Symbols & Secrets – Page 68 – Walking the City of London

I am always surprised when I come across something that I should have researched years ago but somehow missed and this is the case with the Moorgate lighthouse. Here it is, isn’t it wonderful ..

I love the little windows, the steps leading up from what looks like a choppy sea and the fully rigged ships in the background. And, even more extraordinary, the covering for the beacon at the top of the tower is actually made of real glass (and one source states that when first constructed the light flashed intermittently, just like a real warning to shipping).

42 Moorgate, where the lighthouse lives, is now the home of Habib Bank (EC2R 6EL) …

Originally, however, it was designed in 1910 by the famous architects Aston Webb & Son to house the headquarters of the Ocean Accident and Guarantee Corporation, the lighthouse and other decorations re-emphasising the ‘Ocean’ brand name. Neptune, the God of the sea, stares down at the City traffic (glancing slightly to his left for some reason – possibly searching for the real ocean)…

The arcade facade behind the building on Moorgate Place is by W H Atkin-Berry. More ships under sail …

A ship’s prow cutting through the waves …

And another two Neptunes …

This is a nice image by Katie of Look up London showing the sea God crowned with flowers and, above his head, sea horses charging away from the cartouche containing an O and A, presumably for Ocean Accident …

Looking up higher still you can see even more ships’ prows …

Ocean Accident was taken over by Commercial Union in 1910 and is now a footnote in the commercial history of Aviva …

At the other end of Moorgate Place is the stunning Institute of Chartered Accountants building, described by Pevsner as ’eminently original and delightfully picturesque’ …

Look at those imposing bronze doors …

And surely this must be the poshest letter box in the City …

You can read more about the building here.

The frieze is magnificent and was intended as a grand symbolic depiction of all the areas of human activity which have benefited from the services of accountants. Groups of figures represent the arts, science, crafts, education, commerce, manufactures, agriculture, mining, railways, shipping and India and the Colonies. I have chosen ones with female figures and the first is entitled ‘Crafts’ …

The shield in the tree is inscribed Laborare est Orare – to work is to pray. To the left, two women represent ‘workers in metal’, the one on the left is holding a sword. On the other side of the panel are ‘Pottery’, a woman with a two-handled vase, and ‘Textiles’, a woman with a weaving frame.

Next is ‘Education’ …

The group on the left represents ‘Early Training’. A mother leads her son, who is carrying a cricket bat, towards a schoolmaster wearing a gown and carrying a textbook. On the other side is a student ‘in collegiate dress’ and holding a book, and a ‘College Don’ wearing a mortar-board and gown.

Onward to ‘Manufactures’ …

Behind the allegorical lady, and just about visible, are beehives ‘betokening industry’. The two women on the left represent ‘Fabrics’ – one holds a bolt of cloth and the other a shuttle and a spool of yarn. The two men on the right represent ‘Hardware goods’. The smith has his shirt open and stands next to an anvil. The other is ‘a Sheffield Knife Grinder’ feeling a chisel blade.

And now ‘Agriculture’ …

On the left are two men – a sower and a mower. On the other side are two girls – one reaping and the other carrying a basket of fruit.

I have written before about the Lady Justice sculpture. She looks like she has stepped out of her niche in order to upstage the accountants number-crunching away behind her …

If you return to Moorgate and look across the road you will find her again in the company of Prudence, Truth and Thrift at number 13-15 …

Here’s a link if you would like to know more about the two Lady Justices along with other representations of her in the City: Lady Justice.

I paused outside the impressive building that used to be called Electra House – you can read more about it here …

Looking across the road, number 87 is a rather elegant listed building squeezed between The Globe pub and the Crossrail development …

It’s an early 19th century red brick terraced house with sash windows. The ground floor shop was added in the late 20th century.

