In City Of London Churchyards
In the churchyard of St Dunstan’s in the East, Idol Lane
If ever I should require a peaceful walk when the crowds are thronging in Brick Lane and Columbia Rd, then I simply wander over to the City of London where the streets are empty at weekends and the many secret green enclaves of the churches are likely to be at my sole disposal. For centuries the City was densely populated, yet the numberless dead in the ancient churchyards are almost the only residents these days.
Christopher Wren rebuilt most of the City churches after the Great Fire upon the irregularly shaped medieval churchyards and it proved the ideal challenge to develop his eloquent vocabulary of classical architecture. Remarkably, there are a couple of churches still standing which predate the Fire while a lot of Wren’s churches were destroyed in the Blitz, but for all those that are intact, there are many of which only the tower or an elegant ruin survives to grace the churchyard. And there are also yards where nothing remains of the church, save a few lone tombstones attesting to the centuries of human activity in that place. Many of these sites offer charismatic spaces for horticulture, rendered all the more appealing in contrast to the sterile architectural landscape of the modern City that surrounds them.
I often visit St Olave’s in Mincing Lane, a rare survivor of the Fire, and when you step down from the street, it as if you have entered a country church. Samuel Pepys lived across the road in Seething Lane and was a member of the congregation here, referring to it as “our own church.” He is buried in a vault beneath the communion table and there is a spectacular gate from 1658, topped off with skulls, which he walked through to enter the secluded yard. Charles Dickens also loved this place, describing it as “my best beloved churchyard.”
“It is a small small churchyard, with a ferocious, strong, spiked iron gate, like a jail. This gate is ornamented with skulls and cross-bones, larger than the life, wrought in stone … the skulls grin aloft horribly, thrust through and through with iron spears. Hence, there is attraction of repulsion for me … and, having often contemplated it in the daylight and the dark, I once felt drawn towards it in a thunderstorm at midnight.” he wrote in “The Uncommercial Traveller.”
A particular favourite of mine is the churchyard of St Dunstan’s in the East in Idol Lane. The ruins of a Wren church have been overgrown with wisteria and creepers to create a garden of magnificent romance, where almost no-one goes. You can sit here within the nave surrounded by high walls on all sides, punctuated with soaring Gothic lancet windows hung with leafy vines which filter the sunlight in place of the stained glass that once was there.
Undertaking a circuit of the City, I always include the churchyard of St Mary Aldermanbury in Love Lane with its intricate knot garden and bust of William Shakespeare, commemorating John Hemminge and Henry Condell who published the First Folio and are buried there. The yard of the bombed Christchurch Greyfriars in Newgate St is another essential port of call for me, to admire the dense border planting that occupies the space where once the congregation sat within the shell of Wren’s finely proportioned architecture. In each case, the introduction of plants to fill the space and countermand the absence in the ruins of these former churches – where the parishioners have gone long ago – has created lush gardens of rich poetry.
There are so many churchyards in the City of London that there are always new discoveries to be made by the casual visitor, however many times you return. And anyone can enjoy the privilege of solitude in these special places, you only have to have the curiosity and desire to seek them out for yourself.
In the yard of St Michael, Cornhill.
In the yard of St Dunstan’s in the East, Idol Lane.
At St Dunstan’s in the East, leafy vines filter the sunlight in place of stained glass.
In the yard of St Olave’s, Mincing Lane.
This is the gate that Samuel Pepys walked through to enter St Olave’s and of which Charles Dickens wrote in The Uncommercial Traveller – “having often contemplated it in the daylight and the dark, I once felt drawn towards it in a thunderstorm at midnight.”
Dickens described this as ““my best beloved churchyard.”
In the yard of St Michael Paternoster Royal, College St.
In the yard of St Lawrence Jewry-next-Guildhall, Gresham St.
In the yard of St Mary Aldermanbury, Love Lane, this bust of William Shakespeare commemorates John Hemminge and Henry Condell who published the First Folio and are buried here.
In the yard of London City Presbyterian Church, Aldersgate St.
In the yard of Christchurch Greyfriars, Newgate St, the dense border planting occupies the space where once the congregation sat within the shell of Wren’s finely proportioned architecture.
