​Preamble

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Deptford took its name from a ford across the Ravensbourne (near what is now Deptford Bridge DLR station) along the route of a Celtic trackway which was later paved by the Romans and developed into the medieval Watling Street.  The modern name is a corruption of "deep ford”.  

 

Deptford was on the pilgrimage route in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. The ford became a wooden bridge then a stone one, and in 1497 saw the Battle of Deptford Bridge, in which rebels from Cornwall marched on London protesting against punitive taxes, but were soundly beaten by the King's forces.

 

A second settlement, Deptford Strand or Deptford Strond, developed as a modest fishing village on the Thames until Henry VIII used the site for his royal dock - repairing, building and supplying ships. After which it grew in size and importance.  Shipbuilding continued until 1869.

We’ll be visiting both these places on our tour.

 

STOP: Joiner Street bridge

LOCATION: Tooley Street, opposite London Bridge Hospital building

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The history of London Bridge station is confusing but the London and Croydon Railway had an entrance fronting Joiner Street, which in the early days was like any other street - open to the skies. By 1864, this had become the entrance to the South Eastern Railway, and it was they who extended the railway line to Charing Cross and Canon Street.

 

So what had been a terminus station became through platforms, and the railway had to be extended over Joiner Street — which called for the use of girders. These iron girders (known as the Warren Truss Girder) had only been invented a few years earlier. It’s the use of alternately inverted equilateral triangle-shaped beams that give the truss strength in both compression and tension, making it ideal for long spans. These are thought to be some of the earliest surviving examples.

 

And not bad that over 150 years later they’re still up there doing the job they were designed for.

 

Also, the brick arches to the eastern side of Joiner Street are from the original station entrance built by the London and Croydon Railway prior to1864.

 

STOP: Bermondsey Abbey 

LOCATION: No 7 Grange Walk

 

Bermondsey Abbey was founded in 1082.  There’s a reference to 'Bermundeseye' church in the Domesday Book (1086).  Bermondsey was a district of marshes and the abbey was built on a hill.   Bermondsey Street was the original route from the river to the abbey - hence it is straight. The name comes from old english and may have meant 'Beornumund's Island'.    

Henry II held his court at Bermondsey Abbey in the mid-12th century. This was an early version of the English Parliament. 

 

Between William the Conqueror in the 11th century and Henry VIII in the 16th century, there was an important church priory and abbey here. The abbey was closed by Henry VIII as part of the dissolution and the buildings sold to Sir Thomas Pope who built himself a 100 room mansion using one of the abbey walls. 

 

Parts of the Abbey foundations can be seen through glass floor tiles in the Lokma restaurant in Bermondsey Square.   Any other remains are below the surface of the square. 

 

The only remaining part of the Abbey buildings that still exists above ground is part of the East gatehouse, now part of 7 Grange Walk. The crooks for the hinges of the gate can still be seen protruding from the façade. The stonework is in remarkably good condition.

 

The Grange was the name for the farmland that the Abbey cultivated, and so this would be where the labourers and delivery wagons came in and out.  Smart visitors used a more elaborate gatehouse near the junction of Bermondsey Street and Long Lane.

 

The row of houses dates from the late seventeenth century.

 

STOP: Watch house & Fire Engine Station

LOCATION: Saint Marychurch Street

 

Before the formation of the very first professional police service in the form of the Metropolitan Police in 1829, policing duties were undertaken by a local body known as The Watch that was organised by the local parish vestry.

 

Until the end of the 17th century, the watch consisted of householders within the parish who patrolled the streets on rotation from about 9pm to sunrise, looking out for suspicious characters and apprehending criminals. This was not without danger to members of The Watch and increasingly householders paid ‘deputies’ to take their place.  These were first steps towards a professional police force.  

 

This area was something of a crime hotspot. Being just downstream from the horrendous squalor of Jacobs Island (which we’ll pass on return journey to London Bridge) and the docks.

