees in fruitless efforts to get the debtors out. Prisoners’ families, including children, often had to find employment simply to cover the cost of the imprisonment. Here is a view of the inside of the Whitecross Street prison with people meeting and promenading quite normally …

*‘Inside the Debtors’ Prison, Whitecross Street, London’ by an unknown artist : City of London Corporation*, *Guildhall Art Gallery.*

Creditors were able to imprison debtors without trial until they paid what they owed or died and in the 18th century debtors comprised over half the prison population. Prisoners were by no means all poor but often middle class people in small amounts of debt. One of the largest groups was made up of shopkeepers (about 20% of prisoners) though male and female prisoners came from across society with gentlemen, cheesemongers, lawyers, wigmakers and professors rubbing shoulders.

It’s over two years since I wrote about this second plaque so here it is again.

It tells us that there once lived here a lady called Priss Fotheringham who had been ranked ‘the second best whore in the City’. This description appeared in 1660 in a serial publication called The Wandring Whore by John Garfield, which described in some detail the antics of London’s prostitutes.

Described when young as a ‘cat-eyed gypsy, pleasing to the eye’, Priscilla Fotheringham (nee Carswell) was a colourful character very famous in her time. It is thought she was born in Scotland around 1615 and little is known of her early life. What we do know is that in 1652 she was sent to Newgate Gaol having been found in a house of ill-repute …

… sitting between two Dutchmen with her breasts naked to the waist and without stockings, drinking and singing in a very uncivil manner.

In 1658 she was still misbehaving and was bound over by a Middlesex Justice of the Peace for …

… being a notorious strumpet … that had undone several men by giving them the foul disease … and for keeping the husband of Susan Slaughter from her and for also threatening to stab said Susan Slaughter … and also for several notorious wickedness which is not fit to be named among the heathen.

She had married Edward Fotheringham, an odious character from a brothel-owning family, in 1656 and he set her up as a madam at the Jack-a-Newberry Tavern on the corner where her plaque now stands. As her looks faded with time she became more ‘creative’ in the way customers were entertained – you can read more detail in her Wikipedia entry. She made enough money to set up her own brothel and died (of syphilis) a wealthy woman around 1668.

The Whitecross Street area was at one time rather notorious, as this 17th century ballad records …

In Whitecross Street and Golden Lane
Do strapping lasses dwell,
And so there do in every street
‘Twixt that and Clerkenwell.
At Cowcross and at Smithfield
I have much pleasure found,
Where wenches like to fairies
Did often trace the ground.

Nowadays the big attraction is Waitrose.

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City Pumps – more tales of the City’s water

By The City Gent

On 18th February 2021

In Social History, Water

Back in 2012 this magnificent late 18th century pump on Cornhill was in a very sorry state, slowly rusting away …

The pump in 1800 …

*Credit: The water pump in Cornhill designed by Nathaniel Wright. Engraving by S. Rawle, 1800.* *Wellcome Collection.*

Now it has been restored to its former glory (EC3V 3LL) …

*I didn’t notice the cyclist waving at me when I took the picture!*

Two sides of the pump record its history. This is the side facing the pavement …

The ‘neighbouring fire offices’ were insurance companies who made sure that passers-by learnt of their generous contributions by incorporating their emblems into the pump’s design. It was, of course, also in their own interest to have a reliable source of water should there be an outbreak of fire. There had been a particularly ferocious fire in nearby Change Alley in 1748 with many buildings destroyed. You can read more about it in my blog More City Courtyards and Alleys – Change Alley.

The Gentleman’s Magazine of 16 March 1799 tells the pump’s story in a little more detail …

By the sinking of the pavement nearly opposite the front gate of the Royal Exchange a very large deep well of great antiquity has been discovered. The water is of excellent quality, and the ward of Cornhill propose erecting a pump near the spot… What is remarkable, the top of the well was not secured by either arch or brickwork, but only covered with planks.

