Author Archives: admin

London Wall – A Location Shifting Historic Street

For this week’s post, I am back to tracing the locations of my father’s photos, and this photo dates from 1947. Locating the photo is helped by the street name, London Wall being displayed on one of the low walls built to separate street from bomb damaged buildings. Much of London Wall today is a very different place, not only with the buildings that line the street, but also the location of the street.

This is roughly the same scene today, in 2020:

There are a couple of features in the 1947 photo which help to confirm the location. I have ringed the first of these features in extracts from the 1947 and 2020 photos below:

This feature can be found on top of the magnificent number 84 Moorgate, or Electra House, built in 1903 for the Eastern Telegraph and Allied Companies, one of the early telecommunications companies that built cable networks across the world.

The two storey entrance to the building, with the dome at the top, and the feature that can be seen in my father’s 1947 photo.

Above the main entrance is this magnificent coloured glass. A figure sits on top of the world, with a glowing orb above her head which sends rays across the seas, where a sailing ship and lighthouse can be seen. Eastern Telegraph was responsible for the installation and operation of a number of sub-sea communications cables that gradually connected the continents, so I suspect the glass mural in some way represented sub-sea cables shedding light across the world by providing the means for instant communications.

The feature at the very top of Electra House, and visible from London Wall is in the photo below. For a company that was involved with technologies leading the global communications revolution, I was surprised to see the signs of the zodiac surrounding the world.

The second feature that helped to identify the location is this two storey building seen at the end of the section of London Wall shown in the 1947 photo.

Although only visible when you are near the building today, as new developments along London Wall have hidden the building from view along much of the street, the building still exists today.

It is the Armourers’ Hall of the Armourers and Brasiers’ Company, a rather nice Georgian building in the neo-Palladian style. Due to new buildings, I could not photograph the Armourers’ Hall from the same direction as in my father’s photo, so this is the view looking across London Wall.

The Armourers and Brasiers Company was formed in 1322 by a number of craftsman looking to maintain standards in the manufacturer or craft of armour.

London Wall is two very different streets. The section of London Wall west of Moorgate is a wide dual carriageway, leading from the roundabout with the Museum of London at the centre at the junction with Aldersgate Street. East of the Moorgate junction, London Wall is a narrower street with many pre-war buildings still lining the street.

The following map shows the location of London Wall today, running left to right along the centre of the map, with the roundabout that forms the junction with Aldersgate Street on the left (Map © OpenStreetMap contributors).

The area between Moorgate and Aldersgate Street suffered terrible damage during the war. A large part would be redeveloped as the Barbican Estate, and a major change was made to London Wall. From just west of Moorgate, the road was diverted to a new southerly routing to a large new roundabout.

in the following map extract, the original route of London Wall can be seen coming from the right then moving diagonally up along the map. I have marked the first third with red lines.

A third of the distance along, the new London Wall then takes a completely new direction, carving the new dual carriageway through a series of old streets and buildings, many of which had been badly damaged by wartime bombing.

The location of Armourers’ Hall is the green circle on the right. To the left, the red circle is the new roundabout that forms the junction with Aldersgate Street and is the location of the Museum of London. In the centre, there is another landmark that helps confirm the location. This is Brewers’ Hall, set back a short distance from London Wall, with the original, smaller hall shown as the blue oval in the above map.

This new section of London Wall between Aldersgate Street and Moorgate Street was opened on the 7th July 1959. As the plaque shown in the following photo indicates, this was intended to be the first part of a major new traffic route through the City of London. A due carriageway providing a northern, east to west route, with the planned Upper and Lower Thames Street providing the southern, east to west route.

The new dual carriageway would be lined with new office tower blocks, and the planned Barbican to the north would be the future of City residential living. This was how post war City planning was based on the assumption that car travel would be the future and City streets were needed that provided easier traffic flow, with pedestrian walkways above the streets separating pedestrians from traffic.

Fortunately, the full east and west extensions of the new London Wall did not get built, although part of the eastern stretch of the street was extended to dual carriageway, but not as drastically as the western section.

The differences between the two sections of London Wall can best be seen by taking a walk along the complete length of the street. This is the start, looking at the roundabout junction with Aldersgate Street, with part of the Museum of London in the centre of the street.

From the junction with Aldersgate Street, we can look east along London Wall, a view which clearly shows a wide dual carriageway, designed to carry large amounts of traffic, quickly through the City.

The buildings that line London Wall, and occupy space over the street are the second incarnation of office blocks along this street, having largely replaced the 1950s / 1960s office blocks that originally lined either side of London Wall.

London Wall was designed specifically for the car, and this can be seen both above and below ground.

Underneath London Wall is a large underground car park operated by the City of London. The car park runs for a large part of the new section of London Wall. The photo below was taken roughly underneath the lamp-post in the above photo.

There is a section of the original London wall in the car park – a subject for another post.

The majority of the space either side of London Wall is occupied by gleaming new glass and steel office blocks. One exception are the ruins of the tower of the church belonging to the medieval hospital of Saint Elsyng Spital.

The new office blocks that line London Wall are not just tall, they occupy large areas of land, and dwarf older building such as Brewers’ Hall which can be seen in the lower right of the following photo.

The building in the following photo is the one that obscures the view of Armourers’ Hall, which is located just behind the building, where Coleman Street meets London Wall (although traffic access between the two streets is now blocked by a pedestrian route along London Wall).

Nearing the junction of London Wall and Moorgate, where London Wall continues into the heart of the City as indicated by the gleaming towers in the background.

From London Wall, we can look across to Moorgate, and set back from the road is this row of buildings, with a large pedestrian area and small green space between the buildings and London Wall, which help show how the area has changed.

The building on the right of the terrace is a pub, the Globe, and this pub, and the other two buildings that make up this terrace can be seen in the map extract below.

Credit: ‘Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland’

These buildings were originally on Fore Street, a street that once ran all the way up to St Giles Cripplegate. Fore Street has been shortened and blocked of by one of the new buildings alongside London Wall.

Fore Street ran just north of the original alignment of London Wall, and we can still walk part of the original route.

I have ringed a section of the original route of London Wall in the following map extract. Just above the word London, is a small space with the words London Wall.

This is the section of Roman Wall in St Alphage Gardens, shown in the following photo:

This section of wall helps explain why the street is called London Wall, as the street originally ran along the wall, just inside the City.

The following photo is looking west along what was the street London Wall, the section of wall at St Alphage Gardens can just be seen to the right.

The following photo is looking along St Alphage Gardens, what was London Wall, from the junction with Wood Street.

The above photo highlights one of the things I find fascinating about the city. Despite the amount of change, you can still trace out many lost streets, and although London Wall has been widened and moved to the south, we can still find the original junction with Wood Street and the original route down to Moorgate.

Returning now to the junction of London Wall and Moorgate, and the three houses on the left that once faced onto Fore Street, this is the old Fox umbrella shop.

Now Grade II listed. Thomas Fox first opened an umbrella shop in Fore Street in 1868 and umbrellas were both made and sold on the premises for many years.

The wording below the FOX sign give an indication of the business at the site today, however Fox Umbrellas are still being made and sold from the company’s new location in Shirley, Croydon.

Now lets continue along the street, east of the Moorgate Junction, and this is the original London Wall with a much narrower street and still with many pre-war buildings. Thankfully the original scheme to extend the dual carriageway of the moved length of London Wall was never carried out in full.

We have already seen the halls of the Armourers and Brasiers’ Company and the Brewers’ Company, and there is a third hall along London Wall. In the photo below, on the right, the building with the Corinthian Pillars is the hall of the Carpenters’ Company.

The Carpenters’ have had their hall on this site in London Wall since 1429. The hall today is the third hall, as the previous hall had been badly damaged during the war.

On the opposite side of the street, old and new buildings sit on opposite corners.

The building on the left in the above photo still has original London Wall street signs. Not sure of the exact age of these, but they must be pre-war.

Just east of the Carpenters’ Hall, London Wall widens again from a single carriageway to a dual carriageway, as part of the scheme to create a major through route, however along this part of the street, the widening has not been as dramatic as on the section from Moorgate to Aldersgate Street,

Almost at the eastern end of London Wall is the church of All Hallows on the Wall, the name referencing the fact that the church is located up against the Roman wall, with the original church on the site being built on a bastion of the wall.

The present church was built in 1767 to replace the earlier church which had become derelict. The church did suffer damage during the war, but was restored in the 1960s, and is now the Guild church of the Worshipful Company of Carpenters.

A short distance further east from the church, just by the green van and traffic lights in the above photo, London Wall comes to an end, where the road continues as Wormwood Street.

That completes a walk along London Wall. A historic street that originally followed the path of the Roman Wall, but now only does this for the eastern section up to Moorgate. Passing Moorgate, London Wall diverts to the south and becomes a large dual carriageway, reflecting the post-war view that city design had to accommodate the car.

However the magic of London is that we can still find the line of the original London Wall, and that these old routes and boundaries have been retained.

alondoninheritance.com

Bache’s Street – An Ordinary London Street?

44 Replies

The inspiration for this week’s post came when a couple of months ago, a reader e-mailed regarding Bache’s Street, a street a short distance to the north-east of Old Street roundabout.

There was not much initially to find about Bache’s Street. I found some details about the origins of the street, and a tragic murder, but that was about it.

Bache’s Street is a short street of about 106 metres / 348 feet. Nearly every building dates from the later half of the 20th century, and there is nothing of any real architectural merit. It is the sort of street you would only visit if you had business there, or it was on the route to somewhere else.

The view along Bache’s Street, looking north from Brunswick Place.

I believe that if you dig deep enough, there is always a story to tell about any street in London, and my approach to Bache’s Street is based on a visit to Chepstow in South Wales last year.

Chepstow have implemented a brilliant scheme to highlight who has lived in buildings, along with the business carried out, along the high street of the town. Plaques in the pavement, in front of each building list the previous residents and trades that occupied the building.

Close-up of the plaque for numbers 17 and 18 Chepstow High Street.

I think this is a brilliant idea. It makes the history of a place very tangible at the individual level, and standing in front of a building, you can imagine all those who have lived and worked there before.

How could I apply this approach to Bache’s Street? Using census data, could I develop a similar virtual approach, and what else could this data tell us about a typical street in north London?

Using census data from 1881, I built a spreadsheet so the data could be manipulated and sorted. I only had time to work on the 1881 census, but following through on other census years provides a view of how streets and people change over time – I hope to cover this in a future post.

Later in this post, I will take you on a virtual walk through Bache’s Street to meet all 329 people resident in the street for the 1881 census. The data also provides us with a view of how people lived at the time and where they were from, so I will explore this as well, but before getting into this level of detail, some background to the street.

The following map extract shows the location of Bache’s Street, a short distance north-east of the Old Street roundabout (Map © OpenStreetMap contributors).

The street did not exist in 1746. The area consisted of fields, formal gardens and orchards. The Haberdashers Hospital was to the east, and the newly built Charles Square was to the south-east. The following extract from John Rocque’s 1746 map of London shows the area, with the future location of Bache’s Street marked with a red line.

By 1828, the fields had been built over as London’s northward expansion gathered pace. Greenwood’s map of 1828 shows a street in the position of Bache’s Street, but with the name Charles Street. Buildings are shown on either side of the street, and the length of buildings on the eastern side of the street are named Bache’s Row.

I suspect that Bache’s Row may provide a source for the name. The form of the name implies it could have been named after the landowner, builder or owner of the row of houses along the eastern side of the street.