 

During the early part of the 19th century there was a serious problem of body-snatching where corpses would be rushed off to be illegally dissected. It may have been in the name of medical research and science but it was also expressly against the teachings of God and so the good local people of Rotherhithe found themselves quite busy getting the dead to the mortuary and quickly buried before someone could squirrel the body away.  

 

Body snatching was a very lucrative and commonplace because fresh bodies were always in demand by anatomists at the nearby Guys Hospital.

 

Legally the medical profession were only allowed to use the bodies of those who had been executed but as the death sentence was carried out less frequently towards the end of the 18th century, there was a shortage of cadavers.

 

The Rotherhithe watch house served two purposes.  It allowed The Watch to keep an eye on the graveyard and it also had a cell in the basement where suspects could be held. It was staffed by a beadle (a parish constable associated with the church), a constable and 14 watchmen.   The passing of the Anatomy Act in 1832 ended this gruesome practice.

 

There were different categories of watchman. Those who wore white overcoats and carried lanterns were meant to be seen and heard, as they called the time and weather. Watchmen wearing blue were ‘silent’ and looked for wrong-doing in the dark corners of the local area.  It isn’t much of a stretch that this choice of blue outfits were the inspiration for the police wearing blue uniforms to this day.

 

By 1822 there were around 3,800 parish officers employed in London.  For serious disturbances the army were employed to restore order.  The Rotherhithe watch house closed in the same year as the Metropolitan Police was established (1829) but there was no police base in the immediate vicinity until 1836 when a police station opened on Paradise Street, a few hundred yards west of here.

 

And next door is all that’s left of its twin - the fire engine house.  The engine house was a fire station and was home to a single fire engine, which was a hand-operated fire pump on wheels. If you look at small the entrance is, it must have been quite a small and simple piece of equipment.

 

Rotherhithe Free School was founded in 1613 to educate the sons of seafarers.The school moved here in 1797 and it didn’t move out until 1939 when it moved round the corner to Salter Road.  

 

The pub, the church and the schoolhouse define the centre of the former village of Rotherhithe with a line of converted old warehouses extending upon the river frontage for a just couple of hundred yards in either direction beyond this enclave.

 

STOP: Tide Gauge House

LOCATION: Princes Court on The Thames immediately after the entrance to the old Greenland Dock

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Greenland Dock is the oldest of London's riverside wet docks. It was part of the Surrey Docks, most of which have by now been filled in. Greenland Dock is now used for recreational purposes. It is one of only two functioning enclosed docks on the south bank of the River Thames. 

 

The original dock was built in the 17th century and called Greenland because it mostly dealt with the whaling fleet, which was most active around Greenland.  It was expanded in the 19th century and closed in 1970.

 

This bolted cast iron lattice-truss bridge was installed in 1904 when the lock was extended.  It is one of the best features of Greenland Dock.  It was not fixed in its position - its two parts could be swung to each side when tall ships needed to pass through the lock.  It was operated by vast hydraulic jiggers that worked by pushing water at very high pressure through pistons in the cylinder equipment to open and close the two halves of the swing bridge.  

 

The hydraulic equipment is still preserved today in the pits next to the bridge on each side, although it is longer functional.  The lock gates, the granite steps and the hydraulic gear have been preserved, however the lock is now blocked off. The Grade II listed bridge was renovated in 1987

 

The lock buildings consist of the harbour master's cottage and the tide gauge house. They were built when the dock and the lock were extended between 1894-1904. They are lovely little buildings, nicely designed and were clearly intended to be good looking as well as functional. 

 

The lock keeper's office at Greenland Dock lock, headed by the Lock Keeper, was the equivalent of the modern edifice overlooking South Dock's lock entrance that we’ll see shortly.  It was manned in three shifts by teams whose role was to process ships in and out of the lock when the tide was right.  There would have been one of these lock keeper teams at every lock in Rotherhithe. The tide gauge house contained the equipment for determining the state of the tide.  It was essential for the correct operation of the lock for this to be precise. 

