Route starts at Hyde Park Corner

​

STOP: Cows in Chelsea

LOCATION: Old Church Street opposite Paulton's Street

 

This is a reminder of Chelsea's rural past — cow's heads looking down at you! The cow’s heads once promoted Wrights Dairy which, from the late 1700s, had around 50 grazing cows in Chelsea providing milk for Londoners.

 

Until the 19th century Chelsea served as a market garden for the rapidly-expanding city, with corn, barley, fruit and vegetables grown on the area’s numerous farms, orchards and gardens. It was particularly known for its root vegetables and was the first place in Britain where lettuce was grown successfully (in the mid-to-late 18th century). The area started to become fashionable for the wealthy from the 16th and 17th centuries, with its residential districts starting to overtake the farms in the late 19th century.

 

One such farm which held on longer than others was Wright’s Dairy. The dairy was one of the first in Chelsea started in 1796. Around 50 cows and two goats grazed nearby, providing milk for the dairy. 

 

The Old Dairy was forced to move premises due to rapid redevelopment in the late 1800s, setting up here. The fields behind the dairy were used for the grazing cows.

 

As transportation and refrigeration improved in the 20th century, farming was moved outside of the capital, although the dairies remained in London for longer. Wright’s Dairy was eventually bought by United Dairies, which merged with Cow & Gate in 1959 to form Unigate, with the latter selling off most of its dairy business in the late 1970s.

 

Wright’s Dairy’s main dairy building went on to have a pretty amazing reinvention in the 1960s. It became a recording studio.

 

Some of the acts to record here were Sir Elton John, The Who, Jethro Tull, Judy Collins, T Rex and John Cale. In 1967 Pink Floyd recorded several tracks in this studio from their debut album. Also singer/songwriter Nick Drake recorded his debut album, Five Leaves Left, in 1968 – six years before his death of an overdose, aged just 26.

 

The studio closed in 1974 when the lease ran out. Now it’s a three bedroomed town house.

 

You can still see the original tiling from the dairy shop era on the ground floor façade.

 

STOP: Marylebone watch tower (now Chiltern Firehouse)

LOCATION: - view from junction of Chilterns and Blandford Street

 

Chiltern Street was laid out as a service street in the 19th century to complement Baker Street which had appeared in the 1700s.

 

The name ‘Chiltern’ is probably after an area of Buckinghamshire that the Portman Estate owns. 

 

The Manchester Square Fire Station (its original name) was built in 1889.  Today it’s the uber-fancy Chiltern Firehouse restaurant and 26-bedroom hotel. It was renovated after the fire station closed in 2005.

 

There’s still plenty of lovely original details, including the particularly fancy watchtower. That was the 19th century way of spotting nearby fires!  There’s the slightly more obvious lettering on the outside (as well as the fire engine-sized doors) and lovely little red lamp.

 

STOP: Debenhams Building

LOCATION: The large grey building at the junction of Wigmore Street and Welbeck Street

 

Debenhams’ origins go back to 1778 when a draper’s store run by Thomas Clark started trading at 44 Wigmore Street. It sold fabrics, bonnets, gloves and parasols. 

 

The Debenhams name entered the story in 1813 when William Debenham invested in the firm. He was a hosier from Nottingham. The shop was called Clark & Debenham.

 

Success followed (apparently they expanded into a store across the road, calling one Clark & Debenham and the other Debenham & Clark) and in 1818, the firm opened its first store outside London – an exact replica of the Wigmore Street store in fashionable Cheltenham.

 

The company continued to expand and offices opened in various countries around the world – from Australia and South Africa to Canada and China. In 1899, the store even had its own fire brigade and constabulary and it was one of the first businesses to get a telephone.

 

By 1950, Debenhams had become the largest department store group in the UK, owning 84 companies and 110 stores.

 

This is the former Debenhams building [Debenhams and Freebody in those days].

 

It is completely clad in white Carrara tiles by Doulton, which have lived up to their manufacturer's boast of being resistant to time and London pollution. The building is in an Edwardian Baroque style, with touches of art nouveau, and dates from 1906-7.

 

The Debenhams brand and website were purchased by the online retailer Boohoo for £55m in January 2021. However, Boohoo did not retain any stores, meaning the loss of up to 12,000 jobs. Boohoo relaunched the website as Debenhams.com in April 2021. 