Reynolds’s New Map of London dated 1847 still has the street labelled as Charles Street. The street is circled in the following map extract which also shows how the area had changed in the 100 years since Rocque’s map.

By the 1881 census, the street name had changed from Charles Street to Bache’s Street – for some reason, the name of the row of houses on the east side had been used for the whole street.

The 1894 revision of the Ordnance Survey map shows a street with houses lining the majority of both sides, but with a Glass Manufactory on the south-east corner of the street, replacing some of the houses.

The Charles Booth poverty map for the area is shown below:

Bache’s Street is in the centre of the map, and the colour code used for the households along the street is defined as “Mixed, some comfortable, others poor”.

Bache’s Street was explored by George H. Duckworth for Booth’s survey and he walked the area on the 17th May 1898 with Police Constable W.R. Ryland, and he wrote “Only a few dwelling houses at the north east and south east end left. The rest have been replaced by large factories.” This was the start of the change of the street from residential to commercial.

There are also newspaper reports that report on the poor conditions of some of the houses along the street with Aristocratic landlords (Lord Arlington) charging rents for a well maintained property, but which the Medical Officer of Health had found to be unfit for human occupation.

The 1945 maps used for the LCC Bomb Damage maps still show the street much as it was in 1894. Most of the street survived the war, however there was damage to two building half way along the eastern side of the street.

The remaining houses that originally lined Bache’s Street would disappear in the decades following the war, with the land being used for offices and business purposes – a process which has reversed slightly with some of the buildings being converted to flats.

So what can we learn about Bache’s Street from the 1881 census, and more generally about what life was like in the area north of Old Street in the late 19th century?

I transferred the census data for the 329 people living in Bache’s Street at the time of the 1881 census into a spreadsheet, and this is what I found.

The occupants of Bache’s Street were young. The following graph shows the age distribution of the residents.

The majority of residents were under the age of 40, and the highest number of residents were in the age range 0 to 9.

From the age of 40 onward, there was a rapid decrease in the number of people, with only one resident older than 80.

This could be explained by the type of people attracted to the street – younger families, or it could illustrate the life expectancy of those living in the area in the late 19th century.

The residents of Bache’s Street were generally poor manual workers. There were only 23 houses in the street, but 329 residents. The following graph shows the number of residents at each house in the street. showing how densely packed they were into this short street.

These houses were occupied by multiple families, and families were not that large. The following bar chart shows the number of members of each family living in Bache’s Street in 1881 (every other name has been omitted to make the vertical axis readable, all families are included. I have only included family members and have excluded lodgers and visitors).

The largest families in the street consisted of 8 people. The average number of family members across the street was 3.15, so in many ways not that different to today. The families with a single member are typically widows or widowers.

The majority of people living in Bache’s Street in 1881 were born in London, but a significant percentage had moved to London from the rest of the country, and from abroad.

This included 9 people from Germany, 1 from Australia, 1 from Ireland, 1 from Jersey, 1 from Switzerland and 1 from Australia.

I have plotted the birth towns of Bache’s Street residents from the rest of the country in the following map:

People moved from major industrial towns such as Manchester and Birmingham as well as market town’s such as Bridport in Dorset.

Not a single resident was listed in the census as being born in Scotland or Wales.

What is interesting is the north / south of the river split. There has always been a very distinctive split across London just by travelling across the River Thames. For those living in Bache’s Street, and being born in London, the vast majority were from north of the river. Of the 329 people in the street in 1881, only 11 people were identified as being born south of the river (Bermondsey 2, Lambeth 4, Lewisham 1, Greenwich 1, Southwark 1, Kennington 1, Newington 1).

There were more people in Bache’s Street from outside the UK in 1881, than from South London. It would be an interesting study to see if this was typical and whether there was very little migration or marriage between south and north London, and how far that has changed.

An extract from the 1894 Ordnance Survey map is shown below with Bache’s Street in the centre of the map.

Credit: ‘Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland’

There were 23 individual house numbers in the 1881 census and I have tried to align these accurately on the 1894 Ordnance Survey map, so when we take a virtual walk through the street, we can see where the families lived.

The Public House (P.H.) at the top right of the street was the Globe and had an address on Great Chart Street.

The building on the top left also I suspect had an address on Great Chart Street, and the building below this may have had an address on Styman Street as the longer edge was on this street.

The Glass Manufactory at lower right had been built between the 1881 census and the 1894 map, so working down from the top of the street, I assume that house numbers 2, 4 and 6 occupied this space,

So, lets take a virtual walk along Bache’s Street to meet the residents of the street in 1881.

Today, all the houses have disappeared. The “wework” office block shown in the following photo occupies the space of the odd numbered houses from 1 to 15.

Number 1 Bache’s Street

Number 1 Bache’s Street had the most people of any individual house on the street, and also included one of the largest families (the Whiting’s).

Lizzie Bacon is listed as being born in the United States, it would be interesting to know why she moved to London, and how she met her husband Frederick.

The children of many of the residents often had a job related to their parent, for example John Whiting was a Printers Compositor as was his 17 year old son.

Directly across the street from number 1, was the Glass Manufactory in the 1894 OS map. Today, the same space is occupied by an office block. In 1881, this was houses 2,4 and 6.

Number 2 and 3 Bache’s Street

i have combined these two houses, opposite each other on the southern end of the street, as they had a smaller number of people. The Pike family were the only residents of number 2, with the Winter and Kohlsfer families in number 3.

Number 3 had a German family, the Kohlsfer. They were obviously recent immigrants to London as their youngest daughter aged 4 had been born in Germany.

There were a number of lodgers throughout the street and lodgers often would come from the same home village or town as the main family, demonstrating the contacts between immigrants to London and their place of birth persisted. The Kohlsfer’s had a German born lodger or boarder, Henrich Hamer who was a 26 year old Furrier from Germany.

Number 4 Bache’s Street

Number 4 has a possibly interesting tale. Charles Newbegin is listed as a Master Mariner. His wife Elizabeth was born in Jersey in the Channel Islands. Did they meet after he had sailed to Jersey, and he brought her back to London?

The list of occupations also shows how specific jobs were at the time. Many tasks which would be automated in the future were still manual, so for example in number 4 you will find an Envelope Folder.

Number 5 Bache’s Street

It is interesting to speculate on how people moved around at the time.

Take the Cull family at number 5. Elizabeth Cull, the head of the family (she is not listed as a widow, but is living with her children as a single parent) was born in London, as was her oldest daughter and her son. The middle child, aged 10 was listed as being born in Kendal, Westmoreland.

In the 1871 census, Elizabeth Cull is recorded as living in Kendal with her husband Joseph Cull who was originally from Ireland. So had they moved to London where Clara was born, then moved back to Kendal when Kate was born, and back to London for Joseph’s birth (named after his father). There is no record of what happened to the husband / father Joseph Cull – did he return to Ireland?

Number 6 Bache’s Street

Many of the families in Bache’s Street continued to have older children at home. For example in number 6, the Russel family still had children aged 24, 22, 21 and 19 at home. If children were not married, this was probably an economical way for the family to live with the Russell family having a total of 4 members working. It must though have contributed to very crowded conditions and as there were 4 families and the single Elizabeth Smith living in number 6, the Russell family could not have had more than a couple of rooms.

Number 7 Bache’s Street

There are so many interesting job descriptions in the census and in number 7 there were two “Drug Grinders”.

Number 8 Bache’s Street

Lydia Green who is listed in the census as living at number 8 would suffer a tragic fate in the house six years after the census. The following is a report from the London Daily News on the 11th February 1887:

“The victim Lydia Green, an unmarried woman, thirty-one years of age, was found dead in her bedroom last Saturday morning. She was nearly dressed, she lay on her back in a pool of blood, and she bore a terrible wound on the head, as well as other wounds on the hand and jaw. She lived with her mother and a widowed sister at Baches-street, Hoxton, and she and the sister slept in a back room on the ground floor.

Both sisters went out to work, but Alice, the widowed one, usually rose first, and left the house at ten minutes to seven. The deceased woman rose a little later, and at about half-past seven she usually knocked on the ceiling, as a signal to her mother, who slept in the room above.

On Friday last she went to bed in perfectly good health, her mother previously having heard her talking at the street door with Thomas Currell, a young man with whom she had ‘kept company’ for some years. On Saturday morning, just after the widowed sister had left for her work, the mother in her bedroom, heard noises, as of a person falling, in the room below. She heard these noises three separate time, and after them the step of someone walking sharply along the passage and, the slamming of the street-door. The noises do not appear to have alarmed her, and she lay in bed until half-past seven, when she expected to hear her daughter’s signal on the ceiling.

No signal came, and then the mother went downstairs, and found the poor woman dead as described. There were two wounds on the right hand, which seemed to have been inflicted by bullets, though no bullets were found in them, two other wounds on the right jaw, in which were found some piece of metal that might have been parts of bullets, and a wound above the right eye which extended to the brain.”

The article goes on to explain that Thomas Currell had been out of work since the previous August and may have been jealous of Lydia. Currell was known to Scotland Yard and had been twice in trouble before. They were engaged, however a couple of weeks prior to her death, Lydia had wanted to break off the engagement

At the time of the report Thomas Currell had disappeared, however he would hand himself in to the police a few days later, having no money and suffering from cold and starvation. Newspaper reports at the time complained about the failure of the police to find Currell and it was only because he handed himself in that he was caught. If he had more money, he would have escaped London.

He appeared at the Old Bailey during the first week of April 1887, found guilty and sentenced to death. He was hung at Newgate on the 18th April 1887 at the age of 31.

Number 9 Bache’s Street

Number 9 Bache’s Street only had a single family. If I have my mapping of house numbers to houses on the Ordnance Survey map correct, then number 6 was the same size house as the rest along this side of the street, so no idea why there was only a single family.

Perhaps they were affluent enough to cover the costs of the whole house, or perhaps this was a temporary position, as people in other rooms had moved on, and no one else had yet moved into the house. The census provides a snapshot of a specific point in time.

Moving back to the even side of the street, and the building in the following photo occupies the space where numbers 8, 10 and 12 were in the 1894 Ordnance Survey map.

Number 10 Bache’s Street

Number 10 again shows a range of professions, and also how families must have retained contact with their home towns.

Hanna Perman is listed as being born in Hertford, and the family have a lodger, James Cook, a bricklayer who also came from Hertford. Perman was Hanna’s married name, so John Cook could have been a relative.

Number 11 Bache’s Street

Residents of number 11 show how families worked together, probably working at home. James Edmonds was a Fancy Box Cutter and his wide Susan was a Fancy Box Maker.

Caroline Denney is listed as being from Australia. She is 25, has a newborn son, and there is no other member of her household. It does make you wonder how she came to be living as a single parent in a Hoxton Street, a long way from her birth place in Australia.

Many of the Occupation entries are blank, implying that the person was not employed. Occasionally there is a reference to being unemployed, or out of work, along with their profession. An example in number 11 is Edward Wood, an unemployed pie maker.

Number 12 Bache’s Street

An average number of residents, but still with 4 families living together.

Number 13 Bache’s Street

By far the majority of occupations are manual work, but occasionally there is something different, such as William Potts being listed as a Musician, but no indication of what instrument or where he played.

The building in the following photo occupies the space where 14 to 22 were located in the 1894 map:

Number 14 Bache’s Street

By the age of 15, most children were expected to be working, very few are listed as still being a Scholar from 15 onward.

In number 14, 15 year old Charles Cross was an Errand Boy, Edward Wild was an Engraver and Arthur Wild, a year younger at 14, was a Carman.