In the yard of the Guildhall Church of St Benet, White Lion Hill.
In St Paul’s Churchyard.
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Real Life For Children, 1819
Before the internet and before photography, the first means of cheap mass-distribution of images was by woodcuts. These appealing examples, enlarged from originals no larger than a thumbnail, are selected from a set of chapbooks, Pictures Of Real Life For Children, Printed & Sold by R.Harrild, Great Eastcheap, London. Believed to date from around 1819, the series included some Cries Of London and, in spite of the occasionally pious text, these are sympathetic and characterful portrayals of working people.
While some are intended as illustrations of professional types, such as Mr Prescription the physician, others are clearly portraits, such as the Rhubarb Seller who was also included in William Marshall Craig’s Itinerant Traders of 1804. Although we shall never know who they all were, the expressive nature of each of these lively cuts – achieved with such economy of means – leads me to suspect that many were based upon specific individuals who were recognisable to readers in London at that time.
Man with his Dancing Bear. This curious sight is frequently seen about the streets of this great city, and is far from being the most contemptible.
Mary Fairlop was always industrious, she rises with the lark to pursue her labour.
Mr Prescription, the physician, is taking the round among his patients. He is pleased to see Master Goodchild so well. By taking his physic as he ought, he is just recovered from a dangerous illness.
This is Mr Ridewell, the smart little groom, who is noted for keeping himself, his stable, and his master’s horse clean.
The Farmer.
The Milkmaid.
Hair Brooms.
Clothes Props. “Buy a Prop, a prop for your clothes.”
“Pickled Salmon, Newcastle Salmon.” Here comes Johnny Rollins, known for selling Newcastle salmon.
“Fine Yorkshire Cakes, Muffins and Crumpets.” In addition to his vocal abilities, this man has lately introduced a bell, by which means the streets are saluted every morning and afternoon with vocal and instrumental music.
“Rhubarb! Rhubarb!” This is a well-known character in our metropolis. He is a Turk as his habit bespeaks him. With his box before him, he offers his rhubarb to every passerby.
“Live Cod, dainty fresh Cod.” Much praise is due to the Fishman for his honest endeavours to obtain a livelihood. At break of day, he is seen at Billingsgate buying fish, and before noon he has been heard in most parts of the metropolis.
“Old Clothes, any shoes, hats or old Clothes.”
This is John Honeysuckle, the industrious gardener, with a myrtle in his hand, the produce of his garden. He is justly celebrated for his beautiful bowpots and nosegays all round the country.
The Nut Woman.
“Beer!” This is the publican with the nice white apron. I like this man’s beer, he keeps the Coach & Horses and his pots always look so clean.
This porter, for his industry and obliging disposition, is respected.
The Cooper is just now with adze in hand. hooping a large wine cask, which is part of a large order he has received from a merchant who trades to the East and West Indies.
The Pedlar.
The Organ Grinder.
The Watchman.
You may also like to take a look at these other sets of the Cries of London
Geoffrey Fletcher’s Pavement Pounders
William Craig Marshall’s Itinerant Traders
H.W.Petherick’s London Characters
John Thomson’s Street Life in London
Aunt Busy Bee’s New London Cries
Marcellus Laroon’s Cries of London
More John Player’s Cries of London
William Nicholson’s London Types
Francis Wheatley’s Cries of London
John Thomas Smith’s Vagabondiana of 1817
John Thomas Smith’s Vagabondiana II
John Thomas Smith’s Vagabondiana III
Thomas Rowlandson’s Lower Orders
More of Thomas Rowlandson’s Lower Orders
Malcolm Tremain’s Spitalfields, Then & Now
I took a walk with my camera in the footsteps of Malcolm Tremain to visit the locations of his photographs from the early eighties and discover what time has wrought …
Passage from Allen Gardens to Brick Lane
Spital Sq, entrance to former Central Foundation School now Galvin Restaurant
In Spital Sq
In Brune St
In Toynbee St
Corner of Grey Eagle St & Quaker St
In Quaker St
Steps of Brick Lane Mosque
In Puma Court
Corner of Wilkes St & Princelet St
In Wilkes St
Jewish Soup Kitchen in Brune St
Outside the former night shelter in Crispin St, now student housing for LSE
In Crispin St
In Bell Lane
In Parliament Court
In Artillery Passage
In Artillery Passage
In Middlesex St
In Bishopsgate
In Wentworth St
In Fort St
In Allen Gardens
At Pedley St Bridge
Black & white photographs copyright © Malcolm Tremain
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Andrew Scott’s East End, Then & Now
Val Perrin’s Brick Lane, Then & Now
A Walk With Suresh Singh
We are very proud to be the publishers of A MODEST LIVING, Memoirs of a Cockney Sikh, London’s first Sikh biography, telling the story of one family in Spitalfields over seventy years. In celebration of the book, author Suresh Singh will be in conversation Stefan Dickers at the National Portrait Gallery on Friday 7th June at 7pm. (Click here for tickets)
In the meantime, Suresh and I enjoyed a ramble round Spitalfields recently and he showed me some of the places that hold most meaning for him.
