Monthly Archives: July 2015

Swan Upping

Swan Upping is an event which takes place in the third week of July each year. Dating back many centuries, the event has roots in the Crown’s ownership of all Mute Swans (which dates back to the 12th century), ownership which is shared with two of London’s livery companies, the Worshipful Company of Vintners and the Worshipful Company of Dyers who were granted rights of ownership in the 15th century.

Swan Upping is the annual search of the Thames for all Mute Swans, originally to ensure their ownership is marked, but today more for conservation purposes (counting the number of swans and cygnets, checking their health, taking measurements etc.), although the year’s new cygnets are still marked.

Six traditional Thames rowing skiffs are used to travel the river. Two for the Queen’s Swan Marker and Royal Swan Uppers and two each for the Vintners and Dyers.

Originally starting in the City of London and running to Henley, Swan Upping now starts in Sunbury and travels the Thames over a 5 day period to finish in Abingdon. The move out of central London was due to the lack of breeding Mute Swans, with the main area for breeding now being further upstream. The Swan Uppers search the river for Mute Swans and their cygnets and on sighting fence the swans in with their boats, then record, mark the cygnets, measure and check their health before moving on.

Swan Upping takes place in the third week of July as by this time cygnets are reasonably well grown but have not yet reached the stage when they can fly.

My father took photos of the event when it still had a City of London start, on Swan Wharf at the end of Swan Lane, near London Bridge. He did not date the photos, but from checking photos on the same strips of negatives, I am reasonably certain that the year was 1953.

This year, in amongst work and other commitments I was able to fit in a visit to Goring in South Oxfordshire to see the Swan Uppers pass through the lock on their way along the Thames.

This is my father’s photo of Mr Richard Turk who was the Vintners Swan Marker and Barge Master. He held this position from 1904 to 1960. A remarkable period of time to hold the role and the changes he must have seen along the Thames as Swan Upping was performed each year must have been fascinating.

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And today’s Vintners Swan Marker and Barge Master at Goring lock.

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The cap badge of the Vinters Swan Marker and Barge Master is taken from the armorial bearings of the Vintners Company with the chevron and three wine barrels being used. The swans on either side refer to the ancient rights of the Vinters to own swans on the Thames.

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Another photo of Mr Richard Turk:

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One of the 1953 Swan Uppers. The flags of the Vinters and Dyers are very similar. The flag on the right is the Dyers flag and on the left is the Vinters.

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The first skiff from the Dyers arriving at Goring:

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The Dyers flag contains the Dyers armorial bearings which are shown below, and are very similar to that of the Vinters, however barrels are replaced by three bags of madder. (Madder are plants from the genus Rubia and their roots produce a red dye which was used in the dyeing process)

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Swan Uppers from the Vinters Company. On the back of this photo my father had written that on the right is Mr E. Lefever and in the centre is Mr G. Cole.

Swan Upping 1Three more boats arriving at Goring lock. The two Vinters boats at the back with one of the Queen’s boats at the front:

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Another view taken by my father of one of the Vinters boats. The flags are the same today.

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Vinters boat on the left with a Dyers boat on the right. In 1953 Dyers wore caps with the Vinters wearing what looks like some form of woollen conical hats, continuing the same stripes as on the jumpers.

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Today, headgear and striped jumpers have been replaced by less colourful attire, however the shirts still bear the badge of the relevant livery company. The Swan Uppers waiting for the lock gates to open on their way further up the Thames.

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The Swan Marker and Barge Master of the Dyers Company:

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In the following 1953 photo one of the Vinters boats passes one of the barges that lined the banks of the Thames. The reason for Swan Upping now starting in Sunbury was the lack of breeding Mute Swans in central London, however I was surprised that this was only a relatively recent change which implies there were breeding Mute Swans on the river in central London in the post war period. A time when there was far more industry along the banks of the Thames and it was a much dirtier river. I suspect the difference being that the Thames did have many wharfs and gradual foreshore leading up the bank and plenty of inlets whereas the river today through central London now runs through a channel with vertical embankments on either side.