Number 15 Bache’s Street

Louisa Baum was a German born Stick Manufacturer and appears to have been a single parent of a 9 year old son, although I will caveat that with the census being a snapshot in time, so her husband may have been away working or travelling. Census data can only can only tell us so much.

Number 16 Bache’s Street

Whilst the majority of residents were born in the London area, a significant number were from the rest of the country, and from abroad. In number 16, Thomas Bobbing from Shoreditch had married Lizzie from Switzerland. Did they meet in London or Switzerland?

The following photo shows the space once occupied by numbers 17, 19, 21 and 23:

Number 17 Bache’s Street

Number 17 had one of the larger family’s with the Nealon’s having 6 children. John Nealon would have been supporting them all through his job as a Cab Driver, and although their eldest son was an Apprentice Bookbinder at age 14, I doubt he was earning very much.

Number 18 Bache’s Street

In number 18, Henry Bisband’s occupation is listed as “Japanner”. This was a specialist way of applying a varnish or lacquer, and was intended to imitate Asian furniture and small metalwork.

Number 19 Bache’s Street

Number 19 was one of the most populated houses on the street with five families and 20 people. The house was also one of the few with someone from south of the river as Charles Selling was born in Lambeth. Apart from Joseph Thorn from Essex, everyone else in number 19 was local.

Number 20 Bache’s Street

Number 20 had more people than number 19 with 24 people across 7 families, although one family had a single member. The census still listed Phoebe Hodges as the “Head” although she appears to be the only family member.

Phoebe’s occupation is listed as Annuitant, someone who receives an annuity. There is no clue as to her previous circumstances, or profession so no indication as to why she was the only person on the street listed as receiving an annuity. I suspect that this was somewhat unusual on streets such as Bache’s Street, but at 79, and apparently on her own, she would have needed such an income to survive.

Most houses on the street had a single parent, probably indicative of the mortality rate at the time. In number 20 as well as Phoebe, James Wilding is listed as a widower.

Number 21 Bache’s Street

James Edwards in number 21 is listed as an Unemployed Labourer. He was 58, and therefore one of the older residents on the street. Late 19th century diet, healthcare and a life of manual work probably meant that by today’s standards he would have appeared much older than 58, and he could have been unemployed due to health conditions. I would not really have wanted to have been a labourer at the age of 58 in Victorian London. James and his wife Elizabeth would have had to support themselves on Elizabeth’s money as a Charwoman.

Number 21 also had another German family, with the Seyer’s who again must have moved to London relatively recently as their daughter Clara aged 6 was also born in Germany.

Number 21 also illustrates how frequently older, or only children were named after their parents. George Simpson had the same name as his father, Fanny Simpson had the same name as her mother, and Clara Seyer also had the same name as her mother.

Number 22 Bache’s Street

Number 22 had the oldest resident on the street with David Benjamin at the impressive age of 86. He was one of the few who were born in the 18th century. He is listed as “Head” so must have been on his own (if he lived with his children, then he would have been head and his children, whatever their age, would have been listed as children).

He does not have an occupation, so one wonders how he supported himself.

Number 23 Bache’s Street

And finally to the last house on the street, number 23. Again, a large number of people in the house with a wide range of occupations.

James and Martha Daley must have worked together as an Umbrella Frame Maker and Umbrella Coverer – again very specific job roles. The four members of the Farmer family consisted of a Wood Turner, Dressmaker, Coachman and a Wood Carver.

Spencer Dodds at the age of 67 still had to work as a Boot Maker.

Number 23 was the last numbered house on the street. At the northern end of Bache’s Street were two large buildings on the 1894 map, but both of these had Chart Street addresses as they do today.

On the north-east corner of the street was a pub in 1894. This was the Globe. The pub closed in 2013 (although a later version of the building than the one on the 1894 map), and the old pub was finally demolished in 2018 to be replaced with the typical London early 21st century brick clad apartment building shown in the following photo.

Directly opposite, on the north-west corner of Bache’s Street is this building, again with an address in Chart Street.

So that was Bache’s Street in 1881. If you accidentally walked through the street (unless you live or work there), I suspect you would not give the street a second glance, and hurry on to your destination, however scratch the surface and we can really understand what life was like on the street, 140 years ago.

Was this an ordinary London street? Probably, a typical working class street where families would cluster together in a limited number of rooms with other families in the same house, all working manual jobs, and struggling to make enough money to survive in any degree of comfort.

Bache’s Street also had a significant number of residents from outside of London and abroad. London has always been a city of inward migration.

Bache’s Street would become more industrial in the decades to come. The Glass Manufactory built over houses 2, 4 and 6 was the first sign of this change.

I may try to return to Bache’s Street in the future and follow-up on later census data to track how the street changed, and what happened to those resident in 1881.

Now I wonder if I can get the above carved into paving stones and placed along the street?

alondoninheritance.com

My 6th Year of Exploring London

65 Replies

The end of February 2020 marks the 6th anniversary of the blog, and exploring London. When I started in 2014 I really did not expect to manage a weekly post for 6 years.

The original aim of the blog was to track down the locations of my father’s photos and to provide an incentive to get out and explore London. It is so easy when travelling around London to take the direct routes between work, home, station etc. and not see how much history is both obvious and hidden across the streets.

This original aim still holds true, and does result in what may seem to be a random series of posts, but hopefully does reflect how much there is to discover across London.

I am also always looking out for ways to take a different view of the city – tomorrow’s main weekly post will be an example. It was inspired by an e-mail from a reader a couple of months ago, and a challenge to see how a subject that at first looked to have limited scope, could reveal a fascinating history of how Londoners lived over a century ago.

Writing at a computer is very much a one way process, and I do worry whether my posts are too long, tedious to read, focus on the right topics etc. In January I started the brilliant Clerkenwell and Islington Tour Guiding course, which will hopefully help with writing a more focused read on a specific topic, learning more about a fascinating area of London, as well as taking the blog from the screen to the streets at some point in the future.

Now for a quick look back over the year, starting in:

March 2019 – The Perseverance or Sun Pub, Lamb’s Conduit Street

When one of the posts covered the Perseverance or Sun Pub, Lamb’s Conduit Street, this was the view of the pub in 1985

So many London pubs have disappeared in the last few decades. The land they occupy frequently more valuable as apartments rather than as a pub. Although the pub has a new name (the Perseverance), it is thankfully still there, although with not such a colourful mural on the typical Victorian pub curved corner.

April 2019 – Walking the South Bank in 1980 and 2019

In April I was back on the South Bank, an area I have visited a number of times over the last 6 years. It is also the perfect site to demonstrate how an area has changed over the years. I started work on the South Bank in 1979, and took photos of the area, which I can add to my father’s photo, and later photos. The following sequence show how the view from the southern end of Hungerford Bridge has changed over the years. This is 1949:

1980:

2019:

A significant change over the past 70 years.

May 2019 – A City Relic In Deepest Hampshire

The City of London has lost so many churches over the years and the contents of these churches could have been destroyed, sold, moved to another church in the City, or perhaps a longer distance move.

One such church is Holy Trinity, Minories, which closed at the end of the 19th century, and today there is no trace of the church, however a key item from the church furniture can be found in a very different place, which I visited in May.

This is All Saints’ Church in the village of East Meon in Hampshire.

And the original pulpit from Holy Trinity, Minories can be seen in the village church:

Including a plaque which confirms the original location of the pulpit, and how it arrived in this Hampshire village.

Strange to see this relic from a City church in a very different location.

June 2019 – St Katharine’s Way and Ship Fires on the Thames

Hopefully I do not make many mistakes, but luckily when I do, the knowledge is out there and readers are able to correct. In June I posted the following photo in a blog about Thomas More Street. The photo had been labelled with this name by my father, so I assumed this was the street, despite some doubts when trying to match the curve in the photo with Thomas More Street.

Luckily readers were able to identify the correct location as St Katharine’s Way, so I was able to return and write an updated post with the right location.

The aim of the blog is to identify the locations of these original photos, so it is brilliant to identify the right place where I have made an error, or there is insufficient information in the photo to identify the location.

July 2019 – Seven St Martin’s Place and London Hotel Growth

In July, I wrote about a former office building at the southern end of Charing Cross Road that was being converted to a hotel. This is Seven St Martin’s Place.

It was interesting to research the considerable growth in hotel capacity across the city, and how this demand is expected to continue to grow.

The front of the building had a number of sculptures by Hubert Dalwood, a very well-respected sculptor in the Modern British movement. When a building undergoes conversion there is always a worry that wonderful original features such as these works could be lost, and there was no mention in the planning documentation of the works, or the requirement to preserve them.

I walked by the building a few days ago, the new hotel is now open, and the sculptures are in the same place and in good condition, so hopefully they will remain there for many years to come.

August 2019 – Southend on Sea – A London Bank Holiday

In August I followed so many thousands of Londoners from previous years and took a trip out to Southend.

Southend is a bit quieter than 1910, when the following newspaper extract introduced a Bank Holiday day at the town:

Very early in the morning the incoming excursion trains began to unload their human cargoes; the railway stations, like gigantic hearts, beat at regular intervals and sent the human tides flowing outwards, to disperse themselves along the various arteries and veins of the town.

Southend Pier, so typical of a Victorian seaside and which marches well over a mile into the Thames Estuary, and the train still carries those who do not want to walk:

Numerous fires have destroyed the buildings at both ends of the pier, but the train is still one of the major attractions on the pier.

September 2019 – Crow Stone, London Stone and an Estuary Airport

Although not in London, this post was my favourite of the year. It involved some careful plan of tides, and an early morning start to get to the London Stone near Yantlet Creek on the Isle of Grain by 6:45 in the morning.

The London Stone is an example of how the City of London extended their authority over much larger areas than just the City, including the most important transport route at the time – the river that carried all cargoes to and from London docks.

It was a brilliant experience standing there at low tide, with the sweep of the Thames Estuary as the day started to brighten.

St Giles Cripplegate and Red Cross Street Fire Station

September also had another fascinating event when I had on display some of my father’s post war photos of the area now covered by the Barbican in the church of St Giles Cripplegate, as part of the Barbican@50 event.

It was brilliant to meet a number of readers and Barbican residents at the event.

St Giles Cripplegate and Red Cross Street Fire Station were the subject of one of my father’s photos:

Impossible to get a photo of the same view today, as the Barbican now surrounds the church and the fire station was demolished as part of the Barbican construction, the following photo is the closest that I could get.

October 2019 – Baltic Street School and Great Arthur House, Golden Lane Estate

I was in the same area for a post in October with another of my father’s photos, this time showing the area now occupied by the Golden Lane Estate. During Open House London weekend I had visited Great Arthur House on the estate. I was busy on the Saturday when the weather was brilliant, and on Sunday, the sky had clouded over and rain showers added to the gloom, but the view of, and from Great Arthur House was fascinating.

The view from the roof of Great Arthur House during a break in the rain.

November 2019 – The View from Greenwich Park – Watching the City Evolve

There are some places in London that provide an ideal reference point to watch how the city changes. One of these places is Greenwich Park from where there is a superb view over the Isle of Dogs and along the River Thames to the City of London.

With prints and photos I tracked the development of the city from 1676 to the present day, but the developments of the last few decades has been the most dramatic with the exponential growth in the number of gleaming tower blocks.

This was the view in 1953:

And a very different view in 2019:

A Remarkable Story of Bravery

November also included a rather special post.