“I love Whitechapel Library, Aldgate East. It was the library I used to go to every Friday when I was at primary school. You could sit and read. It was just lovely. Upstairs was the art and music library. They had big oversize books of Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, the Impressionists, Matisse, Degas and Le Corbusier’s book about Chandigarh.
It was amazing to have this in Brick Lane, at the end of my street. You were given freedom to look at the books and could borrow twelve books and five records at a time. The librarian in the music library would order whatever you requested. Even if you asked for ‘Yes’ album, he would get it by next week. My dad had a record player and I learnt to be really careful with a record because when you returned it they would meticulously check it.
The library was a whole world. It taught me to read quietly. It exposed me to books that I might never have found. My mum and dad could not read or write. We had no books at home. I liked the art section because the books had pictures and I learnt that pictures told stories as well as words. The librarians always helped me and I could spend hours there. It was a sanctuary from the mayhem outside, a kind of university of the ghetto.”
“Christ Church School, Brick Lane, was my primary school. I loved it when I came back after a long visit to India at six years old. I have frightening memories of it too, as the place I had to go to after the freedom I had experienced in our village. My mum used to walk me here every day and I would walk home for dinner at Princelet St and come back again. School dinners were so bland but my mum gave me dal and roti.
The water fountain used to work and we could drink from it. I remember it as so high, my friends had to give me a lift up so I could drink from it. You pressed the button and it worked. There were little fish that lived in there.
Later on, Eric Elstob – a friend whom I worked for in the renovation of his house in Fournier St – was treasurer of the school and he restored the railings, which was lovely. A couple of years ago, they were repainting them blue and I asked them to paint a bit of my bike with the same colour to remind me of the great memories I have of this school. We used to have great jumble sales at Christmas. You could climb through the school and out through the back, past the gardens of the houses in Fournier St and Nicholas Hawksmoor’s Christ Church into Itchy Park, and out into Commercial St and Spitalfields Market. I loved it because it was a backstreet school.”
“I have fond memories of the rectory at 2 Fournier St when Eddie Stride was Rector. It is one of the few Hawksmoor houses. I helped Eddie wash the steps with Vim when the tramps pissed all over them. There used to be queues outside and Irene Stride made sandwiches for them.
It was a place where Eddie made me feel very welcome. I rang the bell or knocked on the door, and he would always open it to me. The door was never closed. I could always go in and play in the garden. Later on, there were big power meetings at the rectory when Eddie became the chairman of the Festival of Light. So you would meet people like Malcolm Muggeridge, Mary Whitehouse, Cliff Richard and Lord Longford coming and going. It was always an open house.
I was brought up as a Sikh but there were no gurdwaras in Spitalfields, and my dad said ‘You need some moral purpose,’ so he send us to Sunday school and that was how I became friends with Eddie Stride. He was a great friend to our family. He helped me get grants for further education from the Sir John Cass Foundation which led me to study architecture. I loved that time and these steps mean a lot to me. It is amazing how Vim can clean Portland stone. ”
“I always knew the Hanbury Hall as 22a Hanbury St. In those days, Christ Church was closed because it was unsafe and this was used for services instead. There was a youth club at the top of the building on Thursdays and Fridays and we had our Sunday school in the hall.
