Category Archives: London Streets

Tower Hill And The Growth In London Tourism

Much of what I have written so far has been about the physical change across London. How the buildings and streets have changed so considerably over the last 70 years, however there are many other ways in which London has changed and for this week’s post I want to use a series of photos to show that whilst a specific area has not changed that much physically, it is now playing a very significant role in London’s position as one of the major world tourism destinations.

Tower Hill is the area to the north-west and western side of the Tower of London. Tower Hill, in the words of Stow was:

“sometime a large plot of ground, now greatly straitened by encroachments (unlawfully made and suffered) for gardens and houses. Upon the hill is always readily prepared, at the charges of the City, a large scaffold and gallows of timber, for the execution of such traitors or transgressors as are delivered out of the Tower or otherwise, to the Sheriffs of London by writ, there to be executed.”

There is a long list of those executed on Tower Hill, with the last being the execution of Lord Lovat on April 9th 1747. At this execution, a scaffolding built to support those wishing to view the execution collapsed with nearly 1,000 people of which 12 were killed. Apparently, Lovat “in spite of his awful situation, seemed to enjoy the downfall of so many Whigs”.

The following shows the Tower of London from a survey in 1597 showing the moat and the area to the north-west and west that formed Tower Hill.

The western end of Tower Hill. as can seen in the above picture, has long been the main land based gateway to the Tower of London, countless numbers of people must have walked down Tower Hill on their way to the Tower of London, for many, not in the best of circumstances.

The moat was drained in 1843 having long been described as an “offensive and useless nuisance”. After being drained workmen found several stone shot which were identified at the time as being missiles directed at the Tower during a siege in 1460 when Lord Scales held the Tower for Henry VI and the Yorkists cannonaded the fortress from a battery in Southwark.

The following postcard is from the first decade of the twentieth century. I suspect it was taken from the top of the tower of All Hallows by the Tower looking over the Tower of London with part of Tower Hill in the foreground with the approach running down towards the main entrance on the right. Transport is lined up along the approach, taking visitors to and from the Tower.

My father took the following photo looking up Tower Hill from a position to the extreme right of the above photo in 1948 (all of the following three photos from 1948, 1977 and 2014 were taken in the summer at roughly the same time, early afternoon as can be seen by the direction of the shadows).

The moat is just over the railings to the right. The large building behind the trees is the Port of London Authority headquarters. From the Face of London by Harold Clunn:

“Many courts and alleys were swept away between 1910 and 1912 to make room for the new headquarters of the Port of London Authority. This magnificent building, designed by Sir Edwin Cooper, stands on an island site enclosed by Trinity Square, Seething Lane and the two newly constructed thoroughfares called Pepys Street and Muscovey Street. Constructed between 1912 and 1922, it has a massive tower rising above a portico of Corinthian columns overlooking Trinity Square, and the offices are grouped around a lofty central apartment which has a domed roof of 110 feet in diameter”.

The “massive tower” is a very striking local landmark both from the surrounding streets and from the Thames.

The colonnaded building which can partly be seen at the top right of Tower Hill is the memorial to the men of the Merchant Navy and the fishing fleets who died in the two world wars. Some 36,000 names are listed of men who “have no grave but the sea”.

I find the detail of these photos fascinating, from left to right below. An Ice Cream seller in a white coat with his ice cream cart, one of which was bought for the boy in the middle photo and on the right behind the phone box is a Police Box, probably better known these days as a Tardis. Note also how common military uniforms were on the streets of London, even three years after the war had ended.

Now fast forward 29 years and I took the following photo in 1977 when I first stated taking photos of London with a Russian Zenit camera (all that pocket-money could stretch to at the time). The camera had a tendency for the shutter to stick and unlike digital cameras, you did not know this until after the film had been developed. This is one of the photos where it actually worked.

The scene is very similar. the coaches show the start of mass tourism to London and there are additional telephone boxes including one for Intercontinental Calls (this was still at a time when intercontinental calls were the exception and expensive to make).

Now fast forward again another 36 years and I took the following photo in early August 2014. Fortunately I now have a much better camera and I thought converting to Black and White would allow a better comparison with the previous photos.

When I took this, planting of the poppies for the “Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red” installation had only just begun and it had not generated the level of visitors seen in October and the start of November. This was a typical summer’s day on Tower Hill.

This photo also has cranes in the background which now appears to be mandatory for any photo within the City.

The Tower of London is now one of the major tourist attractions in London as can be seen on almost any day in Tower Hill. New ticket offices, food outlets and visitor displays have been built down the left hand side, the telephone boxes have disappeared and the ice cream seller with his ice cream cart from 1948 would be hard pressed to manage the industrial scale of ice cream vending now seen on Tower Hill on a summer’s day.

Visitor numbers to London have risen dramatically over the last few decades. In the last ten years they have risen from 11.696 million in 2003 to 16.784 million in 2013 and the first half of this year’s numbers show a 7% increase over the first half of last year.

Of these visitors in 2013, 2.894 million visited the Tower of London in 2013. I doubt that these numbers could have been imagined on that summer’s day in 1948.

Tourism is one of the many factors that are changing the face of London, and with numbers continuing to increase this influence will continue.

I recommend a visit to Tower Hill late on a cold winter’s evening, when it is possible to look over the moat, across to the Tower without the noise and hustle of the crowds and with a little imagination, see the Tower as it has been for centuries as a functioning garrison, fortress and prison. There is also an opportunity to briefly experience the Tower at night. The Ceremony of the Keys takes place every night with admittance starting at 9:30 pm. Whilst with modern-day security systems this ceremony is now probably more ceremonial than functional it does provide a glimpse of the Tower at night and of a ceremony which has been in existence for at least 700 years. Again, a cold winter’s evening is the best time to experience this event. Tickets are free from Historic Royal Palaces and can be found here.