The previous year, I visited the Netherlands to photograph the locations that my father photographed in 1952. This included the Oosterbeek war graves cemetery on the outskirts of Arnhem where those who died during Operation Market Garden are buried.

I was really pleased to be contacted by Paul Brooker, the nephew of Richard Bond, the name just visible at the bottom of the list of names in my father’s photo, and Paul kindly contributed a guest post detailing his research into Richard (Dick) Bond, and the crew and final flight of those named on the grave at the left of my father’s following photo.

It is a remarkable read.

December 2019 – Tintern Abbey – Summer 1947 and 2019

As well as London, my father photographed many sites across the rest of the country, including Tintern Abbey in South Wales in 1947.

On a very hot and sunny day in August of last year, I visited the site, and wrote about the visit in December, hopefully also as a reminder of a summer day, when writing in the depths of winter.

Tintern Abbey is next to the River Wye, one of the main reasons for the abbey location, and the scenic position of the abbey today. Hopefully with all the flooding of recent week’s the abbey, businesses and homes along this stretch of the river have survived without any damage.

Tintern Abbey in 1947:

And in 2019:

January 2020 – The Waterman’s Arms – Isle of Dogs

January 2020 included a 1986 view from outside the Cutty Sark pub in Greenwich across to the Waterman’s Arms on the Isle of Dogs.

In 2019, the view is now somewhat obscured, however the pub is still there, and hopefully after a rather patchy recent history, will soon be returning as a traditional pub, with the original name of the Waterman’s Arms. The pub briefly shone on the national stage in the 1960s when Daniel Farson put on entertainment that would normally be expected in the West End than the tip of the Isle of Dogs.

February 2020 – The Dome at Islington Green

Coming up to date, and in February I visited Islington Green to track down the location of a 1985 photo with a unique structure facing the street.

This was originally the Electric Theatre which opened in February 1909. The statue on top of the dome dates from the time of the cinema, and the domed structure formed the entrance foyer.

The 2020 photo sums up two changes that can be seen across the majority of London streets, the take over by chain shops, and the ever-present CCTV.

In working on the blog, and looking at my father’s photos and also the photos I have taken since the late 1970s, I am constantly thinking about what is a good photo. I do not mean in terms of composition, getting the exposure right etc. but what does a photo do – how does a photo provide the viewer with information, how does a photo evoke a specific moment in time, or a specific place.

I have a number of themes I always photograph when walking London’s streets. Hairdressers (possibly strange, but they are a constant on the streets and they do show how fashions change), pubs (before they disappear), the changing view from specific view points (Greenwich, St Paul’s Cathedral etc.).

I have recently added a new theme – newspaper stands.

This was outside Charing Cross Station, and the headline on a newspaper perfect;y captures a specific moment in time.

So that was my 6th year. For me it has been a fascinating year of exploration, but sitting here typing to a screen would be a rather pointless exercise without anyone to read it – so thank you for reading, commenting, subscribing and e-mailing.

Now for the 7th year, and tomorrow’s post will be a bit long (sorry) but hopefully an interesting exploration of a city street, bringing to life the Londoners who lived on the street over one hundred years ago.

alondoninheritance.com

Euston Station and HS2 – A 2020 Update

11 Replies

HS2 has been in the news during the week with the announcement that the scheme will go ahead. I have been following the development of the Euston end of the line since 2017 when I photographed St James Gardens before the area was closed allowing the archaeological excavations of the original cemetery to start.

I wanted to follow the development of the area as this will be the largest above ground transport project in central London for at least the next ten years, so I planned to revisit the site in February of each year to see how the site and the new terminus for HS2 develops.

My posts so far are:

An exploration of the St James Gardens in 2017

The Streets Under The HS2 Platforms And Concourse in 2018

Euston Station and HS2 – A 2019 Update

Why am I interested in following the progress of the HS2 station at Euston? I have always tried to visit and photograph sites before, during and after development, an interest that probably came from first seeing some of my father’s photos. For example, the construction of the Royal Festival Hall, and Bankside Power Station. When the new station is complete, the area will look very different, and it will be fascinating to look back and watch how the development progressed.

The weather was sunny and calm last Saturday, Storm Ciara would arrive the following day, so I used the opportunity for a walk around Euston to see how the site has changed and what progress has been made since February 2019.

The following photos are a record of the area in February 2020.

The Government’s announcement of the go-ahead for HS2 implied that initially trains will terminate at Old Oak Common, with Euston following later, and that HS2 had lost responsibility for the development of Euston Station.

The map below shows the area to the west of Euston Station that will be occupied by the platforms for HS2 when the scheme is complete. The numbers are the locations from where the photos in today’s post were taken.

This is the view from location number one, looking north along Melton Street. Euston Station is to the right of the photo.

It is still possible to exit the station, walk along the pavement of Melton Street (the wooden panels on the left of the photo below separate the pavement from the street which is fully closed). There is a crossing point to cross over Melton Street and get to Drummond Street. This is the view looking back along the closed Melton Street towards the Euston Road from location two on the map.

Although the majority of the surrounding buildings have been demolished, the disused underground station entrance on the corner of Melton and Drummond Streets is still there. The station housed an air conditioning system for the tunnels below and also has access to the tunnels, so I suspect it is a more complex structure to demolish.

When I took the London Transport Museum, Hidden London tour of Euston Station, the entrance to the tunnels was through the building shown in the above photo. The tours are still being run so the entrance is possibly still in use, or an alternative route is being used.

The following view, also from location two on the map, is looking north along Cardington Street, fully closed to pedestrians and traffic.

The following photo shows the view looking slight further to the left. In both the above and below photos, the old St James Gardens over the original cemetery was on the left, and on the immediate left was an Ibis Hotel.

The following photo from 2017 soon after the cemetery was closed is from roughly the same place as the above photo and shows the same view before demolition commenced.

The stretch of Drummond Street leading up to the junction with Coburg Street is closed to traffic, however again, it is possible to walk along the pavement which is fenced off by wooden panels.

The following photo is from location three and is looking back towards Euston Station. The underground station entrance is the remaining building on the right.

Walking south along Coburg Street, I get to location four on the map. The length of Euston Street up to Melton Street is closed off, but this was the view looking through the wire fencing from location four.

The following photo shows the same view prior to demolition of the Bree Louise pub, and the houses running along Coburg and Euston Streets.

Looking through the wire fencing, the view towards Euston Road.

The view also from location four, looking back along Coburg Street. The terrace houses to the left of the Bree Louise once ran along where these hoardings now run.

Back to the junction of Drummond and Coburg Streets and this is looking along the northern leg of Coburg Street. The rear of the Ibis Hotel was behind the hoardings on the right.

Looking down the closed section of Drummond Street.

In the above photo, the gap on the right was originally the Calumet photography store, shown in the following photo.

At the end of Coburg Street (location 5 on the map) is the Exnouth Arms, on the edge of the HS2 demolition area and still open.

The view in the following photo is again at location five, and is looking through the gate to the right of the Exmouth Arms.

In the above photo, and the photo below where I put the camera lens between the wire mesh of the gate, the area shown is the location of the St James Gardens and the original cemetery. When I was here last, the archaeological excavation of the cemetery was still in progress and there was a very large marquee covering the whole area.

The following photo is an extract from the photo above. The trees are those that originally lined Cardington Street, opposite St James Gardens. The photo illustrates the depth of the excavation of the cemetery. An earth bank can be seen descending down to the level excavated, and the depth of this can be gauged by the roof of a digger which can just be seen. Clearance of the old graveyard was a major exercise.

The above photos show the area once occupied by St James Gardens. The photo below shows the gardens in 2017, just before closure – hard to realise looking at the area now that these photos occupy the same space.

Looking back across Coburg Street towards Euston Station. The Ibis Hotel once blocked the view.

The area being demolished for HS2 also runs along the Hampstead Road, the location of the next set of stops, and the following photo was taken from location six. The photo is looking back towards Euston Station, again across the space once occupied by St James Gardens. The old underground station is at the base of the left most crane.

Location seven, and this shows a better view of the depth of the excavated St James Gardens/ cemetery.

Last year, HS2 had built a small community space which included a number of artifacts from the cemetery, and the London Temperance Hospital, which once occupied the site. This was in the area to the left in the photo below, but now appears to have been cleared, apart from some of the information panels, one of which can be seen on the left.

The temporary buildings at the end of the pathway are HS2 site offices, however the ground floor door provides an entrance to an “HS2 in Camden” information centre. Unfortunately not open at the weekends, so I could not visit. The community space had on display one of the foundation stones from the London Temperance Hospital, so not sure where this has moved to (see last years post).

The following photo is from location eight.

This is where Cardington Street joined the Hampstead Road, however as Cardington Street alongside the old gardens has all but disappeared, the short stub of road is closed off and only provides access to the HS2 site.

The following photo shows the one remaining building along this eastern side of the Hampstead Road, the former Saint Pancras Female Orphanage building.

After the orphanage moved, the building was an annex of the London Temperance Hospital and is now an NHS facility.

That completed my 2020 view of the area being demolished for the future HS2 platforms and station extension at Euston, following much the same route as in the two previous years.

Euston Station will also be transformed, so I have been taking photos of the station as can currently be seen. The following photo is off the main entrance for traffic to the station from the Euston Road.

Since February 2019, most of the buildings that occupied the area that will become the HS2 station at Euston have been demolished.

Excavation of the cemetery that was under St James Gardens has been completed, so I assume the site is now ready for the build phase to start, however this is such a large area and there is a considerable amount of construction work to take place so I expect it will take many years.

Up to the announcement of the go-ahead there seemed to be some genuine doubt as to whether the new Government would support the project, which raised the question of what would be done with such a large area of prime London space. My fear was that it would have been sold off to property developers to recover some of the costs, which would have created another bland area of towers.

Whatever your views on HS2 (in many ways the name is wrong, whilst it is high-speed, this hides the real benefit of a significant addition of capacity and freeing up the existing lines for more local services), it now seems certain that London will be getting the first major new rail route and station extension since the rail link to the channel tunnel was built.

I will be returning in February next year, and it will be interesting to see if work has changed from demolition to construction.

alondoninheritance.com

The Dome at Islington Green

24 Replies

Last weekend I was in Islington Green for the first time in a few years. It was a perfect opportunity to photograph a rather unusual building, last photographed in 1985:

The same building in February 2020:

Before getting into the history of the building, there are two key differences between the views in 1985 and 2020 which typify what has happened across all London streets, not just Islington.

The first is the loss of many one-off shops, many of which were traditional to a specific area. There were a number of antique shops around Islington Green, today they remain clustered around Camden Passage. All too often chain shops have taken over from so many one offs.

The second is the CCTV camera. Initially I was frustrated with having the pole, CCTV camera and equipment boxes in front of the building, however they do provide a perfect demonstration of the growth of CCTV monitoring across the city, and the amount of street furniture. These are all too often installed without any apparent consideration of the impact on the surrounding street scene and buildings, as the 2020 photo illustrates.

The building has an interesting history. It was purpose built as the Electric Theatre and opened in February 1909. The domed section was originally open at the sides and formed the entrance vestibule to the cinema. Passing through the vestibule was the foyer which was built into the ground floor of the three storey building we can see from the street, and behind that was the single storey auditorium.

The Bioscope on the 11th February 1909 recorded that “The new Electric Theatre at 75, Upper Street, Islington, opened on Saturday last, is a very handsome and artistically decorated hall, both inside and out. Everything for the comfort of its patrons has been studied, and as it is owned by Electric Theatres (1908) Limited it will no doubt prove as successful as the other well-known theatres run by that company.”