Because it was built as a Huguenot chapel, everyone used to say that this hall is older than the church and sometimes that used to scare me late at night. There were these big wooden doors that closed with a hasp and I always feared someone might come down the winding stone staircase. Later, when I was doing carpentry work, Eddie gave me the task of housing the remains of the smallpox victims that they found when they were cleaning out the crypt.
When I started a group, we were allowed to rehearse in the vestry at the back. This place was a playground for me but also a church where services were held until the eighties. Then I helped move the furniture from here back to Christ Church. I remember we put the communion table on casters and I had to clear out all the copies of Lord Longford’s pornography report which were being stored in the church.
This hall was a treasure because it had a lovely atmosphere but also a haunted atmosphere too. It was the main meeting point for all of us in Spitalfields at that time.”
“Once, the Truman Brewery in Brick Lane was a dark scary corridor for me. It was my route from my home in Princelet St to my secondary school, Daneford in Bethnal Green. At that time, it used to smell of hops and it was dark and dirty. I got beaten up by a bunch of fascist skinheads at the corner of the brewery where it meets Buxton St. I still try to avoid this route but like a magnet it draws me through. I used to run through or cycle because to go round the other way was much longer and sometimes more scary- you would have to cut past Shoreditch Station and round the back to Cheshire St.
So this was the quickest route but it was like going through a factory. The brewery was always there in my childhood. The smell and the noise were twenty-four hours, and it was always dark beneath the brewery walls. The brewery was a landmark and I remember smoke coming out of that chimney. It was a place that you had no choice but to pass through. At the other end of the brewery was where the skinheads hung out but at this end was the Bengali area where I felt safer. Every day I hoped I would not get my head kicked in as I went to school.
As a kid, I found these long brewery walls interminable. I walked and walked and thought, ‘Will I ever get through to the end?’ It still scares me in a way.”
“I used to pass Franta Belsky’s sculpture in Bethnal Green every day when I walked along the little passageway to Daneford Secondary School. Today, I am wearing the tank top my mum knitted when I was eleven and I remember wearing it to a non-school uniform day all those years ago.
I always used to see this sculpture out of the side of my eye. My friends would say, ‘You go on Singhey, I dare you to touch her breasts and come back down again.’ But slowly I began to appreciate the beauty of it and began looking at books of Henry Moore and David Smith. It was a lovely thing to see before you went to school every day. It comforted me to see a woman and her baby because I thought, ‘That’s how my mum cares for me.’ It gave me a sense of security. I thought, ‘How amazing that we have a piece of sculpture outside our school.’ It made me feel proud because of the sculpture. My dad used to take me to Hyde Park where there were Henry Moores next to the Serpentine. I thought, ‘We’re on a par with the West End here in Bethnal Green.’
I slowly started loving it. I loved her plait and it reminded me of when I had a topknot. I appreciated it in different types of light and I still love it today.”
Suresh Singh & Jagir Kaur at 38 Princelet St last summer (Photograph by Patricia Niven)
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Click here to order a signed copy of A MODEST LIVING for £20
Underneath Smithfield Market
A train runs beneath Smithfield Market
As one of those who fought to save Smithfield General Market from demolition five years ago, I was delighted have the opportunity last week of exploring the infinite dark recesses of this vast structure which extends deep underground. This was the first time I have been inside Horace Jones’ market building of 1868 and it was a heart-stopping experience to enter his soaring iron cathedral and walk beneath the vast dome at last.
If events had turned out differently in 2014, this magnificence would all have been destroyed with only the facade remaining upon the front of a steel office block. So it was gratifying to visit now as a guest of the Museum of London who are taking it over as their new home, adopting a policy of ‘light touch’ in their treatment of the old building.
In announcing the outcome of the Public Enquiry into the Smithfield Market proposals, the Secretary of State criticised the City of London for deliberately allowing Horace Jones’ beautiful market to fall into decay and disrepair. Readers will be pleased to learn the City of London is now paying for extensive and expensive repairs which are underway.