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Waiting for the Goring lock gates to open with a cluster of flags:

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A Vinters boat with an empty Queen’s boat ready to leave Swan Wharf in 1953:

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When swans are caught, the cygnets are marked according to the ownership of their parent birds. Cygnets allocated to the Livery Companies will have rings placed on their legs by the Livery Company swan marker. Swans owned by the Queen are left unmarked. When the parents have different owners, the Cygnets are split between the owners of the parent birds and when there is an odd number, the remaining cygnet will be allocated to the owner of the male bird.

The Queen’s Swan Marker and Barge Master is responsible for establishing ownership of the parent birds.

David Barber, the current Queen’s Swan Marker and Barge Master:

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The two Vinters boats having left Goring lock make their way up river:Swan Upping 19

As do the two Dyers boats:

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Swans are having a challenging time on the river. On the original route between London and Henley, numbers were low at the start of the last century, but grew steadily till the start of the 2nd World War, when numbers fell, but then rising again to reach more than 1300 birds by the mid 1960s.

Numbers then dropped dramatically, down to only 7 pairs in 1985. The significant reduction attributed to the use of lead weights in fishing, these have now been banned.

Numbers are still low. On the route from Sunbury to Abingdon in 2014 there were 34 broods with 120 cygnets, numbers at the low-end of the past 12 years. This year’s results will be released in the coming week.

It was fascinating to watch this event at Goring. Although Swan Upping has now moved out of central London, the Livery Companies maintain the link with the City and Swan Upping now performs the very important task of monitoring the health and numbers of Mute Swans on the Thames.

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Horselydown Old Stairs

On a Sunday morning in 1947, my father is taking photos along the south bank of the River Thames, in the region of Tower Bridge.

I have already covered Pickle Herring Street in a previous post, and for this week, we have walked under Tower Bridge, a short distance along Shad Thames to the area around Horselydown Old Stairs. If we look to the left, just before reaching the stairs, there is a man sitting on a low stool and painting a view that must have been painted, drawn and photographed many thousands of times since Tower Bridge was completed.

Horselydown 1

The site is adjacent to the old Anchor Brewery building and finding the spot was easy, however where the artist sat in 1947 is now blocked by a wall that obscures the view to Tower Bridge and the river.

My 2015 photo is below. My father’s photo was taken from much closer to the wall, however if I took the same position most of the view is obscured by the wall, but it is close enough.

The Anchor Brewery building was restored in the late 1980s so I assume it was then that this new wall was built and when the brickwork on the right was cleaned.

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Horselydown Old Stairs are just to the right of the brick wall and are one of the oldest remaining stairs providing access to the river along the Thames.

If you look just to the right of Tower Bridge on the southern bank of the Thames in the following map from the 1940 Bartholomew Atlas of London, the position of Horselydown Old Stairs is clearly marked.

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To show the antiquity of these stairs,  John Rocque’s survey of London from 1746 shows the same area long before Tower Bridge was built, but still shows Horselydown Old Stairs in the same position (underlined in red).

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When the Thames was a working river, there were many stairs providing access to the river along both the north and south banks. Roque’s map demonstrates how many there were in this short stretch of the Thames. The map also illustrates the amount of shipping along the Thames and the stairs were used by those who worked the river and took smaller boats out to the larger moored ships etc.

Horselydown Old Stairs are one of the few that remain to provide full access from street level down to the river.

Horselydown was the area roughly from Tooley Street, down to the river and along to St. Saviours Dock. The name Horselydown is from “the district of Horsey-down, Horsa-down or Horsley-down, so called from its having been used by the inhabitants as a grazing field for their horses and cattle”.