You may also be interested in my post on the Tower Hill Escapologist which can be found here

The sources I used to research this post are:

London by George H. Cunningham published 1927
Old & New London by Edward Walford published 1878
The Face of London by Harold Clunn published 1932
The London Tourism numbers are from the Greater London Authority Data Store which can be found here
Figures for visitors to the Tower of London are from the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions and can be found here (which also has a fascinating list of visitor numbers to the majority of UK attractions)

alondoninheritance.com

The Faraday Building of Queen Victoria Street

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One of the things that makes walking the streets of London so enjoyable is a discovery that not only informs about a building or location, but also tells a whole new story about a period in time and what was changing and important in the life of Londoners at that time.

Walk down Queen Victoria Street towards Blackfriars. After passing the church of St. Benet, Paul’s Wharf on your left you will walk past what, at first glance, appears to be a very bland and utilitarian building.

This is the Faraday Building, named after Michael Faraday, an English scientist who experimented with electromagnetism, demonstrated how rotating a coil in a magnetic field could generate electricity and developed the “laws which governs the evolution of electricity by magneto-electric induction”.

The General Post Office (GPO) opened the first London telephone exchange on this site in 1902 with the existing building being completed and officially opened in 1933 to accommodate the very significant growth in telephone services across London. It was designed by A.R. Myers, an architect of the Office of Works who was responsible for the design of a considerable number of Telephone Exchange buildings and Post Offices across the country.

Following completion, the height of the building was very controversial as it blocked the view of St. Paul’s Cathedral from the river. It led to the planning regulations and by-laws that protected sight-lines to the cathedral and restricted the height of buildings. To this day along Queen Victoria Street, the Faraday Building is still the tallest between cathedral and river, as can be clearly seen in the following photo where the Faraday Building is on the right, well above the surrounding buildings.

The Faraday Building was the main telephone exchange for London and also the hub for international circuits with the majority of international calls being routed via the manual switchboards in the building.

Look just above the line of the second set of windows and in the position associated with a key stone, there are a series of carvings, one above each window, that tell the story of what was state of the art telecommunications at the time the building was constructed.

Walking down towards Blackfriars, the first carving is the Telephone.

This type of telephone at the time, was cutting edge technology. It utilised a dial that sent pulses to the telephone exchange when the dial was released from the chosen number position, to tell equipment at the exchange what number was being dialled. Prior to the use of a dial, all calls were put through manually, requiring an initial conversation with an operator which would then start a series of manual patching to put you through to your destination. A technique that worked when few people had telephones, but a model that could not cope with the growth of telephones as the 20th Century progressed.

The next carving shows a series of coded pulses crossing a disk, possibly a representation of the world.

Coded pulses were the means by which information was transmitted about the call to be made. When a dial was turned on a telephone, the release of the dial would cause it to return to its original position and as it returned it would open and close an electrical contact thereby sending pulses to the telephone exchange.

I have seen a number of interpretations for the next carving, but to me these are very clearly the cables that carry telephone signals. There is an outer loop of cable and within the centre, the ends of the cables which have their protective sheath cut back leaving the individual conductors within exposed.

Cables were the key part of the telephone system that carried the pulses and speech from telephones, to the exchanges and then across to their destination, whether in the same street or across the world. (I can see the architects were trying to tell a story in stone of the technology of how a telephone call was made)

The next carving shows a Horse Shoe Magnet. Magnetism was key to the telephone system from the very beginning through to the late 1990s when telephone exchanges driven by magnetic devices were replaced by computer based systems.

Michael Faraday’s work with electricity and electromagnetic induction was critical in the understanding of electricity and magnetism, their relationship and laid the foundations for their future practical application. This work was crucial to enable the technology that would go on to provide the telephone systems that spanned the world to be developed and these carvings clearly seem to be celebrating this fact, and the position of the Faraday Building as a hub in this global network.

One of Faraday’s experiments involved rotating a coil of wire between the poles of a horseshoe magnet which resulted in the generation of a continuous electric current in the wires of the coil. This was the first electrical generator and the fundamentals are the same in the generators of modern-day power stations.

We then come to a carving for King George V, the monarch at the time of the construction and opening of the Faraday Building.

Moving on we come to the carving of an electromagnetic relay which to me is one of the most unique relatively modern-day carvings you will find across London. It is of a core bit of technology, hidden away in the depths of a telephone exchange, but without which automatic telephone exchanges would not have functioned. This type of relay was cutting edge at the time the building was planned, equivalent to the technology that connects the Internet today and switches information from your computer or smart phone through to web-based services across the world.

As an apprentice in the late 1970s with Post Office Telephones (as it was prior to changing to British Telecom and being privatised) I have spent many hours cleaning and adjusting these relays to keep them working and driving the equipment that switched telephone calls. The following photo shows a typical item of equipment from a telephone exchange in the late 1970s full of the relays found carved on the Faraday Building. This is looking end on, as if we were looking at the carving in from the right.

Large telephone exchanges such as that within the Faraday Building would have had many thousands of these relays.

I find these carvings fascinating. They show a pride and celebration in the technology of the time and the function of the building. The majority of buildings constructed during the last few decades, apart from transient corporate logos, tend to have no indication of their function or purpose.

One final set of details can be found just above the main entrances to the building. Just above the door, between the words Faraday and Building is the caduceus (staff with wings above two coiled snakes) of Mercury, the messenger of the Gods, and just above the window there is a carving of Mercury.

Technology has moved on considerably since the Faraday Building and these carvings were completed and I doubt the architect and builders of the time could have dreamt of the Smart Phone and Internet.