When I arrived, the traders’ pavilions that had accumulated to fill the market floor were being dismantled to reveal the open space for the first time since the nineteenth century – this majestic hall will be where all visitors enter the new museum. The only major architectural decision taken here regards the location of the staircase leading down to the subterranean galleries below. After some discussion of a central spiral staircase under the dome, permanently restricting the possibility of displays, a decision has been taken to cut a straight staircase along the north side of the building leaving the ground floor clear for exhibitions.
The great drama lies beneath. Here is an enormous black underground cavern, wider than the market above, with a vaulted roof of brick, grimy from steam trains. This was constructed as a railway station where trains from the London docks once brought meat which arrived from across the world. Deliveries were unloaded onto carts that drove up the ramp to the market above.
As you pause to contemplate the wonder of it, a diabolic rumble fills the darkness. It is a train coming! You stand in the darkness as a Thameslink train full of commuters rattles past, coming from Blackfriars on its way to Farringdon. The passengers sit preoccupied in their lit carriages, unaware of the watcher observing them from the darkness. One day, these commuters will peer out from their windows and discover they can see directly into the galleries of the Museum of London and, one day, visitors to the museum will be able to observe trains passing from a window in the gallery.
Beyond this empty hangar, lies another deep space with brick arches soaring overhead and dripping vaults receding into the velvet blackness of history. The moisture that permeates the structure evidences the presence of the River Fleet flowing below. You stand beneath London, between the underground trains and the subterranean river. You are at the heart of the city. It is dark. It is a space of infinite mutability. It is a place with soul, where the past lingers. It is a natural home for a museum of London.
This concrete dome was constructed post-war to replace the original destroyed in the Blitz
The rare ‘phoenix columns’ that support the roof are hollow, used in preference to cast iron, to minimise the weight of the structure which sits over a tube line
First floor pavilions added to the building as traders offices are currently being removed
A spiral staircase leads to an office that no longer exists
Hanging fireplaces attest to former first floor offices
Cast iron racks once supported rails for displaying meat
The agglomeration of traders pavilions on the ground floor was known as ‘the village’
Abandoned grinding wheel for sharpening knives
Ancient dripping brickwork indicates the vicinity of the River Fleet flowing beneath
Thameslink rails stored under the market
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Kois Miah At Robin Hood Gardens
Local resident and photographer Kois Miah visited families during the final years of Robin Hood Gardens and took these portraits, capturing the dignity of their existence in an estate condemned by many as a brutalist eyesore. “Whatever they think, there’s a huge sense of community here,” Kois admitted to me.
An exhibition of Kois Miah’s pictures entitled LIVED BRUTALISM opens next Thursday 22nd May and runs until 8th June at Four Corners Gallery, 121 Roman Rd, E2 0QN
Moyna Miah and his grandchildren, 9th April 2015
Del and Gaby, 13th September 2014
Samir Uddin and his children, 13th September 2015
Evening Rain, West Building, 1st September 2015
Taurus Miah, 9th April 2015
East Building, 24th June 2015
Summer fun day, 19th August 2014
Pat, 13th September 2015
Adrienne Sargent, 15th August 2016
Poplar High St, 31st March 2015
Jim, Caretaker, 23rd July 2014
West face of east building, 28th May 2016
Joanne, 28th May 2016
Mr & Mrs Hoque, 13th September 2015
On the balcony of the east building, 15th November 2015
Photographs copyright © Kois Miah
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Impending Disaster At 3 Club Row
A pair of weavers’ houses at 3-5 Club Row dating from 1764/66
Ever since Boris Johnson used his executive power as Mayor of London to permit British Land to demolish more than 80% of the fabric of their Norton Folgate development site which sits entirely in a Conservation Area in Spitalfields, there has been an unruly climate of laissez-faire in the East End for the destruction of historic buildings.
Just last month, we saw the destruction of local landmark, Tadmans, a distinguished Regency corner building which had stood on the corner of Jubilee St in Whitechapel for two centuries. The fact that it was neither listed nor in a Conservation Area allowed a Planning Officer simply to grant permission for demolition without even the necessity of consulting councillors.