Two Horselydown stairs were close to the two ends of the area on the river. Follow the bank of the Thames east from Horselydown Old Stairs and we find two Timber Wharf’s, George Stairs and finally Horselydown New Stairs. The above 1940 map extract shows the boundaries of Horselydown well with Tooley Street to the south, Horselydown is the area up to the river.

The fact that there is an old and new stairs in 1746 hints at the antiquity of the old stairs. Indeed Edward Walford’s Old and New London states that “from the corner of Bermondsey Street to Horselydown was formerly called Horselydown Lane; and here, on the west side of Stoney Lane; which was once a Roman road leading to the trajectus, or ferry over the river to the Tower.” Perhaps in the area of the stairs?

Note also that there is a difference in spelling between the 1940 and 1746 maps. In 1746 the spelling is Horsleydown with the spelling of Horselydown used in 1940 (just a swap of position for the l and e).

Horselydown makes an appearance in Ralph Agas map of London published around 1591. The fenced off area close to the river were originally the manor house, mill and brew house of the prior of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem. also known as the Liberty of St. John of Jerusalem. In the reign of Edward 1st, this consisted of three water-mills, three acres of land, one acre of meadow, and twenty acres of pasture.

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A view of a fete at Horselydown in 1590 from Walter Besant’s Tudor London:

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The stars are entered through the old Anchor Brewery building, and drop straight down to the river. Fortunately the tide was out during my visit so I could get down to the foreshore.

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The lower level of the stairs run out from the building down to the foreshore. Note the remains of the paved surface leading from the bottom of the stairs out into the river.Horselydown 8

My father took the same route in 1947 and from the steps took the following photo.

Tower bridge has opened to allow a ship to pass. Part of the Tower of London can just be seen to the left of the bridge and to the right is the General Steam Navigation Company (GSN).

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The General Steam Navigation Company was formed in 1821 by a group of London businessmen and the name came into use in 1824 when a joint stock company was formed. GSN was active in trade around the UK coast and to the near European coast. It also ran a pleasure ship business taking Londoners down river to locations such as Southend, Clacton and Margate.

After the first world war the company was taken over by P&O and ran almost as an independent business, but after the second world war, trade and pleasure shipping was changing rapidly. GSN was integrated into the cross-channel ferry business, the pleasure sailings closed and the name finally disappeared in the early 1970s when GSN was fully integrated into P&O.

A close up of the ship passing underneath Tower Bridge. It is full of passengers, perhaps taking a Sunday excursion to Greenwich or perhaps more likely as far down the Thames as Southend or Margate.

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My 2015 photo from Horseleydown Old Stairs. Unfortunately I did not have the same luck with the bridge opening. The site of the General Steam Navigation Company is now occupied by the Tower Hotel.

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The foreshore at Horselydown Old Stairs is a great place to view Tower Bridge and the river. I also find it fascinating to leave behind the “redeveloped streets” that now run along much of the south bank of the Thames and look at the mass of old bricks and stone work on the foreshore, probably from the many old buildings that once lined the Thames and that are now being slowly eroded by the continuous cycle of tides.

I walked down Horselydown Old Stairs on a busy Saturday afternoon from a very busy Shad Thames, however for the 20 minutes I was on the foreshore there was only one other group of 4 people who came down to admire the view of the bridge and river.

In 1947 the foreshore was also very quiet. This photo looking underneath the bridge to the City has only two other people. A woman by the water’s edge and a man just by the barge.

Note the cranes on the left. These ran along the warehouses that faced onto Pickle Herring Street.

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The tide is further out in my father’s photo and you can see in front of the barge the raised edge of the paved section running down to the river.

Looking at the same view in 2015 (although I should have been a bit further back):Horselydown 5

Looking down at the remains of the paved walkway down into the Thames.

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And back up to the stairs leading through the old Anchor Brewery. The green algae shows the height of the tides.

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At the top of the stairs I found “Rehan’s painting spot” chalked on the wall. No idea who Rehan may be, but I was pleased to find a link back to the artist in my father’s 1947 photo.