I hope these carvings remain for many decades to come to show future generations the pride that they had in the service that the Faraday Building would provide to London.

alondoninheritance.com

The Canopies and Carving of Queen Anne’s Gate

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In tracking down the locations where my father’s photos were taken, there are three distinct categories of photo:

Those with a very recognisable scene
Some have a street name or some other indicator of the location in the photo
Many have no clue within the photo as to where it was taken

Today’s photo falls into the last category. It is one I have looked at many times, mainly fearing that like many London streets from the 18th Century, this one had been lost forever, however whilst tracking down Cockpit Steps for last week’s post I turned a corner and suddenly found myself looking at a street scene where the buildings had hardly changed in 60 years. I had come out of St. Jame’s Park Underground Station, walked up the first leg of Queen Anne’s Gate, turned to the right to head down to Cockpit Steps and found myself facing the same street scene that looked like this over 60 years ago:

My 2014 photo from the location:

There have been some minor changes to the buildings, however apart from the ever-present impact of the car, the scene is basically the same.

Queen Anne’s Gate is a fascinating road. It was originally a street and a square. The section nearest the camera was Queen Square and the part furthest from the camera was Park Street. They were separated by a wall until 1873 when the two areas were combined into Queen Anne’s Gate. The building of the wall has many echoes with traffic concerns of today. Queen Square was constructed first, then when Park Street was constructed, residents of Queen Square were so concerned that the road would be used as a cut through for carriages to avoid the traffic of King Street, the Sanctuary and Tothill Street that a subscription was collected for the building of the wall to avoid the residents having the peace of their square disturbed.

The wall was just over halfway down the street and although the wall is long gone, the statue of Queen Anne still stands at this point:

The street name sign still retains faded versions of the different street names. Note also the plaque underneath the street name sign. There is a another of these on the junction with Carteret Street:

This is the symbol for Christ’s Hospital and is used to show that these buildings were owned by Christ’s Hospital. I believe that Christ’s Hospital owned these buildings until as recently as the mid 1990’s. Queen Square was originally the freehold estate of Sir Theodore Janssen, one of the directors of the South Sea Company in 1720, and when the South Sea crash came Queen Square was seized and sold to help pay of the debts of the institution.

The buildings in what was Queen Square (the part of Queen Anne’s Gate covered by my old and new photos) were completed around 1704 in the reign of Queen Anne (1702 to 1714), a monarch that does not get much visibility these days, however she was on the throne at a crucial time in the history of the United Kingdom when the Acts of Union came into force on the 1st of May 1707 which united Scotland and England into the single Kingdom of Great Britain.

Anne was therefore the first Queen of Great Britain and Ireland.

Intriguing to think that these buildings were completed before the act of union and dependent on the outcome of the Scottish vote in September may see a very changed situation.

Queen Anne’s Gate has a large number of Blue Plaques. The following plaque is for Sir Edward Grey in what was the Park Street end of the road. Sir Edward Grey was the Foreign Secretary at the time of the outbreak of the First World War.

Other Blue Plaques along the street:

The architecture of the buildings in the original Queen Square part of Queen Anne’s Gate is superb, and the main doors to the majority of buildings have very elaborate decorated wooden canopies, the following being a typical example:

Also along the buildings are elaborate stone carvings of which the following two are examples:

This type of decorative stone carving and the carved wooden canopies were soon to be replaced by the Georgian style of architecture which was neater (less intricate carving) and more magnificent stone work. One of the key drivers behind this change was the considerable number of books published by craftsmen for craftsmen from about 1715, which led to the gradual standardisation of ornamentation. Architectural pattern-books resulted in much standard Georgian architecture across London. These Queen Anne’s Gate buildings were very much the end of an era.

The following map is a repeat of last week’s map showing the location of Cockpit Steps. Queen Ann’s Gate can be seen just to the left of the location of Cockpit Steps. The map also shows how the first part of Queen Anne’s gate is a cut through from St. James Park Underground Station through to Birdcage Walk.

As it was in 1940 it continues to be now, and whilst I was stood on the corner waiting to take a photo down what was Queen Square, there was an almost constant stream of people walking from the station area to Birdcage Walk with hardly a glance at the magnificent buildings that are over 300 years old.

The following is a sample of the doors and carved canopies along Queen Anne’s Gate:

I am really pleased to have found the location of this photo. Not just for finding the location, but also that these buildings have survived the developments of the last 60 years.

If you arrive at St. James Park underground station, do not cut straight through to Birdcage Walk, take a detour down Queen Anne’s Gate and admire these superb buildings.

The sources I used to research this post are:

Georgian London by John Summerson published 1945
London: The Art of Georgian Building by Dan Cruikshank and Peter Wyld published 1975
The Face of London by Harold P. Clunn published 1951
London by George H. Cunningham published 1927
Old & New London by Edward Walford published 1878
Bartholomew’s Reference Atlas of Greater London published 1940

alondoninheritance.com

Cockpit Steps – A Hidden Alley Leading To Birdcage Walk

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Unlike my posts of the previous two weeks, the location of this week’s post was very easy to find and also unlike the previous posts the location has hardly changed and I was able to work out the exact position to take 2014 photos some 65 years after my father took the originals.

The following photo from about 1950 was taken halfway down Cockpit Steps, looking up towards the corner of Dartmouth Street and Old Queen Street. The steps link this corner with Birdcage Walk, alongside St. James Park.

The following is my 2014 photo taken from the same location:

The scene is very similar. The lamp-post is still the same and although there is still a post box in the same position, it is a later model.

Walk down the steps, and there is nothing to suggest any history to the location, however the name is a clear indication of what was here a couple of centuries ago as this was the location of one of the three main cock-pits in London (the others were in Whitehall and Drury Lane) where the sport of cock-fighting was held. Whilst to us this is a barbaric sport, for centuries it was very popular and had royal patronage.

The location of the steps is shown in the following map from Bartholomew’s Reference Atlas of Greater London, where they are shown as a continuation of Dartmouth Street, however they do have their own unique identity.

The cock-pit was finally taken down in 1816.

The cock-pit was a typical London scene for Hogarth and the following is Hogarth’s view of the cock-pit at the end of Cockpit Steps:

It is easy to imagine the intrigue, secret meetings and arguments that would have taken place in such a place. It was here that Robert Harley, afterwards Earl of Oxford was stabbed, though not fatally, with a penknife by a French noble refugee, the Marquis de Guiscard who was brought before him and the rest of the Cabinet Council by the Queen’s Messenger, charged with treacherous correspondence with the rival court at St. Germain, whilst drawing a pension from the English Court.

