Ernest George’s London
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Aldgate
Stefan Dickers, Archivist at Bishopsgate Institute, introduced me to these fine copper plate etchings by Ernest George (1839-1922). In the eighteen-eighties, George set out to immortalise those fragments of London which spoke of times gone by and Londoners long dead, recording buildings and views which have for the most part now disappeared.
I realise that my affection for these images sets me in line with the generations of chroniclers who have made it their business to document the transience of the city, starting with John Stow who wrote the very first Survey of London between 1560 and 1598 to describe the streets of his childhood that were vanishing before his eyes.
Ernest George’s etchings were published by the Fine Art Society in New Bond St in 1884, a magnificent temple of culture designed by Edward William Godwin which survived through the twentieth century only to close five years ago.
Bishopsgate
Wych St, Strand
Fouberts Place, Soho
Crown Court, Pall Mall
St Bartholomew, Smithfield
Warwick Lane, City
Tower of London
London Bridge
Staple Inn, Holborn
Drury Lane
St John’s Gate, Clerkenwell
Limehouse
Shadwell
Images courtesy Bishopsgate Institute
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There is a huge amount of detail in these etchings, a very talented artist.
Thank you dear GA for yesterday giving me people, and today places, to fire my vivid imagination of the streets that my forebears walked and who they may have encountered.
The Staple Inn image reminds me that those old buildings (or a later replacement) persisted during my time in London (up to 1959). Are they there yet? Is there a subject here for our Gentle Author to look into and, perhaps, illustrate?
This artist set out to immortalize his surroundings — Wow! — and now he has taken us along with him. My first look-thru was for the purpose of admiring his admirable technique, but then I succumbed to the locations. I was shoulder-to-shoulder, shuffling down Crown Court with other pedestrians. Oh — look out there — stepping out of the way, for that huge lumbering wagon in Warwick Lane. I hear the lapping of water against stone steps and row boats, as I pause in my travels, hearing muffled voices way across THERE in Limehouse on the other shore. The gates of the City are mine, as I duck through, pausing in the shadows; watching others hurry past. My eyes scan each sign board and placard, intrigued by “Easy Shaving”, and then squint at the worn headstones in the tumbled graveyard. And I look up/up/up at the grand Tower. Place of legends, surprisingly built of both stone AND wood, with a guard at the ready.
What glorious travels, thanks to Ernest George and our Gentle Author.
These are wonderful, thankyou. I am intrigued by the notice in Crown Court, Pall Mall advertising ‘Trists (trysts), Divorce, Elopements.
It is worth noting that, as good and interesting as George’s etchings and watercolours are. they were for him something of a hobby alongside his profession as a leading architect of the period.
In addition to being very successful in its own right, responsible for such fine work as 1–8 Collingham Gardens, South Kensington, the practice George co-founded and led, Ermest George & Peto, is famous in English architectural history as having given a start to many of the leading architects of the following generation including Edwin Lutyens.
These are so evocative. He was the you of his time.
Some of the names in the etchings take us down fascinating trails. Sir Paul Pindar, after whom a stout house in Bishopsgate was named, was Ambassador to the Ottoman empire for King James
Would love to have walked in Wych Street.
The detail in these etchings are amazing, a very talented artist.
WOW Factor.