This week, an application was submitted to demolish this seventeen-sixties weavers’ house, one of a pair at 3-5 Club Row in the Redchurch St Conservation Area. The significance of this unique surviving pair of houses is outlined by Peter Guillery, Senior Historian at the Survey of London, in his definitive book The Small House in Eighteenth Century London. “In few, if any, other London districts would the provision of new housing have been so clearly and directly associated with the needs of a single industry,” he writes. They were “a local solution to a local problem,” built specifically for journeymen silk weavers of Bethnal Green – not the wealthy silk merchants of Spitalfields. These were the first buildings in Britain constructed specifically to fulfil the requirements of both living and working.
In January 2017, the Huguenots of Spitalfields responded to Tower Hamlets Council’s request for suggestions of buildings that merit Local Listing, by submitting applications for this pair in Club Row and nine other surviving weavers’ houses in the vicinity. Twenty-eight months later, no response was forthcoming until this week, when an enquiry was made regarding the threat of demolition of 3 Club Row, drawing this reply from the Planning Department.
“The application was considered along with a number a number of other nominations, however, a decision was made to not locally list these buildings as they were all located within Conservation Areas. This is because buildings in Conservation Areas already benefit from a degree of protection under the planning system, including a protection against demolition without permission. We have therefore decided to focus the designation on buildings that currently don’t have any protection or recognition in the planning process… It does not appear that your colleague was notified of this decision, and I am very sorry for this oversight.”
Yet Conservation Area status did not protect the buildings in Norton Folgate and the Planning Department’s focus on buildings that “currently don’t have any protection or recognition in the planning process” did not extend to Tadman’s in Whitechapel.
So now we are faced with the threat of the demolition of a rare survival of an eighteenth century weavers’ house in Shoreditch. The jaw-droppingly appalling Philistinism of the developer is such that they claim destroying this old building – which they have let it slip into decay – and replacing it with generic new spreadsheet architecture will be an improvement to the Conservation Area.
“Regards the demolition of the building, the assessment shows that No’s 3-5 do not make a positive contribution to the area’s special character … The proposed replacement scheme will be of a suitably high quality that will enhance the Redchurch St Conservation Area.” This is an extract from the developer’s Heritage Statement, the only part of their eighty page application in which they mention the historic building.
We need your help if we are to save this building. Below you will find instructions for how you can object effectively to stop the impending disaster at 3 Club Row.
Note the drawing of the developer’s Porsche in this rendering of the replacement
HOW TO OBJECT EFFECTIVELY
Use your own words and add your own personal reasons for opposing the development. Any letters which simply duplicate the same wording will count only as one objection.
1. Quote the application reference: PA/19/00932/A1
2. Give your full name and postal address. You do not need to be a resident of Tower Hamlets or of the United Kingdom to register a comment but unless you give your postal address your objection will be discounted.
3. Be sure to state clearly that you are OBJECTING to the demolition of 3 Club Row.
4. The building is exceptionally rare and significant and should be listed.
5. It is an historic building in a Conservation Area and part of the historic and architectural interest of the area.
6. The replacement scheme is not worthy a replacement.
WHERE TO SEND YOUR OBJECTION
You can register and object by clicking here if you have a UK postcode
or
you can write an email to
planningandbuilding@towerhamlets.gov.uk
or
you can send a letter to
Town Planning, Town Hall, Mulberry Place, 5 Clove Crescent, London, E14 2BG
3-5 Club Row, 1953
These houses were built between 1764 and 1766, specifically for the journeymen silk weavers of Bethnal Green and the related trades of silk throwsters, winders and dyers.
These are single depth, one-room-plan houses with a rear window, so light could permeate from front and back. The wide top-floor windows, built into the main body of the house rather than into the attics, were for maximum light, essential for colour-matching fine silk threads. The brick frontages allowed the construction of the staircases while the rear walls were often of wood.
They were constructed as multi-occupant, single-room, workshop-homes, with one family per floor and silk weaving at the top. A journeyman family could only afford one room and work dominated their lives, so no space was provided for much else, with the size of looms dictating the size of the rooms.
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