 

STOP: Parish boundary stone Rotherhithe

LOCATION: hard to spot - embedded in the low wall on the river front

 

This stone marks the boundary between St Mary's parish, Rotherhithe and St Paul's parish, Deptford. Until 1899 this was also the Kent-Surrey boundary. From 1819 this stone was on the bridge over Earl’s Creek nearby just south of this point by St George’s Stairs.   It was relocated here in 1988.

 

When the tide is low you can see the culverted outlet of Earl's Creek (or Earl’s Sluice, named after Robert, 1st Earl of Gloucester (1100 – 1147)).  This river was the original boundary between Rotherhithe and Deptford.

 

Earl's Sluice is now entirely underground. Its source is Ruskin Park on Denmark Hill. In South Bermondsey it is joined by the River Peck (as in Peckham) before emptying into the Thames here.

 

STOP: The Circumsphere

LOCATION: In The Thames opposite Deptford Wharf

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The Circumsphere was created by Chris Marshall and Stephen Lewis with funding from Sustrans as part of Rotherhithe’s ‘Art on the Waterfront’ project. It was installed in 1998 to commemorate the voyages of ships built here in Deptford. 

 

Examples include the Elizabethan ship Ayde (1562), which having fought against the Spanish Armada, twice sailed in search of the North-West Passage to the Pacific around the North of the Americas. And of course, Drake’s Golden Hinde.

 

The sculpture (which is mounted on a mooring structure called a dolphin) comprises an arrangement of galvanised steel rods forming a globular mass. Attached to the ends of some of the rods are tiny red disks (look closely), which form lines marking the route of Sir Francis Drake’s circumnavigation voyage in 1577–1580.

 

Captain James Cook seems to have favoured ships built in Whitby for his voyages. However, for his first voyage of exploration, the Endeavour was refitted here before he took her to the South Pacific in search of undiscovered and unmapped and there. He visited Tahiti, the Society Islands and New Zealand. All on a ship built here.

 

STOP: The Wall of Ancestors

LOCATION: On the riverside face of the tower block

 

This area is known as Deptford Strand, part of the Pepys Estate, a site originally established as part of Henry VII’s naval yard in 1513.  Strand means ‘beach’ or ‘edge of a river’.

 

This is the ‘Wall of Ancestors’ a row of sculptured faces on Aragon Tower. Aragon Tower is a block of private apartments previously owned by Lewisham Council for social housing, built in 1964.  The Wall of Ancestors was added in 1997.

 

The faces are a mixture of contemporary characters and historical figures. The sculptures made by local artist Martin Bond were designed to reflect the past and present inhabitants of the area. 

 

The historical characters include Grinling Gibbons (17/18th century wood carver), Sir Francis Drake, Catherine of Aragon, Phineas Pett (a shipwright), Peter the Great, Queen Elizabeth I and Olaudah Equiano (an 18th centrury campaigner against slavery in the times when London was an important slave trading port). 

 

Some of the contemporary characters are still living on the estate and as Bond was keen to reflect the diversity and creativity  of the area he included  Dr Burnhart Gloss, originally from Australia, and now a resident working as a professional clown. 

 

Bond says of his work “The Wall portrays some of my friends of that time, elevated and commemorated for ever, mixed in with the historical and socially worthy people. My idea was to show cultural diversity elevated to celebrity sometimes with merit sometimes without – some of the people are still alive and probably ride past on their bicycles!”

 

STOP: Frances Drake

LOCATION: On Foreshore at the point the route leaves the river

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Sir Francis Drake (1540 – 1596) was an English explorer and privateer best known for his circumnavigation of the world in a single expedition between 1577 and 1580. This was the first English circumnavigation, and second circumnavigation overall. Magellan was first.  

 

He is also known for participating in the early English slaving voyages of his cousin, Sir John Hawkins, and John Lovell. Having started as a simple seaman, by 1588 he had worked his way up and was a vice-admiral in the fight against the Spanish Armada.