My father’s original photo of the entrance to Cockpit Steps also shows that very little has changed.

And my 2014 photo from the same position:

Whilst walking down the steps, I noticed some very worn graffiti carved into the brickwork. Probably wishful thinking but is this one from 1907?

The lower entrance to Cockpit Steps is from Birdcage Walk and is the location of the original cock-pit. Even on a busy Saturday morning the steps were very quiet. Lots of tourists and walkers passing along Birdcage Walk between Buckingham Palace and Westminster but hardly a glance at this hidden location.

The entrance from Birdcage Walk:

Looking down Old Queen Street with the entrance to Cockpit Steps in the bottom left:

The sources I used to research this post are:

The Streets of London by Gertrude Burford Rawlings
Old & New London by Edward Walford published 1878
Bartholomew’s Reference Atlas of Greater London published 1940

alondoninheritance.com

Queen Victoria Street and Upper Thames Street – A Lost Road Junction

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Very much like last week’s post, this week’s was initially a bit of a puzzle and I could not locate where the following original photo had been taken.

There are no street names and no instantly recognisable buildings. I could not recall anywhere in central London with two streets joining, separated by a long length of steps. My only clue was the rather dark sign on the right hand side stating Southern Electric and Underground.

After checking the London stations of the Southern Railway I finally found where the photo was taken, but only because the buildings in the middle distance of the photo are still there, the rest of the scene is completely different.

The location is outside Blackfriars Station, looking east up Queen Victoria Street and my 2014 photo from the same position is shown below:

The foreground has completely changed, but what confirms the scene is the church tower (St Andrew by the Wardrobe) and the buildings around the church (the building behind the church is the British & Foreign Bible Society and the taller building behind that is the original Post Office Faraday building, opened on the 4th May 1933 and one of the main hubs for London telephone services).

John Stow in his 1603 Survey of London was rather dismissive of the church of St. Andrew, with the single sentence “then turning up towards the north, is the parish church of St. Andrew in the Wardrobe, a proper church, but few Monuments hath it”.

The “Wardrobe” reference in the church name is to the King’s Wardrobe that was moved out of the Tower of London in the reign of King Edward the Third. This was in a great house built by Sir John Beauchampe, Knight of the Garter, Warden of the Sinke Portes and Constable of Dover. He died in 1359 and his executors sold the house to King Edward the Third. Following this sale, the parson of St. Andrew’s complained to the King that “the said Beauchamp had pulled downe divers houses in their place to build the said house.”

As well as the buildings in the foreground, even the level of the streets has been changed with the level on the right being taken up to that of Queen Victoria Street thereby removing the steps at the road junction. It would be good to think that some part of those steps were left and are buried beneath the current street level adding to the layers of history buried beneath the City’s surface.

This small area is also a good example of how continuous development has reshaped London over the years, not just the buildings, but also the main thoroughfares through the City, and how the City has tried to manage the increasing volume of traffic passing within and through the City.

Queen Victoria Street is the main street on the left of both photos. In the long history of London, this, as the name implies, is a recent road.

It was fully opened to the public on Saturday 4th November 1871 and to quote from “The Face of London” by Harold P. Clunn:

“Queen Victoria Street was constructed by the late Metropolitan Board of Works as a continuation of the Victoria Embankment, with the object of providing London with a new main artery from the Mansion House to Charing Cross. It was the greatest improvement carried out in the City of London during the nineteenth century. Not only did it provide invaluable relief to the enormous traffic of Cheapside, but it completely altered the appearance of the City centre.”

The photos also demonstrate how the City has responded in recent decades when even Queen Victoria Street and the centre of the City were unable to manage the increasing volumes of traffic.

In the original photo there is a road that drops away to the right. This is the original route of Upper Thames Street which, with Lower Thames Street was the main through road running parallel to the River Thames and connected to all the short lanes and wharfs leading down to the river.

The following map is from Bartholomew’s Greater London Street Atlas of 1940, with the area of today’s post identified by the red oval.

The original photo was taken in front of Blackfriars Station looking up Queen Victoria Street and the road turning right below the steps can be clearly identified in the map as Upper Thames Street.

In recent decades the route of Upper Thames Street has been relocated to run far closer to the river, and rather than joining Queen Victoria Street, it nows runs underneath the river side of Blackfriars Station, underneath Blackfriars Bridge straight into the Embankment.

The following Google map shows the area as it is now with the re-routing of Upper Thames Street.

View Larger Map

Not clearly visible in the 2014 photo is the road, just past the bus stop, that leads down underneath the complex of buildings around Blackfriars Station to Upper Thames Street. This road is Puddle Dock, a reference to the original dock that was on this site.

Stow names this as Pudle Wharfe in 1603 and states almost against this wharf there is “one ancient building of stone and timber, builded by the Lords of Barkley and therefore called Barklies Inne. This house is now all ruine and letten out in severall tenements”

Puddle Dock was also probably the landing place for the first Baynard’s Castle which was built in this area by William the Conqueror. The role of Baynard’s Castle was to protect the western edge of the city as the Tower of London protected the east. The first Baynard’s Castle lasted from the 11th to the 14th century following which it was replaced by the second Baynard’s Castle further to the east.

Development of the Puddle Dock area started in 1952 when the Corporation of London offered the trustees of the Mermaid Theatre the lease of a bombed warehouse at Puddle Dock. The theatre opened in 1959 and is just under the building to the right on the road named Puddle Dock. The theatre has survived many attempts at closure and redevelopment and is now mainly a conference and events centre.

Returning to the original photo, I find it fascinating to look at the people in these photos. The following is an enlargement of the group of people in the centre.