 

After 243 years in business, the remaining Debenhams department stores closed for the final time during May 2021.

​

STOP: The first gas-powered light  .

LOCATION: Pall Mall, opposite turn out of St James’ Square

 

The first recorded public street lighting powered by gas was demonstrated here by Frederick Winsor on 28 January 1807. In June of that year, a line of gas street lights was illuminated to celebrate the birthday of King George III. Each one was fed with gas pipes made from the up-cycled barrels of obsolete musket guns.  Unfortunately, the original light itself isn't still in situ, but there's a green plaque recording the occasion.

 

In 1812, Parliament granted a charter to the London and Westminster Gas Light and Coke Company, the world's first gas company. Less than two years later, on 31 December 1813, Westminster Bridge was lit by gas-fuelled street lamps. 

 

By 1823, numerous towns and cities throughout Britain were lit by gas. The cost of gaslight was up to 75% lower than oil lamps or candles, accelerating its development and deployment. By 1859, gas lighting was to be found all over Britain and close to a thousand gasworks had sprung up to meet the demand for the new fuel. Indoors, the brighter light that gas provided enabled people to read more easily and for longer. In turn, this helped to stimulate literacy and learning.

 

Electric street lighting was first introduced in 1878 along the Thames Embankment and near Holborn Viaduct, quickly becoming more popular and leading to the replacement of most gas street lighting. The first street to be lit by electricity was Electric Avenue in Brixton, in 1880.

 

Today, there are still around 1,300 functioning gas fuelled street lamps in London, of which 270 or so are found in the borough of Westminster City.

 

A British Gas team of London Lamplighters maintain these 1,300 gas lamps, continuing their 200 year old traditions. Their territory ranges from Richmond Bridge in the West to Bromley-by-Bow in the East. The long avenue of Kensington Palace Gardens is lit only by gas lamps. Each lamp is visited on a fortnightly rotation. Their mechanisms need to be wound and adjusted to the season's sunrise and sunset. The glass is polished and the ‘mantles’ are replaced. Each lamp base is marked with the crest of the monarch in the year it was erected. The oldest gas lamps in London can be found on Birdcage Walk with King George IV’s insignia (so pre-1830).

 

TOILETS - CHARING CROSS STATION

​

STOP: Ignatius Sancho

LOCATION: A plaque Half way up King Charles Street (on the north wall)

 

Between the Treasury and the Foreign Office is King Charles Street where you can find a surprising plaque. It remembers Ignatius Sancho, who escaped slavery in Greenwich and became a self-made business man, as well as the first known person of African descent to vote in a British election, in 1774.

 

Charles Ignatius Sancho (c. 1729 – 14 December 1780) was a British abolitionist, writer and composer. 

 

Born on a slave ship in the Atlantic, Sancho was sold into slavery in the Spanish colony of New Granada. After his parents died, Sancho's owner took the two-year-old orphan to Britain and gifted him to three Greenwich sisters, where he remained for eighteen years. 

 

Unable to bear being a servant to them, Sancho ran away to Blackheath where John Montagu, 2nd Duke of Montagu, taught him how to read and encouraged Sancho's budding interest in literature. After spending some time as a butler in the household, Sancho left and started his own business as a shopkeeper, while also starting to write and publish various essays, plays and books.  His shop was here at 19 Charles Street and offered goods such as tobacco, sugar and tea - goods mostly produced by slaves in the West Indies.

 

Sancho's status as a male property-owner meant he was legally qualified to vote in a general election, a right he exercised in 1774 and 1780, becoming the first known British African to have voted in Britain. Sancho became, to British abolitionists, a symbol of the humanity of Africans and the immorality of the slave trade and slavery. He died in 1780.

​

STOP: Alfred The Great 

LOCATION: Trinity Church Square Garden

 

This statue of Alfred the Great is thought to be London's oldest outdoor statue. But it’s not all it seems.  The lower portion comes from a Roman statue dating to the late 1st or early 2nd century, while the top portion is a late 18th or early 19th century in the medieval style.