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I walked across Tower Bridge and along the north bank of the river to look at the old Anchor Brewery building and the stairs. The following photo shows the brewery from the position of the General Steam Navigation Company and shows the stairs to the lower right. The wall which I assume was built as part of the redevelopment of this area can be seen as a small 3 tiered wall up against the right hand wall of the brewery. It is clearly not original as it does not have any of the architectural features of the main building. The 1947 artist was sitting at the base of this wall.

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A close up view of the stairs. Fascinating to consider how many people have taken these stairs over the centuries to cross the Thames or to reach shipping on the river.

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I went looking for the location of the artist and the stairs leading down to the Thames foreshore, but found Horselydown. There is much more to this area than I can cover in a weekly post and delving into the history of these areas also shows me how much I still have to learn of this fascinating city.

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The Hidden Tunnels Of Charing Cross Underground Station

Charing Cross is a busy underground station on the Northern and Bakerloo lines. Over recent weeks, the excellent London Transport Museum have been running one of their occasional tours of the transport infrastructure below ground and last Saturday I took their Charing Cross Station tour to see the original Jubilee Line platforms along with the tunnels used for station construction and those providing today’s ventilation of the system.

There is so much infrastructure beneath the streets of London and it is fascinating to understand how this supports the London of today, as well as how the development of London is reflected by what is beneath.

The first part of the tour covered the now disused Jubilee Line platforms.

In 1971 construction started on a new underground line which was to have been called the Fleet Line, initially running from Stanmore to Charing Cross, the Fleet name was used due to the expected extension of the line from Charing Cross, along the route of Fleet Street through to stations in the City, including Fenchurch Street and Canon Street.

The planned name was changed to Jubilee Line to mark Queen Elizabeth II’s Silver Jubilee in 1977. The change of name was one of the pledges made by the Conservatives as part of their 1977 GLC election manifesto.

The new Jubilee Line, running from Stanmore to Charing Cross opened in 1979.

Plans for major redevelopment and building across the old London docklands resulted in a change of route for the Jubilee Line extension. The significant developments at Canary Wharf and surroundings and the large number of people who would need to travel out to these areas required additional transport capacity as the area was not served by the underground railway.

The planned Jubilee Line extension was therefore re-routed from Green Park station to take a new route  to Westminster, then along the south of the river, up to Canary Wharf and finally Stratford.

This left Charing Cross at the end of a short spur from Green Park, now bypassed by the new extension of the Jubilee Line, and as a result, the station closed in 1999, with the Jubilee Line then taking the route we see today.

The platforms and their associated access tunnels, escalators etc. are still in excellent condition and are used for occasional operational purposes as well as a film set with several recent films including Skyfall and Paddington being filmed here, along with episodes of the TV series Spooks.

One of the old Jubilee Line platforms at Charing Cross. Still in excellent condition and with live tracks allowing Jubilee Line trains to be routed in from Green Park if needed:

Charing Cross 1As well as running on to join the main Jubilee Line outside off Green Park, the overrun of the old Jubilee Line heads towards Aldwych, nearly reaching the old Piccadilly Line station at Aldwych (now closed, which I visited here). There is sufficient length in the overrun to park two trains and the tunnel stops about 100m short of Aldwych.

The above photo is looking in the direction of the run off tunnel and Aldwych.

The opposite end of the platform looking towards Green Park:

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Sign showing the original routing of the Jubilee Line, when it ran from Green Park to terminate at Charing Cross:

Charing Cross 20The top of the escalators and stairs leading down to the platforms. These were used in one of the underground chase scenes in Skyfall:

Charing Cross 3The next part of the tour were the tunnels used as part of the construction of the original Jubilee Line and station at Charing Cross.  These are entered from the working passageways and it is always fascinating to see what is behind the many doors along passenger walkways.