The Electric Theatre company was one of the first to open a chain of cinemas across London. The interior of vestibule leading into the Electric Theatre is shown in the following photo. The decorated interior of the dome can be seen. Imagine this view if you walk in today for a coffee.

There is an interesting statue on top of the dome. The following photos show the 1985 statue (left) and 2020 version (right).

The figure on top of the dome, in 1985, was painted and holding a lighted torch above the figure’s head. By 2020, the coloured paint had been removed and the lighted torch appears to be missing.

The Electric Theatre in Islington did not last too long, closing in 1916. It is good to see this unusual building still facing onto Islington Green, and being Grade II listed, the building is protected.

Islington Green is a reasonably small, triangular green space to the east of Upper Street (the main A1 road). The street to the east of the green space is called Islington Green. The following map extract shows Islington Green as the triangular green space in the centre (Map © OpenStreetMap contributors).

The area is very built up today, and was part of the late 18th, early 19th century expansion northwards of London, however the twin roads and road junction that forms the triangular space where Islington Green can be found has long been a feature.

The following extract from John Rocque’s 1746 map of London shows the familiar shape of Islington Green where the two roads come together. There was ribbon development along the roads and some streets just to the north, but the rest of area is still fields. Note the New River running through the area between Hertfordshire and New River Head, just to the south.

One hundred years later in 1847, Reynolds’s Splendid New Map of London shows the area has transformed from fields to streets. Islington Green is still a feature where Upper and Lower Streets meet towards the top centre of the map.

This is the green space of Islington Green looking north. There was a council event occupying the wider northern width of the space at the time.

If you look to the top right corner of the green and you can just see a row of terrace houses.

I wanted to find this terrace as it provides a good illustration of Islington before it transformed to the area of expensive housing it is today, and how you can never really trust the age of a building by looking at the exterior.

Walking to the north-east corner of Islington Green and this is the view of the terrace across the road. The view shows what looks to be a complete row of late 18th, early 19th century terrace houses.

This was the same view in 1979:

Image credit: London Metropolitan Archives, City of London: catalogue ref: SC_PHL_01_188_79_1227

To confirm that this is the same view, look at the building on the far left of both photos, just across the side road where the terrace stops and it is the same building, although the terrace looks very different and the fourth house from the left is missing.

Although many of the 18th / 19th century buildings in Islington were in a poor state in the 1970s, the reason for the condition of this terrace is a bomb in the last war. The London County Council bomb damage maps have the terrace marked as “general blast damage”. The bomb that caused the damage probably landed behind the terrace as the building behind is marked as “damaged beyond repair”. The house on the far left of the terrace still looks as it probably did after the war with smoke marks and missing top floor window frames.

The fourth house in the terrace from the left is completely missing – metalwork can be seen supporting the walls of the houses on either side of the missing house.

But look at the terrace today, and it looks original. The missing house has been replaced with a house identical to the others, and just looking at the terrace you would assume a complete survivor from the time of the original build.

The open space to the right of the 1979 photo was a Gulf petrol station – today the space is occupied by a Tesco store.

The following print of Islington Green from 1750, just a few years after the 1746 map shown above, shows what appears to be the same terrace to the right of the green. The view is looking north, with the church of St Mary in the background.

Image credit: London Metropolitan Archives, City of London: catalogue ref: p5379292

90 years later, and more substantial building lines the northern edge of the green.

The structure on the green in the above print, is probably the one mentioned in the following extract from a report in the Islington Gazette on the 12th of March 1859, which also provides an indication of the state of the green, prior to Victorian improvements:

“A short time since the police gave up possession of their old quarters, the Watch-house on Islington Green, which was built in 1779, and this elegant structure now belongs to the parish. The best use it can be put to is to sell it as old building materials, and this will immediately be done. The Green will then pass into perhaps its final condition.

This open space, for which so strenuous a battle was lately fought and won, was formerly a piece of waste ground, uninclosed, and was granted to Trustees for the use of the parish by the lord of the manor in 1777.

For a long time, however, it was made the common laystall for a great part of the dirt and filth of the parish.

A watch-house, together with a cage, engine-house, and a pair of stocks, stood in the middle of the Green until the present watch-house was built. Upon its site, the Vestry have now determined to place a drinking fountain and a better situation could certainly not be found for it. it will be erected at the apex of the Green which divides the Upper from the Lower street.”

The word “laystall” refers to a place where “waste and dung” is deposited, so this gives a good idea of how Islington Green would have been used for prior to the mid 1700s.

In the 1860s Islington Green was “improved”. The green was grassed, trees and shrubs were planted, and Islington Green was transformed to the Victorian view of an improved city green space.

The next time that Islington Green would be transformed was in 1938 when in preparation for the expected war with Germany, and the use of air power to bomb cities, air raid trenches, along with more substantial shelters were being dug across the green.

The following photo from 1938 shows “labourers engaged in the construction of trenches in one of the smaller open spaces of north London”.

Whilst the following photo from 1939 shows the conversion of one of the trenches from an open trench to a more secure, enclosed shelter made of concrete and steel. The photo shows Sir John Anderson, Lord Privy Seal inspecting the new shelters.

It would be interesting to know if there are any remains of the shelters still under Islington Green.

Time for a walk around the green. The following photo is looking north along Upper Street with the dome of what was the Electric Theatre on the left.

As well as the location of the Electric Theatre, the above photo shows the location of a second, early 20th century cinema on Islington Green. To the right of the photo is “The Screen on the Green” cinema, the wonderful facade of the cinema is shown in the photo below.

The cinema opened four years after the Electric Theatre, in 1913 and named the Empress Electric Theatre. In the early years of the 20th century, cinemas still used the name theatre, and the word “electric” was often included, as in Islington, to accentuate the modernity of the form, and the use of electricity in the display of film.

Not long after opening, the “Electric” was dropped and the name changed to Empress Picture Theatre, which was retained to 1951 when the name changed to the Rex Cinema, followed by Screen of the Green after the Rex closed in 1970.

Watching a film at the Screen on the Green is a very difference experience to the typical multi-screen cinema.

In addition to the two cinemas, another building facing onto Islington Green was an entertainment centre, although this was music hall rather than film.

Facing the northern side of the green is the facade of the building that was Collins Music Hall.

The building is now a Waterstones bookshop, but it is still possible to imagine the building as it appeared when it was entertaining the people of Islington:

A pub, the Lansdowne Arms originally occupied the site, and in 1862, Sam Vagg, a chimney sweep who had built a stage career as Sam Collins turned the pub into a music hall. Three years after opening, Sam Vagg died at the age of 39, however the music hall would continue and retained the name of Collins in honour of the founder.

The entertainment on offer can be appreciated by taking a random edition of the Islington Gazette and checking what was on the bill. The 15th September 1887 edition details the following “Varied Star Programme”:

“The Five Jees, in the Musical Smithy, Sisters Bilton, the enchanting duettists; Dan Leno, the champion comic of all comics; Ethel Victor, the dashing serio-comic; Florrie West, the charming serio-comic; Brothers Passmore, variety artists; Arthur West, extempore vocalist; Sisters Dagmar, the pleasing duettists; Charles Murray, comic; Jessie Hart, the sprightly serio-comic; Fred Carloss, the ‘Sloper’ comedian, Professor Wingfield, with his educated dogs; Swiss Mountaineers, the vocal trio.”

How was that for a night out in Islington – who could not be tempted by Professor Wingfield, with his educated dogs.

The music hall was rebuilt in 1897, this date is still visible on the front of the building.

In the following decades, Collins would continue to put on variety shows in the music hall tradition, and names such as Norma Wisdom, Benny Hill and Tommy Copper performed at Collins in the early years of their careers.

Collins Music Hall was very badly damaged by fire in 1958. Only the front and side walls survived, and the core of the music hall was lost, and the remains of the building (apart from the front wall) was demolished in 1963.

Collins Music Hall was also used for other purposes, which also give an indication of the poverty that existed in Islington. On the 24th December 1912, the islington Gazette carried a report titled “Christmas Dinners – Distribution Today at Collins Music Hall – Over 8,500 Dinners”:

“Through the medium of the Daily Gazette fund between 8,500 and 9,000 persons, or one in every 40 of the population of Islington, will participate in these Christmas gifts. the dinner parcels consist of meat, tea, milk, sugar, cake, rice and sweets, and will represent something like 10 tons of food.”

Up to 9,000 people sounds an enormous number, however this appears to have been only a proportion of those who applied. At the end of the article, the following appears in large, bold text:

“The Editor regrets exceedingly that he is unable to reply to the large numbers of letters received from poor and needy people in the four divisions of Islington, asking to participate in the distribution of dinners to-day at Collins’ Music hall.

Having regard to the enormous population of Islington, and the wide-spread poverty existing in the borough, it naturally follows that large numbers of applicants cannot be administered to.

The Editor hopes that the applicants who have been turned empty away will accept this explanation. Had the fund been half as large again as it is, most of the cases which unfortunately have been rejected could have been dealt with. Some of these, it is hoped, will be relieved from other charities.”

A clear reminder of the poverty that existed across London on a considerable scale.

The following photo shows the Fox on the Green. A pub at the north-west corner of the green.

Originally called just the “Fox”, reference to the pub dates back to the start of the 19th century, however I am not sure if the current building is the original. There are a number of newspaper references to the widening of the road north from Islington Green, starting from the Fox, and also one reference specifically referring to the Fox when describing how the Metropolitan Board of Works would preserve a licence to sell alcohol when they had demolished a pub, and before the replacement had been completed.

Apparently the Metropolitan Board of Works would install a temporary “shanty” on the site which would sell a minimum of a single drink a day. This would allow the licence to be preserved.

One newspaper report from 1881 which covered many of the improvement schemes in the area stated that St Mary, Islington was the “most populous in the metropolis”. An indication of how the area had developed from the fields of the 1746 map.

I need to research more to check the date of the current Fox, however whether this building, or a previous version, there are very many references to a large number of inquests held in the pub, adverts for staff, a suicide from one of the upper floor windows, theft and fatal accidents outside the pub – it was a busy place.

A view along Upper Street, to the west of the green showing a mix of architectural styles.

The larger brick building in the centre has a blue plaque stating that the singer and entertainer Gracie Fields lived here.

More mixed architecture and colour schemes.

At the southern end of Islington Green is a statue of Sir Hugh Myddelton, the wealthy City Goldsmith, who took up the scheme for the New River, and saw construction through to completion. He is facing towards New River Head, a short distance further south where the New River terminated, and water was distributed onward to consumers across London.

The statue was erected in 1862, with the statue being funded by Sir Samuel Morton, and the pedestal and fountains on either side of the pedestal, by voluntary subscriptions and aided by a grant from the Vestry of Islington.

The following drawing from the year the statue was unveiled shows the fountains in operation. It also shows the words “New River” on the plan Myddelton is holding in his left hand – not sure this is still visible today.

Walking back to the Angel underground station, and this is the view looking back up to Islington Green with Upper Street to the left, the street with the name Islington Green to the right, and the green in the centre, with Hugh Myddleton looking back towards New River Head.

Although it is only a small bit of grassed open space, Islington Green is a very old feature. Formed where the road from the City split into two, the green was there when the rest of what is now Islington was still covered in fields and open space.

It has been used as a dumping ground, improved by the Victorians, seen a tremendous growth of traffic on the surrounding roads, along with building on all sides.