 

Drake's exploits made him a hero to the English, but his privateering led the Spanish to brand him a pirate, known to them as El Draque ("The Dragon" in old Spanish). 

 

He died of dysentery after his failed assault on Panama in January 1596.

 

Drake’s galleon, The Golden Hinde was moored here at Deptford when he received his knighthood in 1581. Queen Elizabeth I came here to bestow the honour onboard. And this is where Sir Walter Raleigh placed his coat down at the top of these stairs to keep the queen’s feet dry, pretty much marking himself out for all time as a gentleman.

 

The plaque reads:

 

In 1581 Queen Elizabeth I commanded that Francis Drake's ship the Golden Hind be drawn into a creek here at Deptford as a perpetual memorial for having 'circuited round about the whole earth'. On 4th April 1581 she banqueted on board the Golden Hind and 'consecrated it with great ceremonie, pompe and magnificence eternally to be remembered' and forthwith knighted Drake on his ship in recognition of the honour that he had brought to England by his discoveries and circumnavigation in the years 1577-1580. His achievements included discovery of open sea from Atlantic to Pacific below South America, opening of English trade in the far east and claim to the western region of North America for England naming it Nova Albion (New England) and thereby linking it with claims to the east coast and encouraging subsequent colonization of the eastern seaboard. Drake's voyage fostered the principle expressed by the queen 'that the vse of the sea as of the ayre is common to all, and that the publique necessitie permits not it should be possessed’.

 

STOP Evelyn’s mulberry tree

LOCATION: Sayes Court Park -  follow the route to the mulberry tree with a plaque

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Laid out by the writer and gardener John Evelyn, Sayes Court Garden in Deptford was among the most renowned botanical collections of 17th-century England. The gardens have since been built over and this park (Sayes Court Park) is the largest remaining green space in the area. It is an unremarkable example of 1950s landscaping apart from one feature that has supposedly survived since Evelyn’s time.  

 

This mulberry bush is reckoned to be over 300 years old. How it got here is not entirely clear and there are many varying accounts.

 

It could be that the bush was planted by Peter The Great to make up for his bad behaviour when he stayed in John Evelyn’s house - we’ll come to that later.  More likely is that the bush was planted by Evelyn himself, or even predates his possession of the land. 

 

Almost a century earlier, King James I had sent out black mulberries to London landowners hoping they would attract silkworms and start a British silk industry. Unfortunately he failed to realise that silkworms prefer white mulberries.

 

STOP: Deptford station 

LOCATION: Deptford Market Yard

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Deptford station is the oldest railway station in London that is still in use. It was built when the London and Greenwich Railway opened its first section between Bermondsey and Deptford in February 1836, with an intermediate station at Southwark Park. The line was extended westwards to the new London Bridge Station in December 1836 and eastwards to Greenwich in December 1838.

 

Deptford station was closed between 1915 and 1926. The original station building was demolished by the Southern Railway and replaced by a newer building, which was itself demolished around 2011 and replaced by the one you see here.

 

The railway from London Bridge to Greenwich was built on a three mile brick-built viaduct crossing mainly open fields because, with trains travelling at such high speeds – around 12 miles per hour – the railway company was afraid that their trains might hit a horse or cow that strayed onto the line.

 

While building the viaduct, the Victorians were all too aware that the arches were open and empty. Someone had the bright idea that a wall could be added to the front and back of each arch and then it could be turned into a house. As they said at the time ‘There would only be a few trains passing in the morning and others passing each evening to convey the commuters up to work each morning and home in the evening’. Little did they realise how busy the line would become!

 

The housing idea made the builders of the viaduct think and they considered having a one-arch house for a small family and a two-arch house for a larger family. To that end every alternate pier along the viaduct had a small archway built into it so that, should the arches be turned into houses, there would be a small interconnecting archway already in place. The whole idea of domestic housing came to nothing but the little interconnecting arches can still be seen.

 

The ramp dates from 1835 and originally had rails. It was used for hauling rolling stock to an engine shed after repair here in the yard. Or some think it was so rich folk could take their horse and carriage right up to the doors of the train.  You decide.  Either way, the viaduct and ramp are both grade II listed.