*The emblem of the Phoenix Fire Office.*

*The emblem of the London* *Fire Office.*

*The emblem of the Royal Exchange Fire Office.*

This is the inscription on the side of the pump facing the road …

It refers to a well and a ‘House of Correction built thereon by Henry Wallis Mayor of London in the year 1282’. Also known as Henry le Walleis and Henry le Waleys, he was elected Mayor an impressive five times and was an incredibly active and creative individual. You can read more about him here and here.

The House of Correction was, according to one chronicler …

… to be a Prison for Night-walkers, and other suspicious persons, and was called the Tunne upon Cornhill; because the same was builded somewhat in fashion of a Tunne (barrel), standing on the one end.

Anyone walking about the City at night came under suspicion since at sunset all fires and lights were extinguished and great peals of bells heralded the closing of the gates in the city wall until dawn. Night air was known to be unhealthy. It was therefore believed that those who walked in it were, at best, eavesdroppers at neighbours’ windows or at worst potential burglars, murderers or prostitutes. They would be held at the Tunne until morning and then brought before a judge. For further reading on the subject I recommend Matthew Beaumont’s fascinating book : Nightwalking: A Nocturnal History of London. You can read more about the Tunne here in British History Online including details of the nasty punishments meted out to women ‘taken in fornication or aduouterie (sic)‘.

I suppose the spikes on the spout are there to stop people resting their bottoms on it …

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is IMG_5713-768x1024.jpeg

I am indebted to Metro Girl’s blog for this piece of fun trivia. The pump in it’s original blue state can be seen in the climax of the first Bridget Jones’s Diary movie, where Renee Zellweger’s Bridget enjoys her first kiss with Colin Firth’s Mark Darcy after he buys her a new diary from the Royal Exchange …

*Copyright : Working Title Films (2001).*

In the shadow of St Paul’s Cathedral this old Parish Pump, dated 1819, bears the name of St Faith’s Parish despite the fact that the church after which it was named was demolished in 1256 (yes, over 700 years ago) to allow for the eastern expansion of St Paul’s.

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is DSC_6732-524x1024.jpg — *That’s Paternoster Square in the background. The pump is in St Paul’s Churchyard.*

From the 1250s until the reign of Edward VI, the parish known as St Faith under St Paul’s literally worshiped beneath St Paul’s Cathedral, using a space the end of the west crypt under St Paul’s Quire. After the Great Fire of 1666 the parish was united with St Augustine Watling Street. The pump was once situated against railings of St Paul’s Churchyard close to St Paul’s Cross, but was moved to its present position in 1973.

The old parish still has a boundary marker on the wall of St Paul’s Cathedral School …

*You can read my blog about parish boundary markers here.*

I’m very fond of Aldgate pump and its wolf’s head spout so, although I wrote about it just over a year ago, I hope regular readers will forgive me for writing about it again. At the junction of Fenchurch Street and Leadenhall Street people usually hurry past it without a second glance, not knowing anything about some gruesome aspects of its history …

There was a well here for centuries and one appears to be shown on the Agas map of 1561 …

After a pump was installed in the sixteenth century the water gained a reputation for being ‘bright, sparkling, and cool, and of an agreeable taste’. In the early 1870s, however, people started noticing the taste deteriorate and become foul. Then people who had drank the water started dying in great numbers in a tragedy that became known as the Aldgate Pump Epidemic.

It was known that Thames water was dangerous as illustrated by this 1850s drawing entitled The Silent Highwayman …

But Aldgate water originated in the healthy springs of Hampstead and Highgate and flowed underground – so it should have been safe.

The bad news broke publicly in April 1876 …

An investigation by the Medical Officer of Health for the City revealed the terrible truth. During its passage from north London it had passed through and under numerous new graveyards thereby picking up the bacteria, germs and calcium from the decaying bodies. The pump was immediately closed and eventually reconnected to the safer New River Company’s supply later in 1876. You will find a fascinating history of the New River Company if you access the splendid London Inheritance blog.