 

Conservation works in 2021 confirmed that the top half of the statue is of Coade stone, which was developed in the 1770s. The work to combine this with the Roman lower portion would have been complicated as Coade stone shrinks during its four-day kiln firing. It is thought likely that the lower portion was discovered during the late 18th century and, being thought to be medieval in origin, was used to give the Alfred statue more authenticity.

 

The rear of the statue is quite plain, and it may have been intended for display in a niche.  It has stood in the square since 1836 but is thought to have originally been displayed elsewhere, although no-one is sure exactly where.  It is likely that the statue once stood in a sanctuary in nearby Tabard Square. Because of the strict design parameters of Roman temple statuary of this period the bottom half of the statue has been identified as probably one to Minerva.  Minerva was the Roman goddess of handicraft, professions, arts and, in later periods, of war.

​

STOP: Chimney 

LOCATION: The north west balustrade on Tower Bridge (hard to spot)

 

Passed by thousands every day, most people don't notice that one lamp post along Tower Bridge looks a little different from the rest. The reason: it's a chimney hiding in plain sight. Once connected to the Royal Fusiliers guard room beneath the bridge, the Clean Air Act of 1956 banned coal fires, leaving it redundant.

 

Sorry if this ruins the aesthetic of tower Bridge for you because once seen, it cannot be unseen!

 

STOP: Jewish newspaper

LOCATION: 88 Whitechapel High Street, junction with Gunthorpe Street

 

Here's a reminder that this area of Whitechapel was once the epicentre of Jewish London. 

 

Number 88 is an early 18th century shop and office. It has been many things over the years, including a coppersmith’s workshop and a gin distillery.

 

From 1934-1935 it was the premises of the Jewish Daily Post which was established in 1926.  The ground floor held the presses and the upper floors the offices.  

 

The most striking additions from the Daily Post's brief time at No 88 are the decorative metal reliefs by Arthur Szyk (1894-1951).

 

Szyk was born into a prosperous Jewish family. The Jewish Daily Post published his earliest anti-Hitler cartoons in February and March 1935. Two of his metal reliefs survive at No 88: one over the main door and one inside above the entrance to the lift.

 

The metal relief above the main door was once painted in gold and depicts a Star of David supported by two Lions of Judah wielding sabres. Two medallions on the lions are decorated with menorot or seven-branched candelabra. The lions’ clawed feet rest on a thin turned base that is fixed to the wall.

 

Originally, there were signs on each floor; all but these two were destroyed in a fire in the second half of the 20th century.

 

The Jewish Daily Post struggled to compete with its long-established rival, The Jewish Times and went into liquidation in August 1935 (shortly after moving into this building) when it was sued for libel after it published a salacious story about a rabbi.

 

STOP: Thomas Becket 

LOCATION: Plaque on the corner of 90 Cheapside, junction with Ironmonger Lane

 

This is Thomas Becket, born here around 1120. Son of a Mercer (whose Livery Hall is found around the corner), he rose through the ranks to become Archbishop of Canterbury, only to be brutally martyred in his own cathedral in 1170.  Thomas Becket was also known as Saint Thomas of Canterbury, Thomas of London and later Thomas à Becket.

 

In June 1170, the Archbishops of York, London and Salisbury crowned Henry the Young King at York Minster (He was a sort of junior king - his father Henry II was still king and indeed out-lived his son).  This breached Canterbury's privilege of coronation and in November 1170 Becket excommunicated all three bishops.

 

On hearing reports of Becket's actions, Henry is said to have uttered words interpreted by his men as wishing Becket killed.  The exact wording is in doubt and several versions were reported. The most commonly quoted, and handed down by oral tradition, is "Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?”.  Regardless of what Henry said, it was interpreted as a royal command. Four knights set out to confront the Archbishop of Canterbury. On 29 December 1170, they arrived at Canterbury. The knights placed their weapons under a tree outside the cathedral and hid their armour under cloaks before entering to challenge Becket. The knights told Becket he was to go to Winchester to give an account of his actions, but Becket refused. 

 

Not until he refused their demands to submit to the king's will did the knights retrieve their weapons and rush back inside for the killing. Becket, meanwhile, proceeded to the main hall for vespers. The other monks tried to bolt themselves in for safety, but Becket said to them, "It is not right to make a fortress out of the house of prayer!", ordering them to reopen the doors.