 

STOP: Deptford Lifting Bridge

LOCATION: On bridge over Deptford Creek shortly after turning off Creekside

 

This is one of the most unusual features of the old London and Greenwich Railway.  This lifting bridge was constructed to carry the two tracks over Deptford Creek. Being on a viaduct, the arches were high enough to allow for traffic using the existing roads to pass underneath. The viaduct also had to cross the Grand Surrey Canal where extra-wide arches were constructed. Although the canal has been filled in, those arches are still in use. The most challenging part of building the railway line was where the lines passed over Deptford Creek itself, which is the northernmost part of the Ravensbourne river.

 

Constructing a bridge over Deptford Creek was possible.  However, the Creek is tidal and, at high tide, it is relatively deep. It is also quite wide which means that Thames sailing barges could use it, proceeding as far south as Deptford Bridge. Such barges have a tall mainmast and, because they had been using the Creek for several centuries, they had right of way over trains using the new railway route. 

 

Any bridge crossing the Creek was required to be either a swing bridge or a lifting bridge. For a swing bridge at the height of the viaduct, there would have been considerable problems with its construction. So they opted for a lifting bridge. This proved to be rather complicated and, therefore, it held up the completion of the railway line to Greenwich Station. The London and Greenwich Railway ran from London Bridge Station to Deptford Station from December 1836 but the line over the creek to get to Greenwich Station was not completed until December 1838.

 

The First Lifting Bridge. The first bridge had a complex system of pulleys and chains, sliding rods and counterweights, which needed eight strong men to operate it. Three blasts on a train whistle had to be sounded before it was crossed.

 

The whole procedure to lift the bridge probably took between 30 minutes and an hour to complete, maybe longer if a problem was encountered. When a passenger travelled down to Greenwich Station from London, it was quite usual to consult a tide table because train services from London Bridge Station could be seriously disrupted around high tide on Deptford Creek. Similarly, if somebody was meeting a passenger from a train at Greenwich, they faced a long uncertain wait for delayed trains if the bridge over the Creek was lifted.

 

The requirement to lift the bridge was enshrined in an Act of Parliament. Any failure on the part of the railway, or its staff, to raise the bridge in a prompt and timely manner was a criminal offence. The Act was not abolished until the 1980s.

 

Later Lifting Bridges. The original 1838 bridge was replaced in 1884. But that was just as cumbersome -  even the rails had to be completely removed and no less than twelve men were required to raise the bridge.

 

The one you can see now is the third bridge and dates from 1963.  It is an electric lift-bridge and sailing barges passing through at high tide were required to book a time slot in advance for the bridge to open. However, it hasn’t been used for 30 years and in the year 2000 it was welded shut in the ‘down’ position. 

 

It is now a listed structure and will, therefore, remain in situ. However, Network Rail is considering removing the lifting mechanism which is now completely unusable.

 

Definitely part of Deptford’s industrial heritage.

 

STOP: Queen Caroline’s bath

LOCATION: follow the route for 50 metres after entering Greenwich Park

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The story behind this bath is one of scandal, salacious gossip and drama.

 

Caroline of Brunswick was born in Germany in 1768. In 1795 she was married, by arrangement, to her cousin the Prince of Wales and future King George IV of England. They had, what has got to be, one of the worst marriages in British royal history.

 

A real bone of contention in the marriage was that the Prince of Wales was already illegally married to his sweetheart Maria Fitzherbert. Secondly, he was hugely in debt due to his frivolous nature and gambling addiction. Just to top it off he was a very heavy drinker and according to Caroline, spent most of the wedding night ‘under the grate, where he fell, and where I left him’, having had a few too many.

 

He, in turn, considered her ugly and unhygienic and said he had to ‘overcome the disgust of her person’. So, all in all, it did not get off to a good start.

 

Either way, they somehow managed to ‘do the deed’ that night and promptly nine months later Caroline gave birth to their daughter Charlotte.