The epidemic was obviously a distant memory by the nineteen twenties when Whittard’s tea merchants used to …

… always get the kettles filled at the Aldgate Pump so that only the purest water was used for tea tasting.

I have discovered a few old pictures …

*The pump in 1874- picture from the Wellcome Collection.*

And in August 1908 a little bare footed East End boy refreshes himself using the cup attached to the pump by a chain …

In the full picture his pal is doing the pumping …

The wolf’s head spout is said to reference the last wolf killed in the City of London …

*Nice that it has survived intact into the 21st century.*

Outside Tesco’s on Cheapside is this intriguing manhole cover …

For a fascinating talk by Chris Dyson about this and other aspects of the City’s water supply history click here : This City is Made of Water.

Also worth reading is this article in Square Mile Health Walks and the Gentle Author’s blog entitled The Pumps of Old London.

And there’s my blog from almost four years ago: Philanthropic Fountains.

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https://www.instagram.com/london_city_gent/

A policeman’s lot* …

By The City Gent

On 28th January 2021

In Social History

I have been looking again at my rescued copy of Living London published in 1902 and was fascinated by this description of the London Policeman …

It may be his painful duty to arrest you and lock you up … but he much prefers to be your guide and champion, to help and stand by you at every turn. At the crowded street crossing with uplifted finger he stays the multitudinous thunder of the traffic … and may sometime later risk his valuable life against the murderous burglar. Whether gentle or rough, he is always the same, civil-spoken, well mannered, long suffering but sturdy and uncompromising servant of the people.

The writer, Major Arthur Griffiths (1838-1908), was an Assistant Governor of several London prisons and wrote a number of books about policing, befriending a number of senior officers in the process.

His words inspired me to go off to do a bit more research and find some images that might complement this description.

It has been decades since I saw a policeman on traffic, or ‘point’, duty and so I haven’t for a long time witnessed an officer’s ‘uplifted finger’ staying the traffic. But I have found some great images.

At Bank junction. An old postcard (I’d guess from the 1930s) …

Another from circa 1930, taken on Ludgate Hill and its junction with Ludgate Circus …

This officer is standing in almost the same place during the terrible winter of 1962/3 which became known as the Big Freeze …

Outside the old Lyons Corner House Restaurant on the Strand near Charing Cross, probably early 1970s …

And what about this great scene. It’s entitled A London policeman controlling traffic from a box at Ludgate Circus on 2nd February 1931 …

Here’s another image from a different angle. I imagine that the levers in the box can be used to control the traffic lights. Boy do we need something similar at that location today …

This short eight minute film on YouTube is a real treat. It dates from 1932 and includes film of Bank Junction during a busy time of day with no traffic lights, just two policemen controlling everything. There’s a wonderful moment when a lady interrupts one of them to ask directions! Click here for the link. If that doesn’t work try Googling ‘London Traffic – early (1932) British Pathé’.

As far as arrests are concerned, my copy of Living London has provided me with one arrest image – a man caught trying to pawn stolen goods …

By the expression on the pawnbroker’s face it looks like he was the one who gave the police a tip off.

This is an 1890 photograph of an arrest entitled Taken in Charge …

*Picture from Pinterest, Dustin DeWitt.*

Apparently it’s from an article about the Metropolitan Police but I can’t find any more detail. Presumably the officers and the person they are detaining had to stand still for the picture to be taken, hence its ‘posed’ appearance.

All this research reminded me of my visit almost three years ago to the City of London Police Museum where I recorded a fine set of moustaches …

The City of London police have been responsible for looking after the Square Mile since 1839 and this exhibition is a collaboration with the Guildhall Library.

Some exhibits make you smile …

The coat hanger joke refers to the fact that the minimum height for a City of London Police officer used to be 5 feet 9 inches whereas for the Metropolitan Police it was 5 feet 7 inches.

Other exhibits are more serious …

Cleverly disguised bombs made by Suffragettes.