Inside the start of one of the construction tunnels looking back at the doors to the passenger walkway:

Charing Cross 4This tunnel was used to remove the spoil dug from the station and Jubilee Line. The tunnel runs from Charing Cross station, then under Trafalgar Square passing under the fountain on the right as you look towards the National Portrait Gallery. It now terminates roughly under the 4th plinth at the far corner of Trafalgar Square from Charing Cross. It did run further to where the Sainsbury Wing of the National Gallery is now located. It was here that a shaft to the surface allowed the construction spoil to be removed.

Looking down the tunnel, running under Trafalgar Square:

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At the far end of the tunnel, roughly under the area of the 4th plinth. The end is now blocked, but this ran onto the shaft that allowed spoil to be removed to the surface.

Charing Cross 8At the very end of the tunnel:

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A small side tunnel at the end of the construction tunnel:

Charing Cross 7Looking back down the construction tunnel:

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Back near the top of the construction tunnel showing the detail of the construction of the tunnel walls.

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Each of the segments forming the tunnel surround are dated with their year of manufacture:

Charing Cross 21The next set of tunnels were those used for the ventilation of the working tunnels. These carried large ventilation pipes and other equipment so hard hats were needed:

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Descending down to where the air vents above the working platforms are located:

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A strange experience to be standing on the grills above working platforms with trains arriving and departing beneath:

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Train at the platform from above:

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The other side of the grill, looking through to the passenger walkways from the ventilation tunnels:

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Walking along the ventilation tunnels. Large ventilation pipes running the length of the tunnel:

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At the end of the tunnel is the shaft that rises up above surface level. This is looking down at the base of the shaft. A further tunnel branching off the base of the shaft to the lower right can just be seen:

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Looking up the shaft:

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Again, the segments supporting the sides of the shaft are dated with their year of manufacture:

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This is what the shaft looks like from outside. In a side street adjacent to Charing Cross Station these look integral to the office block on the site but are really part of the infrastructure supporting the underground:

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This was a fascinating tour to see part of the history of the London Underground and some of the infrastructure that has supported past construction and current operation.

My thanks to the London Transport Museum and the staff on the day for the tour.

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The Founder’s Arms, Falcon Stairs, A Brothel And Confused Street Names

A couple of week’s ago, my post was on No.49 Bankside, one of the few remaining historic buildings in Bankside, and for this week, I have moved across to the other side of Tate Modern, and found how echoes of London’s long history are still visible today, despite what at first sight, appears to be a very recent landscape.

My photo for this week from my father’s collection was taken in 1950. As the street sign confirms, it is on Bankside and looking across to a fine Victorian pub. This is the Founder’s Arms.

Behind the pub is the viaduct, approaching Blackfriars railway bridge, carrying the rail lines across the Thames into Blackfriars Station. A couple of the arches underneath the railway can just be seen to the left of the pub.

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Although this part of Bankside has changed dramatically, it is relatively easy to place the location of the Founder’s Arms. The following is my 2015 photo, taken not quite from the same location as the new buildings on the right hide the view of the location of the pub, but using the arches in the railway viaduct and the road layout as reference points, where the pub once stood is now occupied by the single storey building behind the white van. The arches in the viaduct can just be seen on the left.

To the right of the pub in the 1950 photo, the roadway continues down to the wharfs and stairs on the river. Although not a road, this is still a footpath shown in the 2015 photo by the yellow railings. Bankside still curves to the right (although moved slightly away from the river, the original route now occupied by the buildings on the right), and in the 1950 photo, just visible to the left, two cobbled streets appear to be separated by a small part of pavement that extends into the centre left of the photo.

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An alternative viewpoint with a better view of the arches under the viaduct with the position of the Founder’s Arms on the right:

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To help understand the area in more detail, maps covering the last few centuries tell so much of how the area has changed, and what has remained.

Below is the latest Google map of the location. Hopton Street is seen in the middle of the map, coming up to a T junction at the top, with just before this, a small side extension to join with Holland Street.