 

Things then went even more downhill. George wrote Caroline out of his will three days after the birth of Charlotte and the couple refused to live together with Caroline coming to live here at Montagu House. The wall in front of us was the back wall of the house.

 

Montagu House had been built in the late 1600s by the 1st Duke of Montagu. After moving in, Caroline had a glass bathhouse built adjoining the house, including installing this sunken bath.

 

Bathhouses and plunge pools were very popular amongst the well-to-do in the Georgian period. Cold baths in particular, were considered a good way of warding off sickness.  

 

Queen Caroline supposedly held wild parties here. She was accused of taking many lovers and having an illegitimate child.  An investigation called the ‘delicate investigation’ was launched by the House of Lords to ascertain whether she had been adulterous, but no evidence could be found.

 

Caroline lived here until 1814 when she decided to up sticks and move to France.  George almost immediately ordered the house be demolished, presumably as some sort of revenge. The bath was covered over and all that was left was the wall you can see in front of you.

 

In 1820, King George III died and the Prince of Wales became King George IV, thus making Caroline the Queen.  Caroline returned to England against George’s wishes to assume her rightful position. She even turned up to the coronation, uninvited, but was turned away at the door.  Caroline died just a couple of weeks after the failed attempt to attend the coronation, on the 7 August 1821 from, what at the time was understood to be, an intestinal obstruction.

 

The bath was rediscovered in 1909, covered over again in the 1980s, but then re-excavated in 2001. You can still see a few blue tiles remaining inside and the narrow steps down into the plunge pool.  The hedges mark out where the walls of the bathhouse would have once been.

 

STOP: General Wolfe & toilets in Greenwich Park

LOCATION: Adjacent to the Royal Observatory

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James Wolfe (1727 - 1759) was a British Army officer known for his training reforms and, as a major general, remembered chiefly for his victory in 1759 over the French at the Battle of the Plains of Abraham in Quebec.

 

This monument, the gift of the Canadian people was unveiled in 1930 by Le Marquis de Montcalm. 

 

The pockmarks on the plinth are WW2 damage, most likely caused by a plane strafing the ground aiming at anti-aircraft batteries set up in the park.

 

Only recently restored are the Great Steps terraces leading down to the Royal Naval Hospital, which were originally installed by Charles II in the 1660s.

 

STOP: Vanbrugh Castle

LOCATION: Junction of Maze Hill and Westcombe Park Road

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Vanbrugh Castle was built by John Vanbrugh around 1719 as a family home.  Vanburgh had succeeded his mentor Sir Christopher Wren as Surveyor to the Royal Hospital in 1716.  He was the architect of the baroque houses at Castle Howard and Blenheim Palace.

 

In contrast to the baroque style used for his professional commissions, he chose a more medieval, almost gothic, style for his own house. The building's narrow sash windows echo medieval arrowslits or lancets. A garden on the building's lead roof makes the most of the views over the Thames and London.

 

Some say the design was based on the Bastille, where Vanbrugh had been imprisoned for over four years in his youth, and the building was called Bastille House before it became better known as Vanbrugh Castle.

 

It has had various owners since Vanburgh died, and for a while was used as a school before, in 1976, being acquired by a group of four people for £100,000 and converted to four private flats.

 

STOP: Trinity hospital

LOCATION: Highbridge Wharf, just after power station

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These almshouses were originally built in 1613 by Henry Howard, Earl of Northampton, on the site of Lumley House which was the childhood home of Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester.  Dudley was a favourite and suitor of Elizabeth I for many years.  She of course was born round the corner in Greenwich Palace in 1533.  

 

Howard set up his charity for 12 'poor men' of Greenwich and eight from his birthplace in Norfolk, hence the name Norfolk College by which the almshouses were also known. It was one of three Trinity almshouses founded in the last year of Howard's life, the others being in Clun, Shropshire and Shotesham, Norfolk.

 

The hospital was rebuilt in 1812 in Gothic style and is a Grade II* listed building.