The photo was taken on a weekend but note the very formal dress of the men. They have all probably just arrived on a train into Blackfriars and are heading off into the City. The man on the left appears to have a typical pushchair of the time. The adult and child on the right possibly heading down Upper Thames Street to visit the Tower of London?

The streets around them must have seemed permanent. I wonder what they would have thought of the same location today?

The sources I used to research this post are:

The Face of London by Harold P. Clunn published 1951
London by George H. Cunningham published 1927
Old & New London by Edward Walford published 1878
Bartholomew’s Reference Atlas of Greater London published 1940
Stow’s Survey of London by John Stow, 1603 (Oxford 1908 reprint)

alondoninheritance.com

A Lost Bank and the Adam and Eve Pub on the corner of Euston Road and Hampstead Road

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There are some photos from my father’s collection that I was unsure of whether I could find the location where the photo was taken. This week’s post is a typical example of this type of photo, but also how such a simple photo leads into further investigation of the area where the photo was taken. This is what I wanted to get out of this journey, find the location of where all my father’s photos were taken and increase my knowledge of the history of London.

Two very similar photos taken in the late 1940s show a group of men working on the road at a road junction, with a Bank on the corner behind them.

There was nothing really to identify the location, however on closer examination of the Bank, there is the street name of Hampstead Road. The name on the sign on the right of the Bank cannot be identified so I could not work out the road junction. The angle and the distance does not allow a name to be resolved. So I knew this was in Hampstead Road on a street corner, but where? I have walked Hampstead Road before and could find no location that fits these photos.

I have a number of sources to search, both written and online to try to find locations and I eventually found the location for this one following a search on the English Heritage website searching for a Bank in Hampstead Road. This resulted in a photo of the same bank, identifying the location as on the corner of Hampstead Road and Euston Road, so now I had the location with the photo being taken outside Warren Street underground station looking across the Euston Road to the Bank on the opposite corner.

The junction of Euston Road, Hampstead Road and Tottenham Court Road has changed dramatically over the years since this photo was taken. The Euston Road has been considerably widened with the Euston Underpass being constructed to take traffic along the Euston Road under the junction of Tottenham Court Road and Hampstead Road.

Working along the Euston Road to Great Portland Place underground station shows how the road has been widened at this junction with the road at Great Portland Place being about the original width.

There are still many original building on the south side of Euston Road with Warren Street underground station being one of these that has not changed, therefore the south side marks the original alignment of Euston Road. The north side has all been redeveloped with Euston Tower and the more recent Regent’s Place office buildings. My estimation of where the bank was located is therefore half way across the new road, just over the Euston Underpass.

There was one point that worried me in confirming the location of this photo, there is an Underground sign pointing east along Euston Road, I would have assumed that if this was outside Warren Street it would be pointing to the station, however a quick check confirmed that in the direction of the sign, a short walk along Euston Road is Euston Square underground station, so this sign was directing travellers emerging from the Northern line at Warren Street to the Circle, Hammersmith and Metropolitan lines at Euston Square.

The following is my 2014 photo from roughly the same position outside Warren Street underground station as the original.

Very hard to be precise as there has been so much change since the original, and I suspect I should have been more on the current edge of Euston Road slightly to the left. If I have worked out the original road widths correctly then the corner of the Bank in the original photo is roughly where the white truck is in the 2014 photo.

Despite the appearance of this road junction and the surrounding areas, as with anywhere in London there is a considerable amount of hidden history to be discovered.

The following map is from the 1940 edition of Bartholomew’s Reference Atlas of Greater London with the red oval covering the area of today’s post. The junction of Tottenham Court Road, Hampstead Road and Euston Road is under the “J” in the centre of the oval. Warren Street station can just be seen and the photo was taken outside looking diagonally across Euston Road.

If we cross the Euston Road from Warren Street to the north side we find Euston Tower and the Regent’s Place development. This has completely obliterated Eden Street, Seaton Place, Fitzroy Place, indeed this whole area bounded by Drummond Street and Osnaburgh Street.

Eden Place was probably where the front of Euston Tower is now located and was lost in the widening of Euston Road and the construction of the underpass. Seaton Place was probably at the rear of Euston Tower, this is now a pedestrian walkway between Euston Tower and the other office blocks of Regent’s Place which for some reason is called Brock Street. No idea why the original name could not have been retained.

It was on this corner of Hampstead Road where the Adam and Eve Tavern was located. The location now is probably exactly where the underpass dives under the Hampstead Road, Tottenham Court Road junction. This was built on the original site of the Tottenham Court from which Tottenham Court Road takes its name. The manor was converted to the original Adam and Eve somewhere around 1645. Up until the later part of the 18th century the tavern and extensive gardens were very popular with Londoners. In the road outside the Adam and Eve, Hogarth set the scene for his “March to Finchley” where a military camp had been set-up and the picture shows the disorderly Guards in true Hogarth style on their way to the Finchley Camp as part of the journey to Scotland to meet the Jacobite Pretender (Charles Stuart).

The March to Finchley is shown below:

The Hogarth picture shows two Taverns with the Adam and Eve on the left and the Old Kings Head is on the right. Strange to think that the Euston Underpass is now running left to right across this picture. The King’s Head was demolished in 1906 to make way for the widening of the Hampstead Road. The very narrow road width of the junction at this point had long been a problem as the King’s Head jutted out into the thoroughfare and calls had been made to address this from the start of the nineteenth century.

Also, when the Adam and Eve and Kings Head were at the peak of their popularity, much of this area was countrified and to demonstrate the rural nature of the area, the following advert appeared in The Postman for December 30th 1708 of a house to be let:

“at Tottenham Court, near St. Gile’s and within less than a mile of London, a very good Farm House, with outhouses and above seventy acres of extraordinary good pastures and meadows with all conveniences for a cowman, are, to be let, together or in parcels, and there is dung ready to lay in”

I took the following photo on the east side of Tottenham Court Road looking over towards Euston Tower and Regent’s Place. The Adam and Eve Tavern was roughly where the red traffic lights are now located with Eden Street just in front of Euston Tower.