Turn left at the T junction and the walkway to the river past the original location of the pub is shown in grey. The map still shows a Founder’s Arms, now directly on the river, I will come back to this later.

2015 map

Working back in time, the following map is from the 1940 Bartholomew’s Reference Atlas of Greater London and shows the road layout as it was at the time of the 1950 photo. I have marked the position of the pub with a red dot.

Compare the roads Holland Street and Hopton Street. The 1940 map has these reversed compared to the Google map, and checking on site, Google is accurate, so was this just a map makers error?

1940 map with spot

Going back 10 years to the 1930 version of Bartholomew’s Atlas and it is even more confusing. Look at the same location near the top of the following map and now both are called Holland Street with no mention of Hopton Street.

1930 map

I checked the 1913 version of the same Atlas (yes, sadly I do have multiple editions of the same London Maps !!)  and the streets are both called Holland Street in this version as well, so I doubt this was an error.

So now, let’s jump back much further to John Rocque’s survey of London from 1746. I have again marked the approximate position of the pub by a red dot. In the John Rocque map, the reference point we can use that is still there today are the Hopton Almshouses which can be seen along The Green Walk. These can also be seen on the Bartholomew maps as the U-shaped building where Holland Street meets Southwark Street.

Founder 6a with spot So, in 1746, neither Hopton or Holland street names existed. Today’s Hopton Street was The Green Walk and today’s Holland Street was part of Gravel Lane.

To start with trying to explain the street name changes, George Cunningham in his survey of London’s streets, buildings and monuments gives an explanation for the name Holland Street:

“Location of the old moated Manor House of Paris Garden, subsequently notorious under the name of Holland’s Leaguer, from Holland, a procuress (an early name for a “woman who procures prostitutes”), who occupied it in Charles I’s time. The old Manor House was a favourite resort of James I and his Court, George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham and the nobility generally.”

Holland was Sarah Holland who in 1631 had been charged as an “incontinent women” and imprisoned in Newgate. The Manor House was very suitable for her needs as she said it was “near the theatres and baiting rings, with their wild beasts and gladiators”.

George Cunningham’s book was published in 1927 and there is no mention of Hopton Street.

So that explains the source of the name Holland Street, but does not explain why or when The Green Walk and Gravel Lane changed their name. The 1913 Bartholomew Atlas is therefore correct by labelling the two streets (which were in effect one, looping back after reaching Bankside) as Holland Street.

In the original The Green Walk are Hopton’s Almshouses. These were built around 1749 for “twenty-six decayed house-keepers, each to have an upper and lower room with £10 per annum and a chaldron of coals.” They have been occupied continuously since July 1752.

The money (and name) for these came from one Charles Hopton who on his death left a large sum of money to his sister, and on her death the money was used to build the Almshouses. Hopton was born around 1654 into a wealthy merchant family and was a member of the Guild of Fishmongers.

The Almshouses are still there today. A surprise to walk down Hopton Street in the summer and suddenly find these 18th century buildings with at their centre a wonderful colourful garden:

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The Almshouses as they appeared around 1850. A far more austere appearance with no gardens:

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In 1831 there is a description of these as being “those of Mr Hopton in Green Walk” – so it appears the name had not changed to Holland Street by 1831. By the time of Edward Walfords Old and New London (1890) the name had changed to Holland Street.

Hopton Street has one further surprise. This is No. 61 Hopton Street, or when it was first built, No. 9 Green Walk and is the oldest building in the area.

One of a number of houses built by James Price around 1703. This is the sole survivor and is surrounded on all sides by much later (and much larger) additions to Hopton Street. The changes that this house has seen over the centuries must be quite remarkable.

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The change of part of Holland Street to Hopton Street probably occurred around the mid 1930s.

In Grace Golden’s history of Old Bankside, published in 1951, she refers to: “An apparently puritanical drive has recently changed Holland into Hopton Street, named after Charles Hopton”.