The green has seen the changing forms of entertainment, from pubs, to the Electric Theatre, the Music Hall, and now retaining one of London’s unique small cinemas.

Bombed at the north-east corner, and dug up for air raid shelters, Islington Green continues watching the changes in one of London’s northern villages.

alondoninheritance.com

Hidden London – Piccadilly Circus

20 Replies

I had intended to publish a different post, however work and other commitments have slowed down research, so for today, a brief post on one of the design and construction wonders of London. For a number of years, the London Transport Museum under their Hidden London brand have run a fascinating series of tours of those parts of the underground network that you do not usually see.

Last year, a new station was added to the list of tours – Piccadilly Circus – and as usual, it is fascinating to get a glimpse of some of the infrastructure and tunnels hidden behind the tunnels now in general use. These tunnels show how stations have developed over time, and this was the focus of the Piccadilly Circus tour, not a long tour in terms of the area covered, but a tour packed full of information.

Leaving the public areas of Piccadilly Circus, and a new set of tunnels appear, dating from the first incarnation of the station:

The original Piccadilly Circus station opened in 1906, however due to the station’s central West End location, the volume of people using the station grew rapidly. In 1907, 1.5 million passengers were using the station annually, and by 1922 this had risen to 18 million, and passenger numbers were expected to continue growing.

The original station was too small, and making small changes to the station would not support the growing numbers of people using the station. Lifts were a distance from the platforms and lifts really needed to be replaced by escalators, larger entrances were required along with a larger ticket hall.

There was considerable development in the area, including the redevelopment of many of the buildings along Regent Street where existing buildings would be replaced by six storey buildings. The need for a larger station was urgent.

The original plan was for a new domed ticket hall below Eros / the Shaftesbury Memorial, however the final scheme went for a new flat roofed ticket hall surrounded by an oval shaped passage which provided access to the stairs leading up to the street entrances. The station would broadly follow the dimensions of Piccadilly Circus above ground.

New banks of escalators would be installed between the ticket hall and an intermediate landing, with further escalators leading down to the Bakerloo and Piccadilly lines. It would be a major engineering and construction project.

To facilitate the work, the statue of Eros and the Shaftesbury Memorial were moved to the Victoria Embankment Gardens, and a construction shaft was sunk.

One of the major problems with such a large construction site in the centre of the West End was the amount of services that were buried below the surface, in the way of the new station. These had to be diverted away from the site, or transferred into a 12ft diameter pipe that had been installed around the circumference of the new station.

The new station was opened on the 10th December 1928, by the Mayor of Westminster, with the first public users of the station being given access later that afternoon.

The original station was closed on the 21st July 1929 and Eros / the Shaftesbury Memorial was returned to sit above the new station, on the 27th December 1931.

The considerably enlarged ticket hall and the new Otis escalators provided a Piccadilly Circus station that was ready to support the numbers of passengers using the station as London entered the 1930s, and for many years to come.

Escalators had replaced the original lifts, however walking the tunnels today, we can still see the direction signs and the original lift shafts.

Looking up one of the original lift shafts:

To the trains signs still point to where early 20th century passengers would have walked to get down to the platforms.

In a disused underground tunnel it is always intriguing to wonder just what is after that curve in the tunnel:

Although the new tunnels and escalators provide access from the ticket hall down to the platforms, the old tunnels still provide a very useful purpose. In an environment where space is at a premium, having areas available to store equipment is valuable.

The tunnels explored in the tour provide a reminder of how London’s underground system has grown, and the major construction works needed to continually support the growth in passenger numbers.

The tunnels are a step back to the original Edwardian Station, but perhaps the best place to admire Piccadilly Circus station is in the passageway surrounding the ticket hall. Piccadilly Circus was seen as the “hub of Emprire”, and as such needed a design, and quality building and decorative materials to match.

Charles Holden was responsible for the design of the station, and his distinctive style can be seen across the station. The passageway surrounding the ticket hall and the central concourse are clad in cream travertine marble. Decorative pillars and lights are roughly equally spaced around the oval passageway. Their relatively narrow form ensures maximum space is available for passengers walking between surface and the escalators through the ticket hall.

The ticket hall was restored in 1989, and in 2016, on the 75th anniversary of his death, a commemoration of Frank Pick was installed. Frank Pick was the Managing Director of London Underground in the 1920s, and was responsible for commissioning architects and designers such as Charles Holden.

The design of the memorial by Ben Langlands and Nikki Bell used words from one of Frank Pick’s lectures which highlighted his approach to design, and that good design contributes significantly to the quality of life in the city.

A very unusual feature in Piccadilly Circus station that dates back to the reconstruction of the station is a world map. The central dark band scrolls across the map to show the local time in the different time zones across the world. The location of the map here in Piccadilly Circus emphasised the view of the station at the time as the “hub of Empire”.

Too often we rush through London’s underground stations, trying to get as quickly as possible between the train and the street, and not taking the time to appreciate the design, engineering and construction wonders that we pass through.

The Hidden London tours provide the perfect opportunity to step back, explore the old tunnels and appreciate the effort that has gone into building a transport system we probably take too much for granted.

alondoninheritance.com

St Martin Ludgate and a Hidden Name

23 Replies

City churches are interesting, not just the history of the church, but also for the artifacts that London’s churches seem to accumulate. St Martin Ludgate, or to give the full name St Martin Within Ludgate is a church I have not visited for a while, so on a rather grey day I went for another look inside the church.

St Martin Ludgate is on the northern side of Ludgate Hill. I suspect that the church suffers from the fact that St Paul’s Cathedral is at the top of Ludgate Hill and the cathedral tends to attract the gaze, rather than the historic church along the side of the street.

The view looking down Ludgate Hill with the church and spire of St Martin Ludgate on the right:

St Martin is an old City church, with written evidence dating the church to the 12th century, however Geoffrey of Monmouth writing in the 12th century claims that the church was founded by the Welsh King Cadwallader in the 7th century. Given that this was 500 years before Geoffrey of Monmouth, I doubt very much whether this was based on any truth or factual record.

The claim was embellished in the text with the following print from 1814 which shows the tower and steeple of St Martin Ludgate standing clear from the surrounding houses. The author adds that Cadwallo was buried here. The text included evidence that the site was ancient as “several antiquities were discovered to prove it being a Roman burial-place”.

The location was certainly interesting, being adjacent to Lud Gate and the Roman Wall. Travelers from the west would have approached the City along what is now the Strand. Crossing over the River Fleet, then a short distance up the hill to the Lud Gate, with the location of St Martins just inside the wall on the left.

The current church dates from between 1677 and 1686 when it was rebuilt by Wren following the destruction of the previous church in the Great Fire of London, although there is a possibility that rather than Wren, it was Robert Hooke who was responsible for the church.

The original church was slightly clear of the Roman Wall, however the new church was moved slightly to the west and included the Roman Wall in the foundations of the church. Ludgate Hill was also widened at this time, so the new church was also set slightly further back

The spire of the church was designed to be a counterpoint to the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral.

Through the entrance to the church and there is a wide corridor running the width of the building before entering the church proper. This was an attempt to sound proof the church from the noise on Ludgate Hill which must have been one of the busier and noisier streets in the City.

Entering the church and we can see a typical Wren designed City church of the 17th century.

The organ loft above the font:

The font dates from 1673 and was a gift to the rebuilt church from one Thomas Morley.

Behind and to the right of the font is an information panel that confirms that this wall of the church was the original western limit of the Roman City, and below the floor and wall are the foundations of the original Roman Wall, along with remains of the later Medieval Wall.

The full name of the church St Martin within Ludgate indicates that the church was within the City walls.

There is an interesting plaque in the church, which holds a hidden message in the text. A brass plaque, now in St Martin’s was originally in St Mary Magdalene’s on Old Fish Street. A serious fire severely damaged much of St Mary in 1886, and as a number of City churches were closing and being demolished under the Union of Benefices Act (an Act to reduce the number of City churches as the population of the City had decreased), the decision was taken not to rebuild St Mary and a number of artifacts were moved to St Martin Ludgate.

The plaque is shown in the following photo and dates from 1586.

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.

The ten lines are shown below (thankfully “If Stones Could Speak” by F. St Aubyn-Brisbane (1929) have the transcribed text as it was hard to read from the plaque):

If you take the first letter from each sentence and read from the last sentence, you get the name Tomas Beri.

The parish church in Walton-on-the-Hill had a similar brass plaque, however it was badly damaged when the church was destroyed in the Liverpool Blitz in May 1941. The Walton church was rebuilt after the war, and a replica plaque can now be seen.

Unlike the Walton church, St Martin Ludgate suffered the least damage of any City church during the last war, with only a single incendiary bomb damaging the roof.

A closer view of the font. The wall behind the font marks the limit of the original Roman City, and remains of the Roman Wall are below the wall of the church.

City churches tend to accumulate objects, not just from other City churches, but from across the world. For some reason, St Martin Ludgate has a large chandelier from the 18th century which was originally in St Vincent’s Cathedral in the West Indies.

The chandelier is unusual as the majority of objects in the church appear to have come from St Mary Magdalen, including these bread shelves:

On display within the church is one of the bells from the post Great Fire rebuild. The bell dates from 1683 and was a “Gift of William Warne, Scrivener to the Parish of St Martin’s Ludgate”:

In a side room of the church is an interesting 17th century carved pelican:

The symbol of the pelican feeding its young is a very early Christian representation of Jesus. It comes from a pre-Christian legend that in times of famine, a mother pelican would pierce her breast, allowing her young to feed on her blood, thereby avoiding starvation.

Apart from the slender spire, there is nothing remarkable about the building of St Martin Ludgate, and the church is over shadowed by the much larger cathedral a bit further up Ludgate Hill.

The key though with City churches is that despite the ever-changing City, they are stable reference points, providing the same function for over 900 years.

St Martin Ludgate has the added bonus that the west wall of the church marks the western boundary of the original Roman city, and the Roman wall.

And whilst pondering the Roman city, we can also wonder why Thomas Beri decided to conceal his name in the plaque, or what game he was playing with the future back in 1586.

alondoninheritance.com

The Waterman’s Arms – Isle of Dogs

18 Replies

For this week’s post, it is 1986, and I am standing outside the Cutty Sark pub in Greenwich, looking across the River Thames to the south eastern tip of the Isle of Dogs. The photo below shows the view which includes the spire of Christ Church, on the corner of Manchester Road and Glenaffric Avenue, the Newcastle Draw Dock leading down into the river, and to the left, a pub, the Waterman’s Arms.

The same view today:

Although the weather was the same for the “now” photo, the tide state was different which does change the views, however the Newcastle Draw Dock is still there today, just below the water.

Apart from the spire, Christ Church is still hidden by trees. Housing on the right is the same, however a large new build of apartments has been built on the left of the dry dock which completely obscures the Waterman’s Arms and the towers of the City, which in 1986 consisted only of the Nat West Tower.

The Waterman’s Arms was originally the Newcastle Arms, built as part of the Cubitt Town development. It seems to have opened in 1853, and that year is the first that I can find any written references to the pub, with two contrasting newspaper mentions.

In the Morning Advertiser on the 30th April 1853 there was an advert for a Servant, Potman and Waiter – possibly the first staff for the newly opened pub. In October 1853, the Kentish Mercury had a very different report on the pub, where George Henry Wood, the step son of Mr Harris, the landlord of the Newcastle Arms, was charged with stealing a horse, the property of Mr Brooker, a grazier of Poplar.