The following photo is the second of the same scene. It is fascinating to compare working conditions of the late 1940s with those of today. Not a single high visibility jacket or traffic cone in sight.

I have recently received some fantastic photos of the Euston Road, Hampstead Road junction and the building of the underpass from John Cinnamond. They show the junction before the widening of the Euston Road and the building of the Underpass.

The first photo, taken in 1961, is looking east along Euston Road. The bank on the left of the photo is the same as the one in my father’s photo, however this now shows the full view of the road.

The next photo, also taken in 1961 is looking west along Euston Road. Warren Street Underground Station is on the left and this is basically the same today, however the very significant change is to the right of the photo. The pub on the corner is the Adam and Eve. All the buildings on the right of this photo were pulled down in order to make way for the widening of the Euston Road and the Euston Underpass. Where the buildings on the right, facing the camera stood, is now the underpass and a bridge over the underpass leading to the north side of Euston Road.

I have repeated one of my photos from earlier in the post. This is looking across to where the pub and the buildings running to the right in the photo above used to stand.

Now we come to the building of the Underpass. These photos were taken in 1966 and this is looking across to Warren Street Underground station, the curved building to the left of the photo. The pub and buildings in the early photos ran across to the right, where the hoarding can be seen, but have now been pulled down and the Underpass is being built.

And looking in an easterly direction, the Underpass is where the bank used to stand, which would have been roughly left of centre, slightly set back from where the Underpass goes under the road.

One final photo which again is from 1961 and is looking to the west. The lorry is from the company G.E.C. the engineering and electrical conglomerate that failed so spectacularly after trying to turn itself into an internet / communications business at the height of the dot-com bubble. Interesting not only how the urban landscape changes, but also the businesses operating in that landscape.

An amazing series of photos and I am very grateful to John for sending and letting me include in the post as they complete the story of how this road junction has changed so considerably.

So, one simple road junction in London, but as with most places across London, a fascinating history.

The sources I used to research this post are:

London’s Old Latin Quarter by E. Beresford Chancellor published 1930
London by George H. Cunningham published 1927
Old & New London by Edward Walford published 1878
Bartholomew’s Reference Atlas of Greater London published 1940

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The Royal Festival Hall – Before, During and After Construction

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A few weeks ago I published a post about the South Bank before the Festival Hall with some photos taken on the South Bank. This week I want to cover the same area, but this time showing the scene from the north bank of the Thames as this provides a very clear view of how a small area between Waterloo and Hungerford Bridges has changed.

The following photo was taken by my father from the north side of the Thames next to Hungerford Railway bridge in 1948:

Hungerford Railway Bridge is to the right and Waterloo Bridge is on the left hand side, both bridges framing the future site of the Royal Festival Hall. To the left of the photo is the Shot Tower and to the right is the Lion Brewery.

Until the 16th Century, this area was foreshore to the Thames, overgrown with rushes and willows and subject to flooding at high tides. The road behind the Royal Festival Hall, Belvedere Road was the Narrow Wall, a road built on the embankment to the Thames.

From Old and New London (Edward Walford (1878)): The spot between the Belvedere Road and the river between Waterloo and Westminster Bridges – till recently known as Pedlar’s Acre – was called in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries Church Osiers from the large osier-bed which occupied the spot (an Osier is a type of Willow) This is a plot of land of some historical notoriety. It was originally a small strip of land one acre and nine poles in extent , situated alongside the Narrow Wall and has belonged to the parish of Lambeth from time immemorial. It is said to have been given by a grateful pedlar. (There is also a story that the pedlar’s dog discovered treasure there whilst scratching around in the ground). On Pedlar’s Acre at one time was a public house with the sign of the pedlar and his dog and on one of the windows in the tap-room the following lines were written:

“Happy the pedlar whose portrait we view,
Since his dog was so faithful and fortunate too;
He at once made him wealthy, and guarded his door,
Secured him from robbers, relieved him when poor.
Then drink to his memory, and wish fate may send,
Such a dog to protect you, enrich and befriend”

What ever the truth of this story, it is still fun whilst walking round the Royal Festival Hall to imagine the Pedlar and his dog digging in the willow beds and finding treasure.

Continuing from Old and New London:

Not far from the southern end of Waterloo Bridge on the site now occupied by the timber-wharfs of Belvedere Road and close by the Lion Brewery, which abuts upon the river stood formerly a noted place of public resort known as Cuper’s Gardens. As far back as the eighteenth century if not earlier it was famous for its displays of fireworks.

The Shot Tower was built in 1826 as part of the lead works on the site for the production of lead shot. The tower is built of brick, with a diameter at the base of 30 feet. The tower tapers slightly so at the top gallery the diameter is 20 feet. The gallery is 163 feet from ground level.

From the gallery, molten lead was dropped to form large shot, half way down the tower was a floor where molten lead could be dropped to make smaller shot.

The Lion Brewery is on the site of a former Water Works where water was taken from the river for distribution to the local area. Pumping water from the river was replaced by a supply from reservoirs on Brixton Hill and the works were removed in 1853. The site then became a brewery which became the Lion Brewery Company Limited in 1866. The building was damaged by fire in 1931, it was then used for a short time for storage and then remained derelict until demolition in 1949 to make way for the construction of the Royal Festival Hall.

The following photo was taken from the same position a few years later during the construction of the Royal Festival Hall in 1950 (judging from the position of the shadow on the river this was taken at the same time as the 1948 photo, some careful planning to get the comparison right). Construction was fast, from the foundation stone being laid by Clement Atlee in 1949 to the hall being opened on the 3rd May 1951

The Shot Tower remains (apart from the gallery at the top) and would remain for the duration of the Festival of Britain. The core of the Royal Festival Hall is under construction, covered in scaffolding and cranes. The new river frontage is also under construction.

The Royal Festival Hall was constructed by the London County Council and was planned as the one permanent building to remain from the overall Festival of Britain site that occupied the South Bank.