And finally some police enforcement equipment …

The object with the elaborate crest is a tipstaff dated 1839 – it was a sign of rank and unscrewed to provide a place to carry documents. The handcuffs are 19th century, the earlier one was attached to the wrist of the detained person and the officer would hold the other side. The ‘bullseye’ lamp for night patrol is from the 1880s and the truncheon, with the City emblem, from the same period.

Villains also had ‘tools of the trade’. It looks like Major Griffiths had access to the notorious ‘Black Museum’ at Scotland Yard when writing his article since it includes pictures of some of the Museum’s exhibits …

In this image showing a corner of the Museum you can see that exhibits include some nooses hanging from the ceiling. They were probably used in the execution of individuals whose story excited particular public interest. Also visible are the death masks of five executed criminals lined up on a shelf at the back …

A number of items on display in the London Police Museum have come from the Black Museum.

*Click here to listen to the D’Oyly Carte Opera Company singing A Policeman’s Lot from The Pirates of Penzance. You will find the lyrics here.

If you have enjoyed today’s blog you may also like to read The Brave Policemen of Postman’s Park.

If you would like to follow me on Instagram here is the link …

https://www.instagram.com/london_city_gent/

‘Living London’ 1902

By The City Gent

On 31st December 2020

In Social History

Where I live there is a space outside the flats which is designated for ‘Large recyclable items’ which are collected regularly by two guys in a slightly rickety van. Earlier this year I glanced at the stuff designated for removal (clapped out chairs, leaky radiators etc) and was intrigued to see a small stack of books which I duly rescued. I would like to write about one of them.

It had clearly had a bit of a hard life …

But its title page told me it might be something special …

This was Volume 2 (of three) of Sims’s series entitled Living London.

George Robert Sims (1847-1922) began writing lively humour and satiric pieces for Fun magazine and The Referee, but he was soon concentrating on social reform, particularly the plight of the poor in London’s slums. A prolific journalist and writer he also produced a number of novels.

Here he is, looking very dapper, in around 1890 …

Sims was also a very successful dramatist, writing numerous plays, often in collaboration, several of which had long runs and international success. He also bred bulldogs, was an avid sportsman and lived richly among a large circle of literary and artistic friends. He earned a fortune from his productive endeavours but had gambled most of it away by the time of his death. Read more about his fascinating life here.

To me, the book is treasure house of descriptions of London and its people at the turn of the 20th century. It contains almost sixty contributions from a host of authors with chapter headings such as London Sweethearts, London’s Flower Girls, Underground London and London’s Dosser-Land. Even more wonderful is the fact that it contains over 500, yes, 500, illustrations to enhance the authors’ themes.

For today’s blog I have just dived in to the book, pretty much at random, and chosen a few illustrations that you might find interesting. Later in the New Year I’m going to study it in much more detail and share with you what I have discovered.

This little selection I have entitled Saturday Night …

After the performance some folk will be heading straight off home but others will be seeking sustenance at the grand hotels and restaurants nearby …

In another part of London, like another planet, people are gathering for a different reason. The book tells us that, within a radius of ten miles from the Royal exchange, there were 692 pawnbrokers’ shops…

For working class Londoners a convivial evening in the pub …

… might be followed by some tasty fish and chips …

This evening meal in the servants’ quarters is rather more sedate…

Dinner at the workhouse probably didn’t vary much from day to day …

Here are a few of the features of early 20th century London and its people that I may pick up on in the New Year.

London’s homeworkers …

London romance …

London crime …

And London’s hospitals …

I like to end my blogs on a lighthearted note if possible and one of the pictures in the book raised a smile. This gentleman selling matches had worked out that a person on the upper deck of an omnibus was unlikely to come all the way downstairs to buy a box. So our creative vendor devised a way to deliver the purchase and collect payment …

As usual, in the New Year I will be walking the streets to see just what evidence still exists today to remind us of those times past, particularly here in the City.

It just remains for me to wish all my readers a very happy, safe New Year in the hope that, with the arrival of a vaccine, the worst of times may soon be behind us.

If you would like to follow me on Instagram here is the link …

https://www.instagram.com/london_city_gent/

Category: Social History