Also, the licensing records for the Founder’s Arms state that the original address was 8 Holland Street and the address was changed to 56 Hopton Street between 1934 and 1938.

From this, I assume that in the 1930s, there was an initiative to change from Holland to Hopton Street to erase the reference to what must have effectively been a brothel kept by Sarah Holland at the old Paris Garden’s Manor House.

The reversal of Holland and Hopton Streets between the 1940 and today’s maps was probably down to it being a very recent change in 1940 and an error in recording which leg of Holland Street had changed (although I cannot find out why only part of the street changed – it may have been down to the Almshouses wanting to have an address of their founder rather than the founder of a brothel !)

Before I return to the Founder’s Arms, there is one further name that persists in this small area. At the end of Hopton and Holland Streets is a paved area, planted with trees. This is Falcon Point Piazza:

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Also, the new buildings to the right of the above photo are named Falcon Point:

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If you return to the John Rocque map from 1746 and look on the river’s edge to the lower right of the red circle you will see Faulcon Stairs, one of the many old stairs that led down to the river.

The earliest explanation I can find for the name is from the sport of Falconry that took place in the Paris Gardens that occupied much of this area, so the buildings and the Piazza both retain the name of a sport that took place here hundreds of years ago.

The Falcon name has other associations with the area.

Between the end of Holland / Hopton Streets and the Hopton Almshouses was the Falcon Glass Works. Built in the late 18th century by the firm of Pellatt & Green, partly on the site of a Millpond (the millpond can be seen on John Rocque’s map above. Look slightly below the red dot and to the left and a small shaded area adjacent to the road is the original millpond. The curve of the current road still maintains the outline of the millpond)

Writing of the Glass Works in 1843 in his History of Surrey, Brayley states that “Their present importance and excellence are mainly due to the taste and exertions of the present proprietor and the employment of skilful hands on materials that science and experience approve. By these means the most elegant productions of the Continent are advantageously rivalled, and in some respects surpassed”. 

Falcon Glass Works as they appeared in 1827:

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As can be seen, they were located at the point where Hopton / Holland Streets loop round, back to Southwark Street and Sumner Street. The same location now with the curve of the road (due to the original millpond) still very obvious:

Founders 9

I have read, but have been unable to corroborate, that the source of the name Founder’s Arms was due to the Glass Works or Foundry as a “Founder” is also an operator of a Foundry.

In addition to the Founder’s Arms, there was a much earlier pub on the site of the Falcon Drawing Dock, (closer to the river, near the stairs). This was the Falcon Tavern which was allegedly used by Shakespeare, but was definitely a major coaching inn, acting as the terminus for coaches to Kent, Surrey and Sussex. The Falcon Tavern was demolished in 1808.

Now if we walk past where the Founder’s Arms use to be back up to the walkway along the river we find both the latest the latest incarnation of the Founder’s Arms and steps leading down to the river, roughly in the location of the Falcon Stairs (I say roughly as with the building of the walkway and other changes it is impossible to be precise).

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A very different pub to the Victorian original but good that for at least 176 years (the earliest record I can find for the Founder’s Arms is from 1839) a pub with the same name has been found in this small area of Bankside.

A rather convoluted story, but one that demonstrates how much is to be found in one very small area of London, and that despite so much reconstruction and change, links with the history of the site are still there to be discovered.

The sources I used to research this post are:

  • Old and New London by Walter Thornbury published in 1881
  • London, South of the Thames by Sir Walter Besant published in 1912
  • Survey of London, Volume XXII published by the London County Council in 1950
  • Old Bankside by Grace Golden published in 1951
  • London by George H. Cunningham published in 1927
  • Bartholomew’s Reference Atlas of Greater London, editions published in 1913, 1930 and 1940
  • A Plan of the Cities of London and Westminster and the Borough of Southwark by John Rocque published in 1746

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