Finally, I’ve always been intrigued by this carving near the entrance to Moorgate Station and presume it was part of the old station which was seriously damaged in the War. It seems to show a bridge over water with little boats sailing underneath it and below them tunnels containing underground trains …

My theory is that it represents the Tube train tunnel under the Thames at Wapping. Here’s an image from 1958 …

*Photo credit – London Transport Museum.*

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A trip to Highgate in search of a famous cat (and other animals).

By The City Gent

On 15th July 2021

In Animals, Memorials, Sculpture

Everyone knows the story of Dick Whittington and his cat. Poor young Dick has given up on his hopes of making a fortune in London and is heading back home. As he climbs Highgate Hill, faithful cat at his side, he hears the bells of St Mary-le-Bow Cheapside ring out the words ‘Turn again Whittington, thrice Lord Mayor of London!’. There are several representations of Whittington and his companion in the City.

The first is a stunning window by the artist and glass maker John David Hayward in St Michael Paternoster Royal on College Hill (EC4R 2RL) where Dick Whittington was buried in 1423. It depicts him on Highgate Hill …

He’s just heard the church bells and glances back …

It has been commented that he rather resembles a flat-capped Hoxton Hipster – maybe there is an iPad in that bag.

I love the expression on the cat’s face. Perhaps he has seen a mouse.

I only recently discovered this sculpture in the ambulatory to The Guildhall Art Gallery (EC2V 5AE). He looks very thoughtful, doesn’t he. Times have been hard (note his torn leggings) and a rather unpleasant creature is peeping out from his pile of clothes – ‘Shall I return to the City and try my luck one more time?’ The milestone indicates it’s three miles away …

The sculptor Lawrence Tindall has written : ‘My figure, in Portland stone, is carved in a style illustrative of children’s literature. It shows Dick and his cat at the point of turning again on hearing Bow Bells and — look behind him: there is a rat! My idea with this and the other figures was to lighten the atmosphere at the entrance of this impressive building and provide something for visiting children’.

The cat …

And a rat! …

Although the story is a total myth, it burned itself into folklore so deeply that the point on Highgate Hill where he supposedly heard the bells is also commemorated (and I knew exactly where it was). Take the Underground train to Archway, walk up Highgate Hill, and a hundred yards or so further on, you will encounter this charming little memorial …

Carved on the side of the stone facing the road are the dates of Whittington’s Mayoralties, the three Kings he served under and the year he was Sheriff …

*It also records that the stone was restored by W Hillier in 1935.*

You can read a comprehensive history of the stone and the cat here on the London Remembers website. I recall the cat (made from Irish limestone) being added in 1964 since I walked up the hill almost every day on my way to school. The cat also lives on in the signage of the nearby Whittington Hospital …

And the pub opposite the stone …

Knowing that I was going to be visiting Highgate I couldn’t resist the temptation to book a self-guided tour of the famous Cemetery.

To get there I walked further up the hill and turned left into Waterlow Park. I paused briefly to pay my respects to the wonderful philanthropist Henry Waterlow in the park that he donated to people who were ‘gardenless’ …

*He’s prepared for inclement weather with hat, overcoat and neatly-furled umbrella.*

The entrance to the Cemetery is opposite the west entrance to Waterlow Park and is in two sections separated by a road. Paid entry to the West part gets you free entry to the East and includes an excellent printed guide – what a fascinating experience it was. Regular readers will know that I am intrigued by the way animals are represented in sculptures and memorials and here are three from my visit.

Firstly a very loyal doggie, a huge black mastiff called ‘Lion’ …

Thomas ‘Tom’ Sayers (1826-65) was an English bare-knuckle prize fighter. There were no formal weight divisions at the time, and although Sayers was only five feet eight inches tall and never weighed much more than 150 pounds, he frequently fought much bigger men. In a career which lasted from 1849 until 1860, he lost only one of sixteen bouts. He was recognized as heavyweight champion of England in 1857, when he defeated William Perry (the ‘Tipton Slasher’).