 

On seeing the knights, Becket said, "I am no traitor and I am ready to die." One knight grabbed him and tried to pull him outside, but Becket grabbed onto a pillar.

 

Several contemporary accounts of what happened next exist. After some early blows the third knight “inflicted a grave wound on the fallen one; with this blow... his crown, which was large, separated from his head so that the blood turned white from the brain yet no less did the brain turn red from the blood; it purpled the appearance of the church... The fifth attacker – not a knight but a cleric who had entered with the knights... placed his foot on the neck of the holy priest and precious martyr and (it is horrible to say) scattered the brains with the blood across the floor, exclaiming to the rest, "We can leave this place, knights, he will not get up again.”

 

Becket was canonised just two years later and to this day pilgrims still travel to Canterbury to pay their respects.

 

STOP: Christ Church Greyfriars

LOCATION: King Edward Street, junction with Newgate Street

 

This is the remains of a Christopher Wren church which was destroyed during the blitz.  It uses box hedges to mark out the plan of the nave, with wooden towers standing in for the columns that once held up the roof.

 

The mix of rough hewn walls, monumental stone pineapples that once graced the roof and which are a symbol of wealth and prestige, and the tower itself make for quite an atmospheric place.  

 

The ‘quite interesting’ thing here is that the tower is a private residence.  It sold in 2021 for £3.7m and is now valued at £5.2m. It has three bedrooms distributed over ten floors with a 360 degree open balcony at the top. You can catch a glimpse of the ground floor dining room from the garden.

 

Christ Church Greyfriars was originally a Franciscan monastery, the name 'Greyfriars' being a reference to the grey habits worn by Franciscan friars. 

 

The first church on the site was built in the mid-thirteenth century, but this was soon replaced by a much larger building in about 1360. This new church was the second largest in medieval London, with at least eleven altars.

 

It was built partly at the expense of Marguerite of France, second wife of King Edward I. She was buried at the church, as was Isabella, widow of Edward II and her daughter Joan of the Tower, Queen of Scotland. The heart of Eleanor of Provence, wife of Henry III, was also interred there.

 

STOP: Cutler’s hall

LOCATION: North end of Warwick Lane

 

Cutlers’ Hall is the home of the Worshipful Company of Cutlers, the earliest recorded reference to dates from 1285. The earliest hall on this site was built in 1638 but was demolished and rebuilt twice; in 1725 and the 1832. The third and current hall dates from 1884.

 

Remarkably it survived the Blitz, with bombs falling really close, wiping out the building on its left; the former HQ of the Royal College of Physicians.

 

The present building displays a finely carved terracotta frieze.  Each process of the Cutlers’ craft is shown is lovely detail, step-by-step.

 

We begin with the forging, turning metal into glowing molten liquid with help from the huge bellows in the background. Then the apron-clad men hammer the metal into flattened blades. Followed the grinding process, with the large sharpening wheels dotted around the workspace. 

 

Next comes the handle production; hafting. Within this section there’s a lovely moment between an older man and a small apprentice or son, a moment of teaching and passing on new skills.  

 

Lastly people work on fixing handles to the blades, making final touches to the product.

 

STOP: WW1 bombing

LOCATION: on the wall of 28 St John’s Street 

 

Although minimal compared with the Second World War, London was bombed during the First World War.

 

Early attacks during the war were by Zeppelin airships and during the later years of the war, the Germans switched to the use of aircraft to bomb London.

 

The first fleet of German aircraft attacked London on Wednesday, the 13th of June 1917. Sporadic raids continued during the following months, and night raids commenced in September. On the night of the 18th December 1917, a fleet of sixteen aircraft set off from Belgium, and reached London, where they dropped their bombs across the wider city causing considerable damage, including here.

 

On the route from Belgium and return via London, the planes dropped 2475kg of high explosive on the city, 800kg on Ramsgate, 450kg on Margate and 400kg on Harwich. One of the bombers was shot down by a Sopwith Camel flying from an airfield at Hainault in Essex. The bomber crashed in the sea off Folkestone.

 

It is remarkable that aircraft of 1917 had the range and lifting capabilities to carry heavy loads of high explosive bombs from Belgium to London and across Essex and Kent.