Apart from these mentions, there seems to have been very little reported about the Newcastle Arms, apart from the occasional advert for staff, and reference to the adjoining dry dock. most often related to criminal activity.

The most significant period in the pub’s history were a couple of years in the 1960s when the pub changed name to the Waterman’s Arms and became an East London centre for pub entertainment, attracting many national and internationally famous celebrities. I will cover this phase later in the post.

In 2011 the pub changed name to the Great Eastern and became a pub on the ground floor and backpackers hostel on the upper floors, and it was this version of the pub that I photographed when I was in the area last year.

The adjacent Newcastle Draw Dock, photographed at low tide and looking across the river to the Cutty Sark pub.

The reason why the Waterman’s Arms has a rather unusual history compared to other Isle of Dogs pubs is down to a brief period between 1962 and 1964 when the pub was run by Daniel Farson.

Daniel Farson was an interesting character. Born in 1927, he was the son of Negley Farson, an author and American foreign correspondent. After National Service in the American Army Air Corps (he had dual US / UK citizanship – he would later renounce US citizanship), he went to Cambridge University, then took a post as photographer with the Picture Post.

He had a variety of jobs in journalism and also the Merchant Navy, before joining Associated Rediffusion, one of the early independent television companies.

During his time at Associated Rediffusion, Farson proposed a TV programme on the boom in pub entertainment. This he saw as a continuation of the Music Hall tradition which was one of his interests. The proposed programme was to be called “Time Gentlemen Please!” and to help with research he visited a number of East London pubs. It was during this research that he found the Newcastle Arms. The pub was described as being “down on the floor” and the “pub with no beer”. The pub attracted very little trade and the brewery refused any credit for the purchase of beer.

Farson was also interested in the area of East London along the river, and had been living at 92 Narrow Street in Limehouse so was relatively close to the Newcastle Arms, although he admits to knowing very little about the Isle of Dogs, and his view of the location of the Newcastle Arms would have been very different if he had approached the pub from inland, rather than from the river.

Despite all the warning signs, he purchased the pub in 1962 using money left to him by his parents, and set about converting the pub to accommodate space for an enlarged stage area. He would use this to put on pub entertainment, based on Musical Hall traditions and building on the entertainment to be found in many East London pubs, although he attracted stars that would not normally be found in a pub at the tip of the Isle of Dogs, or a usual East End crowd.

Farson also changed the name of the pub from the Newcastle Arms to the Waterman’s Arms, a name he felt better suited the pub’s riverside location.

Farson’s proposed programme “Time, Gentlemen Please!” was shown at 9:45 on the evening of the 5th December 1962, and part was filmed in the Waterman’s Arms. The Daily Mirror description of the programme was:

“ITV commentator Dan Farson, who recently became landlord of a pub in London’s East End. takes a look at pub-land entertainment in tonight’s ‘Time, Gentlemen Please!’.

Says Farson: ‘If the spirit of music-hall lives anywhere today, you’ll find it in the East End pubs.’ Many pub owners say that entertainment is a good boost for business.

So Farson and director Rollo Gamble visited four public-houses to film some of the professional and semi-professional acts that appear there.

One of the pubs was Farson’s own, the Waterman’s Arms, near the docks at the Isle of Dogs.

Most of the pub entertainers are singers, who present modern pub tunes along with the old music hall hits. One artist is 80 year-old Ida Barr, a star of the Edwardian music hall.

Others in the programme rejoice in such names as Tommy Pudding, Sulky Gowers, Welsh George, Queenie Watts and Tex, who wears a cowboy hat.

Says Gamble; ‘Though some of the performers are unknowns, there’s a lot of talent there. Some of these people live by touring the pubs, others entertain in the evening after a hard day’s work.”

Ida Barr, one of the original stars of the Edwardian music hall was a popular performer at the Waterman’s Arms, and she was still very active, including performing at London’s last remaining music hall, the Metropolitan Theatre in Edgware Road. She sang at the last performance at “The Met” on the 14th April 1963 before its demolition later that year as part of the road widening scheme for the Edgware Road.

As well as the Waterman’s Arms, the other pubs that featured in the programme were the Lansdown Arms, part of the old Collins Music Hall at Islington Green, the Rising Sun in Bethnal Green, and the King’s Arms in the Old Kent Road.

The entertainment put on by Farson in the Waterman’s Arm consisted of both local amateur and professional acts, old-time music hall stars, as well as those that you would not expect to see in a Victorian pub on the Isle of Dogs such as Shirley Bassey.

The audience at the Waterman’s Arms attracted not just the locals, but also those from the West End, and a global set of celebrities from the early 1960s. Names such as Lord Delfont, George Melly, Groucho Marx, Lionel Bart, Trevor Howard, Tony Bennett, Mary Quant, Norman Hartnell, Judy Garland and Clint Eastwood (who wrote the word ‘rowdy’ in the guest book).

Daniel Farson also discovered local talent who went on the perform at the Waterman’s Arms. One of these was Kim Cordell who Farson saw performing at the Rising Sun in Mile End Road and who was described in The Stage as: “In the booming world of pub entertainment, one personality is causing more and more comment. This is Kim Cordell, first seen in Dan Farson’s TV pub show Time, Gentlemen Please! and now the compere/singer of his pub on the Isle of Dogs, the Waterman’s Arms. Kim herself says: ‘Without a doubt, this has been the best year of my life. I seem to have found a real incentive for the first time’. Apart from her success at The Waterman’s, the year has included appearances on TV; two films, one called ‘Songs of London’ for the British Tourist and Travel Association, the other ‘London After Dark’, not yet released; and the lion’s share in a forthcoming L.P. ‘A Night At The Waterman’s'”.

Kim Cordell performing at the Waterman’s Arms:

The Waterman’s Arms was a success in terms of the number of people arriving to watch the entertainment, the number of stars attracted to perform, and those who came to the Waterman’s Arms to be in the crowd, but it could not last.

In 1964 Farson received a call from his bank manager to tell him that he was £3,000 overdrawn.

The financial challenges were down to how much was being sold to fund the costs of running the pub. People would not arrive until 8pm, from then on the bar was crowded. Crowding meant that people could not easily get to the bar, so drink sales were limited. For many there was more interest in the entertainment rather than a long evening’s drinking. They would watch the entertainment than move on. The costs of putting on entertainment were also high, particularly for the more famous acts.

He could not go on, and after a battle with the brewery, a new tenant was found, Daniel Farson sold up and left the Waterman’s Arms and Narrow Street and moved down to north Devon to start a career as an author.

One of the books that came out of this move was Limehouse Days. A record of his time in Limehouse and at the Waterman’s Arms. The front cover of the book shows Daniel Farson behind the bar at the Waterman’s Arms, talking to customers.

The book does have some strange diversions, such as a chapter where Farson claims to identify Jack the Ripper, however the book, and the photos taken by Farson provide an intriguing view of life in East London in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

Daniel Farson was also part of Soho in the 1950s and early 1960s (and continued to visit after his move to Devon). He photographed and wrote about Soho in another book Soho in the Fifties, although due to his level of drinking there was always some doubt as to the details of the stories Farson would recall and tell.

His obituary by Philip Hoare in the Independent started with the paragraph “Mythomaniacal, egotistical, and often unable to tell the truth or the difference between it and fiction, the character of Daniel Farson – photographer, writer, and drunk – is redeemed by at least one grace: that of self-awareness: “One of the more bizarre aspects of my life is the way it has veered from triumph to disaster without my seeming to notice the change.”

He was also frequently mentioned in the obituaries and memoirs of others who found the pubs, bars and clubs of Soho as a second home. For example the following is from the obituary of the journalist and author Sandy Fawkes: “One close friend for 30 years was Daniel Farson, the television journalist, chronicler of Soho and spectacular drunk. He would suddenly turn from an intelligent conversationalist into a growling monster. “I loathe you,” he would shout suddenly between fat, quivering cheeks. Sandy Fawkes would go to stay with him in Devon, where he enjoyed comparative calm, though barred from local pubs.”

It was also in Soho that Farson met people such as the artists Francis Bacon and Lucian Freud, who would also go on to visit the Waterman’s Arms.

The Waterman’s Arms and Daniel Farson tell of a very different time. Soho has since lost so much of its character, and East London pubs have been disappearing rapidly over the last few decades.

The Waterman’s Arms is part of a listed group around the Newcastle Draw Dock, which also includes Glenaffric Avenue, Christ Church and Christ Church Vicarage, Manchester Road.

The future of the pub as the Great Eastern looked in doubt, running as a pub on the ground floor and backpacker hostel on the upper floors. The pub has a good location, close to the river and the Newcastle Draw Dock, so could easily have fallen to the fate of so many other London pubs, and been converted into apartments. The good news is that a very recent story in the Docklands and East London Advertiser reports that starting this month, the pub will get a £600,000 refurbishment,. The name of the pub will also be changed from the Great Eastern back to the Waterman’s Arms.

So although not visible from Greenwich as it was in 1986, hopefully the Waterman’s Arms will have a good future.

For a glimpse of the Waterman’s Arms when owned by Daniel Farson, the 1964 film London in the Raw by Arnold Louis Miller includes a sequence filmed in the Waterman’s Arms. The film is available from the British Film Institute.

alondoninheritance.com

A Winter Walk from Tower Bridge to Westminster

15 Replies

The photos from Hungerford Bridge for last Sunday’s post were part of a walk over the New Year from Tower Bridge to Westminster. I sometimes think that at this time of the year, London looks better after dark than during the short, grey days when a low sun and cloud cover conspire to subdue the city. Having said that, a sunny winter’s day brings out all that is best in the city.

I also take plenty of photos, because the city keeps changing, and because I just find all aspects of the city fascinating. For a mid-week post, here is a selection showing just how good the city looks when the grey sky is hidden by the dark of night, and the lights are on across London.

I started on the south bank of the river, looking back at Tower Bridge:

And across to the Tower of London:

The ever growing number of office towers in the City:

London seems to have hit peak Christmas Market, and now wooden sheds selling vaguely Christmas related products can be found anywhere across the city where high footfall and tourists are likely to congregate. Along the south bank, they start near Tower Bridge and can then be found dotted along the route to the London Eye.

Hay’s Galleria, the old Hay’s Wharf with more Christmas market themed shops.

Themed sculpture trails have been a trend of the last few years, and this year London Bridge City (another trend whereby areas of the City are given brand names to promote a sense of identity, usually by the corporations who own large areas of the city) are hosting a sculpture trail where twelve of Raymond Briggs Snowman characters have been individually decorated to represent the twelve days of Christmas.

The is “A Partridge in a Pear Tree” by Jodie Silverman:

Crossing London Bridge, it was down into Borough Market. Very quiet at this time of the evening, with the majority of stalls packing up, although hot mulled wine was still available.

Brightly lit interiors contrast with the dark of the exterior arches.

Borough Market:

Taking a photo of someone else taking a photo – Monmouth Coffee in Stoney Street by Borough Market:

Pubs always look very welcoming at this time of year – the Market Porter on the corner of Stoney Street and Park Street:

The Anchor, Bankside:

Many of London’s bridges are now part of the Illuminated River project where the intention is to light up each bridge with a unique lighting scheme from the Albert Bridge to Tower Bridge. Many of the inner City bridges have been completed and the aim is to complete the rest during 2020.

This is Southwark Bridge:

A good place to view the project is where multiple bridges can be seen at the same time. The following photo is looking back at Southwark Bridge, Cannon Street Railway Bridge and London Bridge.

The Illuminated River project will be in place for 10 years, after which the lighting and associated running and maintenance costs will be transferred to the bridge owners.