‘Tom and his battles’, from The Police Gazette …

On 17th April 1860 there took place what was claimed to be the first ‘international’ title fight. At 6ft 2in and 195lb John Carmel Heenan, the American contender, towered above Sayers’s 5ft 8in and 149lb as the first round started at 7.29 am. Each severely battered and bloodied, yet unbowed, they would finish, level pegging, tit for tat, their business unsettled as a draw and with all bets off, fully two hours 27 mins and 42 rounds later. The bout was halted when the Aldershot police, brandishing magistrates’ warrants, stormed the ring. This picture of the encounter was painted by a retired boxer called Jem Ward …

Tom in his prime circa 1860 …

Seriously ill from consumption (tuberculosis) aggravated by diabetes he died aged only 39 at No. 257 Camden High Street on 8 November 1865 in the presence of his father and two children. His funeral a week later attracted some 100,000 people. According to the Spectator magazine, the crowd that accompanied the coffin stretched for more than two miles in length and the bier was drawn by four sable-plumed horses. Lion, the mourner in chief, sat alone in a pony cart …

A real lion called Nero rests, sleeping, on top of the tomb of George Wombwell (1777-1850) …

George became a household name as owner of three large travelling animal shows. His menagerie included an elephant, giraffes, a gorilla, a hyena, a kangaroo, leopards, six lions, llamas, monkeys, ocelots, ostriches, panthers, a rhino (billed as ‘the real unicorn of scripture’), three tigers, wildcats and zebras …

Sadly, because many of the animals were from hotter climes, lots of them died in the British climate. Sometimes Wombwell could profitably sell the body to a taxidermist or a medical school; other times he chose to exhibit the dead animal as a curiosity.

This poor horse on a pedestal looks old, tired and worn out …

Once upon a time this was taken to be the tomb of John ‘Jack’ Atcheler who claimed to be ‘Horse Slaughterer to Queen Victoria’, and is described as such in the guide. More research has revealed, however, that he is buried elsewhere although there is a John Atcheler beneath the monument. He is the famous man’s son, who died in 1853 aged twenty-two. The grave also holds Jack’s second wife, Sarah, and his son-in-law. The now faded inscription may contain a clue as to why there is a horse on the monument: ‘She’s gone; whose nerve could rein the swiftest steed’. Jack almost certainly paid for the grave and monument and no doubt intended that he would be buried there as well. You can read about Jack in this fascinating article from the Highgate Cemetery Newsletter.

If you visit the East Cemetery other famous people resting there include …

Malcolm McLaren – Better a spectacular failure than a benign success …

The ‘Great Train Robber’ Bruce Reynolds. The inscription reads ‘C’est la vie’, the words that Reynolds uttered when he was finally arrested in 1968 in Torquay by Tommy Butler, the dogged detective who pursued him to the end …

A very moving sculpture marking the tomb of Philip Gould, one of the architects and strategists of New Labour …

There is also some humour – the book spine reads The final chapter …

The painter and print-maker Patrick Caulfield (1936-2005) was a contemporary of David Hockney. Regarded as part of the Pop Art movement, and a Turner Prize nominee in 1987, Caulfield designed the memorial which now sits on his grave. Brutally frank! …

And finally, of course …

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In search of the Bull & Mouth

By The City Gent

On 8th July 2021

In Animals, Architecture, Sculpture

One hundred and eleven years ago, in 1910, a wonderful chap called Percy C. Rushen published this meticulously researched piece of work …

He was extremely angry, stating in the Introduction to his work that the disappearance of external memorials …

Unfortunately, the ‘sordid tampering’ and action by ‘sacriligists’ that Percy detested was insignificant compared to the destruction meted out to the City’s churches and churchyards during the Second World War. I thought it would be interesting to take his painstaking list of memorials and see how many have survived to this day.

I started at the church of St Anne and St Agnes on Gresham Street (EC2V 7BX). In 1910 Rushen recorded eleven headstones and the first one I came across was this one …

It’s the one in the book with an inscription as follows: ‘Family Grave of EDWARD HENRY and MARY SANDERSON of the Bull and Mouth. Their children: EDWARD died 30 June 1835 aged 10 weeks, SAMUEL EMERY died 18 April 1846 aged 3 years, ANNE HUNT died – November 1851 aged 11’. This started me off on a quest to find out more about the Bull and Mouth where Edward and Mary had lived. An extraordinary relic of the inn survives to this day, which I will share with you later in this blog.