​

STOP: Booth’s distillery

LOCATION: 24 Britton Street at junction with Bristet Street

 

The Booth family, who moved to London from north-east England, were established wine merchants as early as 1569. By 1740 they had added distilling to their brewing and wine interests and built a distillery at 55 Cowcross Street. This date appears on the label of each Booths gin bottle and makes Booths the oldest surviving gin brand in the world.

 

Booths has undergone several changes of ownership and these days is owned by Diageo.

 

In 1770 they expanded onto the opposite side of Cowcross Street and here on Britton Street. and the distilleries dominated the street. Their new building here was finished in 1903 but was demolished in 1975. 

 

It was agreed that parts of the building would be saved. Of the original features, it’s only the ground floor granite arches and the carved panels that survive.

 

There are five relief panels across the top of the building. The central one is an allegorical figure of commerce and the others showing stages of gin production.

 

We begin with harvesting the grain. Then there’s a huge dray horse with a laden cart behind him, perhaps alluding to bringing the grain into London.

 

Next there’s oxen pulling the barrels of gin, a nice nod to the earlier distillery location and the literal meaning of Cowcross Street - where the cows cross the street on their way to Smithfields market - and that still survives nearby.

 

And finally you see the liquid being poured and inspected.

 

The Gin Craze was a period in the first half of the 18th century when the consumption of gin increased rapidly in Great Britain, especially in London. Daniel Defoe commented: "the Distillers have found out a way to hit the palate of the Poor, by their new fashion'd compound Waters called Geneva, so that the common People seem not to value the French-brandy as usual, and even not to desire it”.

 

Parliament passed five major Acts in the mid 18th century, designed to control the consumption of gin. Though many similar drinks were available and alcohol consumption was considerable at all levels of society, gin caused the greatest public concern. Although it is commonly thought gin or Jenever was the singular drink, "gin" was a blanket statement for all grain-based alcohols at the time.

 

STOP: Emerald Court

LOCATION: Tiny alleyway off Rugby Street (south side)

 

A narrow slit in the streetscape this alley is just 26 inches wide. By comparison, Brydges Place near Trafalgar Square (often said to be the narrowest street in London) is a massive 33 inches wide at its narrowest point.  Those extra inches matter!

 

Emerald Court is not the original name though, as it used to be known as Green Street, and was apparently renamed in the late 18th century to avoid confusion with other green named streets in the area.

​

This road, lined with fine Georgian housing and shops is called Rugby Street which is quite appropriate, as the whole area is the Rugby Estate, a charitable bequest of land to Rugby School by Lawrence Sherriff, a Rugby-born London grocer in 1567.

 

Although its fortunes have waxed and waned over the centuries, the land is still owned by the Rugby school charitable trust, which is very rich indeed.

 

Although the Rugby Street side of the alley is narrow and Georgian, if you pass through the alley, you emerge into the 20th century, with a block of modern flats behind the Georgian shops.

 

STOP: The Horse Hospital

LOCATION: Junction of Herbrand Street and Collonade

 

By 1900 there were around 50,000 horses transporting people and goods around the capital. The clatter of iron wheels and horseshoes on the stone cobbles was deafening, and not great for the horses which often slipped. But quieter and wooden blocks introduced in the first half of the 19th century (a few of which still exist) wore out more quickly and smelled rank on hot days. having absorbed large quantities of horse urine. We visit some of these on the 'street furniture' ride.

 

Most of the wooden paving was replaced after WW2 and used as domestic fuel. Buying and selling these old wooden blocks was Alan Sugar’s first foray into business.

 

A more pervasive reminder of the age of the horse are London’s mews - small two storey terraced houses behind grand houses, often with stabling below and haylofts or living quarters for grooms and drivers above.   Most have now been converted to bijou homes.

 

Here at the horse hospital you can still detect the plan of the stalls in the basement and see the interior ramps that allowed horses to access both lower and upper levels.  The upper floor ramp retains hardwood slats preventing the horses from slipping. The horses treated here were mostly those of cab drivers.

 

Now an arts venue, the former hospital and HQ for horse vets was built in 1797 as part of the redevelopment of Russell Square.

 

The ride ends at the cafe in Russell Square