The following is my 2014 photo of the same area. I could not get into exactly the same position as my father when he took the original photos as the new foot bridge extends further into the river from the railway bridge.

The following Festival of Britain postcard shows a model of the site with the Royal Festival Hall on the left of Hungerford Railway Bridge. Difficult to see from this model, but Belvedere Road runs behind the Royal Festival Hall, under the railway bridge and behind the Dome of Discovery on the right. It is incredible how this small area changed in a few years either side of 1950.

On the north bank of the Thames opposite the Royal Festival Hall is Shell Mex House. The following is a painting of the view from Shell Mex House included in the programme for the Festival of Britain. The Shot Tower and Lion Brewery with Waterloo Station in the background.

The text below the picture is typical of the mood surrounding the Festival of Britain, the prospect of a bright future following the long years of war. The Royal Festival Hall is the only remaining building from the Festival of Britain as the rest was quickly removed after the closure of the festival.

Photo focussing on the area around the Shot Tower:

And again showing the Shot Tower and river:

You may also like to read my earlier post covering the site of the Royal Festival Hall and the area towards Waterloo Station before construction started which can be found here.

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Hairdressers of 1980s London

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For this week’s post, I bring you a collection of photos taken in 1985 and 1986 that focus on the Hairdressers of east and central London. These show a type of business that whilst providing the same function, has changed over the years and provides a snapshot of London streets in the recent past. Many have long since disappeared, but good to see that a couple still survive maintaining a continuity of business across many decades.

The first photo is of Ron’s Gents Hairdressers – 27 Three Colts Lane, Bethnal Green, E2.

After almost 30 years, this building is still there, but has changed from a Hairdressers to a Barbers, fascinating that the same type of business has been operating in this location for many decades as Ron’s had obviously been long established in 1985.

The perfect location for an “Executive Mood” or “Avant Garde Mood” hairstyle. 1980s “big hair”.

Dave & Syd Strong, Gent’s Hairdresser. Typical of the time, always with photos in the window showing typical hairstyles:

Dennis Gents Hair Stylist. Note the razor blade advertising sign, the long term association between barbers and shaving.

Gents Hairdressers moving into Ladies Hairdressing:

If it was not for the sign you would not know this was a hairdresser:

Apples Hair Stylist:

Peter Individual Gents Hair Stylist. Again with model photos in the window. The painting of the wall to the left of the shop continues the association of red and white stripes with barbers. This is more usually seen as red and white stripes around a pole and symbolises bloody bandages wrapped around a pole when barbers also performed surgery, blood letting, the use of leaches and teeth extractions.

The Saloon. Faces of customers peering out from the left of the shop window:

Mario’s Men’s Hairstylist. With the traditional red and white pole.

Hairdresser at 10 Laystall Street, EC1 with plaque commemorating Giuseppe Mazzini “the apostle of modern democracy inspired young Italy with the ideal of independence unity and regeneration of his country. ” I am not sure why this plaque is on this building, when he was in London he lived at 183 Gower Street where there is a London County Council Blue Plaque.

The plaque is still there, although the hairdresser is long gone.

The Pleasant Gent’s Hairdresser. Rosebery Avenue, Clerkenwell, EC1. Still going as the Pleasant Barbers – http://pleasantbarbers.co.uk/ (Interesting to see the change over the last 30 years from Men’s Hairdressers to Barbers)

Gentlemen’s Hairdressing Salon, 59a Carter Lane EC4 (central London). The building is still there as are the same bollards, however the building is now a coffee shop.

Junes Ladies Hair Stylist. Closed and being cleared. Note on the sign the old London telephone number format with the area name rather than number. STE was the code for Stepney Green. Letters were replaced by numbers around 1966.

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Murals and Street Art from 1980s London

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In the 1980s there was a growth in the amount of murals and street art across London, a mix of decoration or serious and politically inspired.

These photos were taken in 1985 and 1986 and demonstrate not only considerable skill and effort but many also reflect the social and political concerns of the time. Some of these murals still exist, however they are now much faded. These photos show them shortly after completion with their detail and vibrant colours.

The following picture shows Greenwich Park, the Queens House and the Royal Observatory in the centre with the Thames curving past the Isle of Dogs which is to the left. Above and below is a horrific scene of missiles falling onto the population of London, presumably with the aim of destroying the people and the city.

Starting from the mid 1980’s, the Cold War was coming to a gradual end, concluding a period when nuclear annihilation had been a real possibility, which this work probably represents.

Many of the people are holding hands around the vision of London, their outstretched arms appear to be hitting out at the missiles. A representation of people power against the nightmare of nuclear war?

And note the fine example of a 1980s car in the foreground, a Ford Capri.

The following was painted in 1985. The lettering top right of the smaller picture states that this was GLC funded. The GLC (Greater London Council) was dissolved in 1986 following the Local Government Act of 1985.

The TV is showing a picture of Margaret Thatcher. It was mainly the conflict between Ken Livingstone’s policies at the GLC with the Conservative government led by Margaret Thatcher that led to the abolition of the GLC.

The following mural shows El Salvador in Latin America. A country that was going through considerable violence and turbulence throughout the 1980s following a coup d’état in 1979.

The mural appears to represent the idyllic cooperative movement rolling back the military and industrial complex back into the sea.

The mural is still there, although much faded. The location is the side of Macey House, Horseferry Place, Greenwich.

The following picture seems to cover a number of events. A street party with a banner referring to the Silver Jubilee in the background. In the background to the right is a banner referring to Victory in Europe, probably referring the previous street celebrations.

Street market, Wentworth Street in E1.

Continuing the above mural to the left:

The Waterloo Mural near Waterloo Station. The detail on the newspaper identifies this as completed on the 20th October 1980 by Carolynne Beale and Cat… (rest hidden behind the tree) of Murals Unlimited.

Could this be the same people as Carolynne and Kate?