 

The 20 poor men lived in the hospital along with a warden. They were expected to comply with a set of standards which included not being allowed to go to taverns or ale-houses. In 1841 there were 25 residents with a combined age of 1680 years - the average age of the residents was just over 67 years.

 

Directly opposite Trinity Hospital is the river wall, heightened over the years to prevent flooding. With plaques on the wall detailing the heights and dates of previous high tides. The plaque on the right records an extraordinary high tide on the 7 January 1928 when 75 feet of the wall was demolished, this must have flooded the hospital.

 

STOP: Peter The Great statue

LOCATION: Shortly after crossing Deptford Creek on the swing bridge

 

This extraordinary monument to Peter the Great (unveiled in 2001) overlooks the convergence of Deptford Creek and The Thames. According to the dedication it is ‘a gift of the Russian people and commemorates the visit of Peter the Great to this country in search of knowledge and experience’. 

 

So, what is the story?

 

For a few months in 1698, as part of his ‘Grand Embassy’, Peter stayed in the area to study shipbuilding in the famous Deptford dockyards. Peter’s ‘Embassy’ as it was called was not an official state visit, yet it was far from quiet or uneventful. He rented nearby Sayes Court, owned by the diarist John Evelyn (he of the mulberry bush), and there were soon reports of trouble. 

 

‘There is a house full of people, and right nasty’, a servant wrote in anguish. Peter’s capacity for drinking was well known, but some of the accounts of what happened sound fantastical. Did the Tsar really make a hole in the house wall to give himself faster access to the shipyards? Or have himself pushed through Evelyn’s prized mulberry bushes in a drunken wheelbarrow race? What we do know from official reports is that there was significant damage to the property – over fifty chairs broken, floors, doors, locks, linen and, yes, wheelbarrows, all needing replacement.

 

Evelyn got a quote for repairs from his local builder – Sir Christopher Wren - and it was over three hundred pounds, a staggering amount at the time. Half the damage was repaid by the Treasury. 

 

Not all of the ‘Grand Embassy’ was spent partying. Peter also undertook a fact-finding tour that included the Royal Society and Royal Mint, the Observatory at Greenwich, and the Arsenal at Woolwich. His knowledge was put to good use when he returned to Russia, with the foundation of the country’s first sizeable fleet and navy.

 

A tall, rangy Peter holds a pipe and a telescope and looks out over the Thames, his expression unreadable. He should be flanked by a comedic dwarf, and there is a throne, and parapets featuring Russian and English inscriptions, cannon, sea-monster heads, a mysterious triangle filled with balls, and depictions of food and drink. 

 

It is the work of two Russians. There is a companion sculpture in St Petersburg.

 

The dwarf has been boxed in because of angle grinder damage in an attempted robbery, leaving a diplomatically awkward repair bill of thousands of pounds.

 

Millennium Quay, the owners of the housing estate, suggested the Russian embassy could pick up the tab. The embassy has not responded.  Greenwich council has said the statue was the responsibility of the developer which owns the section of the Thames path here.

 

UK relations with Russia and its leader have deteriorated sharply in the years since Putin sailed down the Thames in 2003 to visit the statue, accompanied by the Duke of York.  The worst thing about that visit was the Russian naval band practising the national anthems here every morning. Apparently they couldn’t even get their own anthem right, let alone God Save the Queen say local residents.

 

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the statue had been decorated with a Ukrainian flag and ribbons in Ukrainian colours. One local resident even threatened to paint it blue.

 

STOP: The Jolly Roger & Christopher Marlowe's grave

LOCATION: Gates into St Nicholas churchyard on Deptford Green

 

The Jolly Roger.

Skull and crossbones creep into every nook and cranny of London — on a previous ride we saw them over the gateway into St Olave’s near Fenchurch Street. 

 

Why is it, then, that it's rumoured these particular two skulls inspired the bloodcurdling logo of the pirate, the Jolly Roger?