The excellent Know your London suggests that the original name was ‘Boulogne Mouth’, a reference to the mouth or entrance to the famous harbour at Boulogne, on the north coast of France. The name was a tribute to Henry VIII who captured the harbour in 1544*. The name ‘Boulogne Mouth’ was gradually corrupted to ‘Bull and Mouth’. The last inn by this name stood in St Martins le Grand, although there was once a Bull and Mouth Street as can be seen on Ogilby & Morgan’s 1676 map …

The coaching inn was a vital part of Europe’s inland transport infrastructure until the development of the railways, providing a resting point or ‘layover’ for people and horses. The inn served the needs of travellers, for food, drink, and rest. The attached stables, staffed by hostlers, cared for the horses, including changing a tired team for a fresh one. Coaching inns were used by private travellers in their coaches, the public riding stagecoaches between one town and another, and (in England at least) the mail coach. The Bull and Mouth had stabling for 700, yes 700, horses, most of it underground, and the yard could accommodate 30 coaches.

I have found a few pictures of the Bull & Mouth. This is one of the yard, probably painted around 1820 by H. Shepherd (1793-1864) …

And this is the frontage as painted by John Maggs (1819-1896) …

As you can see, the inn had a huge sign illustrating its name and, astonishingly, this was preserved after the building’s destruction and can now be found in the rotunda garden outside the Museum of London EC2Y 5HN) …

*At the top is a bust of Edward VI and below that the arms of Christ’s Hospital which owned the land on which the inn stood.*

Literally a bull and a mouth …

The inscription beneath reads: ‘Milo the Cretonian an ox slew with his fist and ate it up at one meal. Ye gods what a glorious twist’. It’s probably in reference to Milo of Croton, an ancient Greek wrestler and strongman sometimes depicted as carrying a bull on his shoulders.

The inn was extensively remodelled and rebuilt in 1830 and became the Queen’s Hotel, the old sign being reattached to the new building. The hotel itself was demolished in 1888 to make way for the new General Post Office which now displays this plaque …

One of my favourite blogs is Look up London by Katie Wignall. She writes ‘there’s a curious painted ghost sign under Smithfield’s rotunda car park (EC1A 9DY) …’

Katie goes on to say : ‘As tempting as it would be to imagine this was somehow part of the inn’s underground stables, sadly, I think that’s a bit far-fetched. It’s about half a mile from where the inn used to stand and (though it is covered) the paintwork looks pretty new to have been there since the 19th century.

Given how popular Smithfield is as a film location, it seems more likely that it’s simply a leftover film set that’s remained behind to puzzle us curious Londoners’.

Incidentally, there was another Bull and Mouth Inn on Aldersgate Street which also had a wonderful sign. Here it is …

*Picture credit : Bishopsgate Institute.* *For more old street signs see this edition of Spitalfields Life.*

I hope you enjoyed this tale of London’s past. I shall be tracking down more of Mr Rushen’s memorials in future weeks and hope to find some more fascinating stories.

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* I have to point out that not all commentators agree with the ‘Boulogne Mouth’ story, arguing that there were numerous strange combinations of words for inns (for example the Cat and Fiddle on Lombard Street). And some theories have been repeatedly shown to be untrue (for example claims that Elephant & Castle was a corruption of the Infanta de Castilla). It has been argued that the name of our inn really refers to the aforementioned wrestler ‘Milo the Croatian’ reputedly eating an entire ox at one meal after he slew it ‘with his fist’. But why name a number of English inns after a Croatian? I have no idea!

A beautiful lighthouse, the poshest letterbox in the City and other sights around Moorgate.

A trip to Highgate in search of a famous cat (and other animals).

In search of the Bull & Mouth