Fantastic artwork on the side of a house in Wolsey Road in Islington. This is still in place although a large tree has now grown in the garden in front and covered most of this work.

Detail of the window:

In Camden:

Giant Rabbits:

And across London there was always plenty of window art as illustrated by the following photo:

I suspect that this period was a peak for this type of street artwork. Walking around London now, I do not see very much contemporary work and there is certainly very little that has the same political inspiration as that created during the 1980s.

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Shepherd Market – A Village in Piccadilly

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Throughout London there are many small areas that have their own distinct history and unique atmosphere. One of these is Shepherd Market and part of the title of this week’s post “A Village in Piccadilly” is taken from the book of the same title by Robert Henrey, first published in 1942 and describing life in Shepherd Market during the early part of the last war.

Shepherd Market is the core of the area between Curzon Street and Piccadilly, the site of the original May Fair that gave the district its’ name. The following map is taken from the book A Village in Piccadilly:

Robert Henrey was a journalist, however his wife was the French writer Madeleine Gal who also wrote under the name of Robert Henrey. Writing was a joint enterprise with much of the material being hers and he supplied the editorship. Their son, Bobby Henry was the child star of the British 1948 film “Fallen Idol”.

See the Guardian obituary of Madeleine for more information.

The Henrey’s lived in Shepherd Market during the 2nd World War and the majority of the book is a fascinating account of the impact of the war on life in Shepherd Market and the immediate area around Piccadilly.

Shepherd Market was the site of the original May Fair. This had started in the reign of Edward 1 as the annual St. James Fair after Edward 1 privileged the hospital of St. James to keep an annual fair “on the eve of St. James the day and the morrow, and four days following”. By the reign of Queen Anne it had become the May Fair. The fair had a considerable reputation. A review by the editor of the Observator from the reign of Queen Anne (1702 – 1707) states:

“Oh! the piety of some people about the Queen, who can suffer such things of this nature to go undiscovered to her Majesty and consequently unpunished! Can any rational man imagine that her Majesty would permit so much lewdness as is committed at May Fair, for so many days together, so near to her royal palace if she knew anything of the matter? I don’t believe the patent for that fair allows the patentees the liberty of setting up the devil’s shops and exposing his merchandise for sale”

Unfortunately he does not state the nature of the merchandise for sale !

From 1701 the fair was growing considerably in scope and occupied the area on the north side of Piccadilly, in what would become Shepherd Market, Shepherd Court, White Horse Street, Sun Court, Market Court and the area as far as Tyburn (now Park) Lane.

Within the area of the May Fair was a cottage built in 1618 which was the home of the herdsman who looked after the cattle during the annual fair. This cottage lasted until 1941 when it was destroyed in an air raid. One of the many examples of the large loss of historic buildings during the bombing of the last war.

Robert Henrey’s book describes how the area that held the May Fair became Shepherd Market:

To the north of our village in 1708 was a low house with a garden embowered in a grove of plane-trees. Here lived Mr Edward Shepherd. In 1708 Mr Shepherd had seen a lot of disorderedly behaviour at the May Fair so much that the fair was abolished by Grand Jury presentment, “the year riotous and tumultuous assembly …in which many loose, idle and disorderedly persons did rendezvous, draw and allure young persons, servants, and others to meet there to game and commit lewdness”

The fair did return after a short pause (the temptation of gaming and lewdness probably too much for Londoners of the time), however with London expanding the land started to be built on. Mr Shepherd noticed that the market value of the land made building profitable and he bought the irregular open space on which May Fair had been held and in 1735 built Shepherd Market.

The core of the market consisting of butchers’ shops and the upper floors containing a theatre.

In the map at the top of the post, Hertford Street can be seen to the west of Shepherd Market. In this street was the “Dog and Duck” public house with its duck pond and shaded by willows. Duck hunting was described as one of the “low sports of the butchers of Shepherds Market”.

My reason for tracking down Shepherd Market was to identify the location of two photos taken by my father in the late 1940’s.

The first is of the pub “Ye Grapes” and can be located in the top right hand corner of the map at the start of this post. The following photo is my father’s original:

Almost 70 years on, the area is still very much the same. Ye Grapes is still a pub, the alley leading through to Curzon Street is still there and the newsagents to the left of the alley is still a newsagents.

Ye Grapes is recommended for a drink after some London walking. The bar area is many years old and is what a local London pub should be.

The following is my father’s photo of Market Street:

And the following is my 2014 photo:

I recommend Robert Henrey’s book, A Village in Piccadilly as it provides a very detailed description of life in a small part of London at the start of the war, when the bombing of London was at its most intensive. The book is a very personal account of the impact on individual shopkeepers and inhabitants of the area through the dramatic early years of the last war.

Whilst the buildings of Shepherd Market have not changed significantly, the area is now home to many small restaurants and does almost have a “village” atmosphere after the noise and congestion of Piccadilly, just a short distance away.

Looking back down towards Shepherd Market from the alley that leads to Curzon Street:

The following is from the book “A Village in London” and shows an area in 1910 which was later destroyed in an air raid. As the text states, it was kept by the newsagent to remember the “old days”.

So, if you are in the Piccadilly area, take a short detour to Shepherd Market. Enjoy the restaurants and the pubs, but be moderate with the drink otherwise the riotous and tumultuous assembly and lewd behaviour that was the defining feature of this area for so long may still be just below the surface.

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A London Inheritance

A Private History of a Public City

Category Archives: London Streets

Tower Hill And The Growth In London Tourism

The Faraday Building of Queen Victoria Street

The Canopies and Carving of Queen Anne’s Gate

Cockpit Steps – A Hidden Alley Leading To Birdcage Walk

Queen Victoria Street and Upper Thames Street – A Lost Road Junction

A Lost Bank and the Adam and Eve Pub on the corner of Euston Road and Hampstead Road

The Royal Festival Hall – Before, During and After Construction

Hairdressers of 1980s London

Murals and Street Art from 1980s London

Shepherd Market – A Village in Piccadilly

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