 

The skulls certainly didn't have anything to do with pirates when they were erected here sometime between 1697 and 1716. The classic skull on crossbones is a ‘memento mori’ symbol ("remember you must die") and indeed the charnel house is just inside the gates. This small churchyard had many more burials than it could support and so bones were piled up in there waiting for the second coming to resurrect them.

 

During the 16th and 17th centuries Deptford positively reeked of salty seadogs. Where there were ships, there were pirates — or privateers at least. One such privateer was Welshman Captain Henry Morgan. And it is he who is supposed to have passed through these gates, clocked the skulls, and turned them into a flag. Then he set off to terrorise the Spanish.

 

All very romantic, yet there are no records that this was ever the case. Other people name seafaring characters such as Emanuel Wynne, Edward England, Richard Worley and Henry Avery as pioneering flyers of the Jolly Roger. Maybe, if Morgan did use the motif himself, he simply nicked it off one of these. Nicking stuff is, after all, what privateers do.

 

A skull motif flag in various forms is reported being used by Barbary pirates a century before and there are no reports of them raiding Deptford.

 

So while real pirates may well have walked beneath the gateposts and smiled at them, it's more likely they were recognising an existing symbol rather than being inspired by it.

 

Christopher Marlowe.

Christopher Marlowe was an Elizabethan playwright and a contemporary of Shakespeare.  He was born in Canterbury in 1564, the son of an upmarket shoemaker and a clergyman's daughter. He was just two months older than Shakespeare.

 

Marlowe was suspected of being a spy (among many other things) during his university years in Cambridge. Educated at Corpus Christi College, he frequently took leave from lessons and nearly didn't get his degree. It wasn't until The Privy Council intervened on his behalf, commending him for his 'good service' to Queen Elizabeth I, that he was awarded his degree – arousing speculation that Marlowe was operating as a secret agent for Sir Francis Walsingham's intelligence service.

 

In 1593, Marlowe wrote a manuscript that pointed out (what he considered to be) inconsistencies in the Bible. This was heresy. Another contemporary was tortured into giving evidence against him and on Sunday 20 May, Marlowe was arrested for the crime of being an atheist – the penalty for which was to be burned at the stake. He was, however, released on the condition that he reported each day to a court officer.

 

No one quite knows how Marlowe died. Ten days after his arrest, Marlowe had dinner with Ingram Frizer, another 'secret' government employee around here. A fight broke out between the two men over the bill, and Marlowe was supposedly stabbed to death by Frizer. 

 

Other theories about his death include speculation that Queen Elizabeth had ordered his death; that he was meeting with three government agents who tuned out to be paid assassins; and that Marlowe faked his own death and fled the country, later writing plays under a pseudonym – 'William Shakespeare’.

 

Since it is probable that the most crucial information about his death was never committed to paper, it is unlikely that the full circumstances of Marlowe's death will ever be known.

 

And no-one knows exactly where he is buried, although there is a plaque in his memory on the wall on the far side of the churchyard.

 

STOP: Dockers shelter

LOCATION: Redriffe Road, shortly after passing the Wetherspoon pub

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Dock work in the 19th century was largely casual labour, and this is a replica of the dockers' call on shelter where men would come in the early morning in the hope that they would be chosen to work that day.

 

Before the Great Dock Strike in 1889, men might be taken on for as little as half an hour at a time - and at a wage of 5d an hour would get only tuppence ha'penny. Allowing for inflation that's a little over a pound in today’s money, not certainly not enough to feed a working man, let alone a family.

 

The ‘call-on’, as it was known, was brutal. Men would be herded into a ‘cage’ like this each morning, come rain or shine.  Physical fights were common, and Ben Tillett – one of the leaders of the Great Dock Strike – wrote that men could lose ears, or be crushed to death, in the frantic struggle to catch a foreman’s eye. Outside some docks, tokens would be thrown into the crowd and any man that managed to grab one would be able to work.  Brutal.

 

The ride ends at the Horseshoe Inn close to London Bridge station