The changing light schemes across multiple bridges does focus the attention on the river rather than the surrounding buildings which is good.

A short distance along are the buildings that are part of the Globe Theatre complex on the corner of Bankside and New Globe Walk. Very different to the Emerson Wharf building that once stood on the site.

Entrance to Blackfriars Station on the south bank of the river:

Passing Blackfriars Bridge and this is the view looking over to the north bank of the river:

The three cranes are part of the construction site for the Thames Tideway Tunnel, which will also be one of the intercept points between the existing sewage system and the new tunnel.

On the right is the Unilever Building. The illuminated building in the centre is the old City of London School.

Further along we come to the South Bank complex, and here is a good point to look back towards the lights of the City, framed by the Oxo Tower on the right and St Paul’s Cathedral on the left.

Fast food on the South Bank:

South Bank walking:

The night and lighting softens the architecture of the buildings along the South Bank. This is the National Theatre:

Evening book browsing and selling under Waterloo Bridge:

The South Bank has many restaurants, and during the Christmas period, these dining pods are a colourful addition:

Opposite is the under croft of the Queen Elizabeth hall which from 1973 has been used for skateboarding:

Threatened with closure in 2013 / 2014, the space has been saved and refurbished and continues to offer a long term space for skateboarding on the South Bank.

Possibly a bit optimistic for mid -winter is this ice cream van:

Illuminations between the Royal Festival Hall and the river:

From here, I crossed over the river to take the photos from the Golden Jubilee Bridge for last week’s post, then continued up to just north of Trafalgar Square, where the London Coliseum looks impressive after dark:

Seven St Martin’s Place is between the church of St Martin in the Fields and William IV Street and faces the Edith Cavell Memorial. Back in July i wrote a post about the building which at the time was undergoing conversion to a hotel.

That conversion now appears to be complete and the hotel open.

One of the reasons for my interest in the building was the future of the sculptured panels on the facade of the building facing St Martin’s Place. These panels were the work of Hubert Dalwood, a sculptor in the Modern British movement.

The conversion looks complete and I am really pleased that the panels are in their original position, and look to continue to decorate the building in its new function.

Whilst much of the West End was relatively quiet, Leicester Square was busy, with the central square being occupied with another Christmas Market (further confirming that London must by now have reached peak Christmas market).

Brightly lit market stall in Leicester Square:

The surroundings of Leicester Square were full, and the area continues as a centre for the brands that attract the tourist trade.

In the following photo, a reminder of the old Swiss Centre is in the centre, with the M&M store on the right.

Directly opposite is the Lego Store, and whilst walking between the two stores you can still get your portrait drawn.

Trying to avoid the crowds, I headed down Waterloo Place, across the Mall, then into Horse Guards Road, and there was not a person in sight.

Apart from a single walker, I did not see anyone whilst walking the full length of Horse Guards Road between the Mall and Birdcage Walk.

An empty Horse Guards Road:

Westminster was the destination of the walk from Tower Bridge and here Westminster Abbey was looking impressive against a dark sky. Again, the area was deserted apart from a couple of people looking in the window of the closed visitor centre.

And then it was back to Westminster Underground Station. Although this was a walk along what could be described as the tourist focused areas of the city, it is always a pleasure to walk alongside the river, and it is fascinating to see how London is evolving.

Also, London does look really good after dark.

alondoninheritance.com

The View from Hungerford Bridge – 1985 and 2020

24 Replies

I usually try to get in a couple of evening walks in that quiet period just after Christmas and before the main return to work at the start of January. This year, part of one of these walks crossed the River Thames using the Golden Jubilee walkways alongside Hungerford Bridge. I wanted to photograph the same scenes as 35 years ago in 1985, and to have a look at what has changed. Although the formal name of the crossing is the Golden Jubilee Bridge, I have called the post the view from Hungerford Bridge, as this was the original 1985 walkway and seems to be the most used name for the crossing.

This was the view in 1985, looking south across the river towards the Royal Festival Hall.

The same view 35 years later:

The viewpoint is slightly different, as seen by the different location of the tall office block on the left, however the area around the Royal Festival Hall is still an illuminated focal point on the South Bank.

The 1985 photo does include a feature that was a focal point of the South Bank. To the left of the Royal Festival Hall was a tall, illuminated lattice structure. The coloured lights were continuously changing.

I was working on the South Bank for much of the 1980s, and these ever changing lights were always in the background when working or walking in the area after dark. I moved abroad for a few years at the end of the decade, and cannot remember when these lights disappeared. It is these subtle changes that are so easy to miss.

The following photo shows a detailed section from the original 1985 photo, which includes the lights, and also another unique feature from the 1980s.

In a previous post on London postcards, I included one of a large birthday cake created by the Greater London Council on the South Bank as an exhibition and celebration of 95 years of the London County Council / Greater London Council. I had visited the exhibition within the cake, and taken photos, but had not yet scanned the negatives. In scanning negatives I finally found some which included the GLC cake.

This can be seen in the 1985 photo above, and also in the extract, which does give an indication of the size of the cake, and how incongruous a traditionally decorated birthday cake looked against the concrete architecture of the South Bank.

The following photo is from the original postcard which shows the cake close up.

There was also some event advertising along the front of the Royal Festival Hall. The following is an extract from the 1985 photo which shows this advertising along the front of the building.

The red banner requests “Keep GLC Working for the Arts in London”. The mid 1980s was a time of conflict between the Thatcher led Conservative Government and the Labour majority Greater London Council led by Ken Livingstone.

This resulted in the 1985 Local Government Act which dissolved the GLC in 1986. Campaigns by the GLC could not influence the majority of the Conservative Government, and at the time there were serious concerns about future funding of South Bank complex. Probably one of the reasons why now the majority of the exterior ground level of the Royal Festival Hall is occupied by commercial businesses.

In the centre of the hall, there is a banner advertising that “EROS: Back in Town at the Royal Festival Hall”. I had completely forgotten about this, but in the 1980s the statue on the top of the Shaftesbury Memorial Fountain in Piccadilly Circus (so I assume technically correct to state Eros, which is frequently applied to the whole fountain), had been removed for restoration.

Prior to the return of the statue to Piccadilly Circus in 1985, it was displayed for a short period in the Royal Festival Hall.

The banner on the right advertises the “Mars London Marathon Exhibition” in advance of the marathon which took place in April of that year. Perhaps strange now that a health focused event would be sponsored by a brand such as Mars, but at the time (and for many years previously), the energy giving benefits of glucose were a major advertising feature of Mars bars.

The following 1985 photo again shows the GLC cake, and also the Festival Pier.

The same view from a slightly different angle, as to the right, the Kings Reach Tower office block now appears from behind the square office block of what was London Weekend Television.

A similar view in 2020 is shown in the photo below. The Kings Reach Tower building is now much taller having had several floors added during conversion of the block from offices to apartments. The future of the old London Weekend Television building (known after the closure of London Weekend Television as the London Studios and operated by ITV) is not clear. ITV moved out of the complex a few years ago, originally intending to return to refurbished studios, but they now uses studios at the redeveloped BBC Television Centre site in White City. I am sure that this high value location on the South Bank will become yet more expensive apartments.

The following 1985 photo is looking along the river towards Waterloo Bridge, St Paul’s Cathedral and the City of London.

In the above photo, the cathedral stands clear, as does the old Nat West Tower to the right. This building, now called Tower 42, was the tallest building in the City.

The same view today is shown in the following photo. The Nat West Tower is now dwarfed and almost lost by the City developments of the last few decades.

The following 1985 view is of the north bank of the river from the Hungerford Bridge walkway. The brightly lit building is the wonderful 1931, Grade II listed, Shell-Mex House, occupied at the time by Shell UK. The building is now known as 80 Strand. To the left is the Adelphi building, and the Savoy on the right.

The same view today, although a bit later in the evening so a somewhat darker sky. The front of the Shell-Mex building is covered in sheeting as part of an ongoing refurbishment.

Walking along the walkway towards the north bank, and this was the 1985 view from Hungerford Bridge looking towards the Embankment.

The same view in 2020:

The Embankment is much the same, however the main change is the scale of the Embankment Pier. This is a relatively small feature in the 1985 photo, which has since been replaced by a much larger pier by the 2020 photo. This is indicative of the considerable growth in passenger transport along the Thames in the 35 years since 1985, when river piers were mainly used for tourist focused cruises of the river. The opening of the Thames Clipper Service in 1999 has contributed significantly to passenger traffic on the river, with the resulting upgrades and additions of river piers to support this traffic.

The main change between 1985 and 2020 has been the bridge across the river from which the photos were taken.

In 1985 there was only a single walkway on the side of the bridge looking towards the City. It was a narrow walkway, frequently covered in large puddles of water, and from experience, not somewhere that you would really want to walk across late at night.

The following photo shows the original walkway:

Today, there is a walkway on either side of Hungerford Bridge. Officially named the Golden Jubilee Bridge, these new walkways were completed in 2002 and provide a considerably improved walking route between the north and south banks of the River Thames.

With the growth of attractions and events along the South Bank, the number of people walking across the bridges has grown considerably. According to the website of the architects Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands, who with engineering company WSP, won the competition for the bridges, they are the busiest walking routes across the river in London, with 8.4 million pedestrians in 2014.

The following photo is the view south along the walkway, towards the Royal Festival Hall.

A view during the day of the Golden Jubilee bridge:

The architects state that the bridges “are slung from inclined pylons that pay homage to similar structures created for the 1951 Festival of Britain, held on the adjoining South Bank”.

As evidence of this, the following photo was taken by my father from the southern end of Hungerford bridge, just after the Festival of Britain had closed, and shows the structures referenced by the architects.

The view looking north along the walkway towards the illuminated buildings above Charing Cross Station.

One final photo before I headed off north of the river – the Embankment from the walkway looking unusually quiet:

The Golden Jubilee Bridge is a considerable improvement over the previous walkway and provides a wonderful location to look at a spectacular view of the river, north and south banks, and the City, whether by day or night. The second walkway on the other side of Hungerford Bridge provides superb views towards Westminster.

The opening up of a walking route from the South Bank through Bankside and to Tower Bridge and beyond, along with attractions such as the London Eye and growth in the numbers of bars and restaurants has significantly increased walking across the river, along with the always present use of the bridge as a route between the north bank of the river and Waterloo Station.

Use of the river has grown since 1985 as evidenced by the considerably enlarged Embankment Pier.

In another 35 years time, the Royal Festival Hall will be just over 100 years old – it will be interesting to see how the area changes in the coming decades. One change I suspect will happen is the growth of tower blocks on the south bank beyond Waterloo Bridge and across the City. The area around the old London Weekend Television tower block and the London Studios will certainly look very different.

alondoninheritance.com

Share this:

Number 1 Bache’s Street

Number 2 and 3 Bache’s Street

Number 4 Bache’s Street

Number 5 Bache’s Street

Number 6 Bache’s Street

Number 7 Bache’s Street

Number 8 Bache’s Street

Number 9 Bache’s Street

Number 10 Bache’s Street

Number 11 Bache’s Street

Number 12 Bache’s Street

Number 13 Bache’s Street

Number 14 Bache’s Street

Number 15 Bache’s Street

Number 16 Bache’s Street

Number 17 Bache’s Street

Number 18 Bache’s Street

Number 19 Bache’s Street

Number 20 Bache’s Street

Number 21 Bache’s Street

Number 22 Bache’s Street

Number 23 Bache’s Street

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: