City of London – Multicultural London:|The Literature of Migrants and Immigrants

March 1, 2021August 14, 2021 Kayra Guven

The Humans of Bridewell and Surroundings

The area around Bridewell brings together people from all walks of life as one might expect from a place with a garden, two prisons, multiple churches, countless wharves, and a royal history. In addition, the small houses cramped together in the spaces left in between the various institutions suggests that the area was probably relatively densely populated. This makes sense as everyone might have a different reason for living there.

“A Whistling Shop. Tom & Jerry visiting Logic ‘on board the Fleet'” from Pierce Egan’s Life in London (1821)

Someone could be in Fleet Prison because they are in debt; another might be working at the prison. The drawing of the inside of a whistling shop from Egan’s Life in London shows the range of people who are living here. Within the same room, there is a man in tattered clothes warming himself by the fire, a woman with children, some card players, and almost everyone is drinking. The clothes of the people—especially the colours and cuts of their clothing, and the types of hats they are wearing—implies that most of these people are not from the same socioeconomic class; however, it is also clear that no one is from the upper-upper class, and there are very few from the lower-upper class, if indeed there are any. How much would things have changed in, say, fifteen years from the time this drawing was made in 1821?

“The Warden’s Room,” Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens, image from chapter 41.

Charles Dickens could help us see that the answer is not that much. In his earliest novel, The Pickwick Papers, Mr. Pickwick ends up in Fleet Prison, and Dickens’s description wouldn’t appear strange to someone familiar with the prison from Horwood’s Plan.

Charlotte Brontë references another prison in this area during a game of charades in Jane Eyre: Bridewell. This prison starts off as a Tudor palace and is later converted into a hospital and prison during the reign of Edward VI. While the purpose of this building has changed over time, the various structures surrounding Bridewell are a reminder of its history through names like King Edward Street, St. Bride’s Church Yard, St. Bride’s Wharf, Crown Court, Tudor Street, Bride Lane, Bride Court…

“Poor Sweep, Blackfriars Bridge” from Mapping Modern London (1804)

Bridewell during the late 18^th and early 19^th century has significantly changed since its days as a royal palace. The Pass-Room from Ackermann’s Microcosm of London shows a Bridewell where women are sleeping on hay because there are not enough beds. It is probable that some of these women are single mothers since there are children in the middle of the drawing.

In addition to the prisons and people who live in the area because they are in some way connected to the prison system, another demographic to keep in mind is children working to survive. We see Blackfriars Bridge as a spot where crossing sweepers work in Modern London. This suggests there are also middle class people who are coming in and out of this part of the City of London since someone must be paying for this service provided by children. Bridewell and its surroundings is a point of entry into the district, and therefore it makes sense that the place be populous and host people from different socioeconomic backgrounds.

March 1, 2021August 14, 2021 Kayra Guven

Bridewell and Surroundings: The Importance of Nature

The seam joining the Thames with the rest of the City of London is the wharves: just within the area surrounding Bridewell there are over fifteen of varying sizes. This abundance makes sense with the context given in Fores’s list that London harbours over ten thousand boats. As a result, however, the boundary between the natural and built environment is blurred even more than it already was; after all, where does the river end and the district begin if the boats are part of the city?

Blackfriars Bridge as depicted in Malton’s Picturesque Tour (1792-1801)

The natural environment—most notably the Thames—influences the built environment both in terms of the types of structures that need to exist to make this district the heart of the larger city, and in terms of the names of these structures. In addition to the wharves, a point of contact between this part of the City of London and the river is Blackfriars Bridge. Without the bridge and the wharves, not only would access to the area be far more limited, but this shift away from being a hub would fundamentally change the area’s identity since multiple structures have names referring to this symbiotic relationship between the natural and the built. The two most prominent streets that connect other smaller streets together are aptly named Fleet Street and New Bridge Street. The prison located right next to the intersection of these streets is also called Fleet Prison. There are numerous other smaller streets that highlight this Thames-based identity such as Little Bridge Street and Water Street.

Another important meeting point between the natural and the built environments is the Temple Gardens. The natural body of water directly next to the garden plays into the style of English gardens that contrasted from the jardin à la française. As can be seen in the image of Temple Gardens from 1809, the artificially created nature is still meant to look realistic to an extent. This is a heightened form of nature, but is, nonetheless, reminiscent of undisturbed nature. There is a deliberate attempt to work with nature—unlike the symmetrical and perfectly trimmed topiary common in French gardens—that makes this garden stand out as quintessentially English.

The gardens of Versailles; an example of a French garden for reference

Bridge Street, Blackfriars from Papworth’s Select Views (1816)

When we look at changes between Horwood’s Plan and Faden’s 1819 revision, we see there is a new and much smaller garden that is built right next to Bridewell. In addition to the garden, Bridewell also has a new chapel in its premises. Another change is the obelisk located in the intersection between Fleet Street and New Bridge Street. The obelisk must have been there since 1816 at the latest given the image of Bridge Street from Papworth’s Select Views includes the obelisk. The most substantial change in the area that alludes to technological developments of the time is the replacement of the New River Office and Yard with the Gas Light Company. The existence of the company suggests that using gas light must have been popular enough to sustain a business as early as 1819.

Bridewell Hospital and surrounding area in Horwood’s Plan (1792-9)

Bridewell Hospital and surrounding area in Faden’s 1819 revision. Orange highlights refer to places that have changed since Horwood’s original map. Green highlights refer to places mentioned in the current and following posts that have not changed between the two editions of the map.

February 28, 2021August 14, 2021 Sophie Garcia

A Walk Down Cheapside

On Cheapside, a street running through the City of London, tall, ornate, brick and brownstone buildings from after the Great Fire line either side of the road. There are signs outside of them for their businesses: a library, a stay and shirt manufacturer, a jeweller. There are lots of side streets with homes and businesses of their own, and the tall, brick buildings run in every direction. There are so many storefronts, and the buildings are full of windows out of which business owners fly advertisements for their goods. They remind the street of their vegetarian meals, teas for sale, and more. There are people, so many people, from all over, walking in and out of the different businesses, jumping into carriages, speeding in a rush toward their offices. The men wear bowler hats, the women dresses, and their modern daughters, shirtwaists and skirts.

This is a modern street. Lamp posts stand at each corner, and the intersections teem with carts and cabs and other carriages. They crowd together at the roundabouts and make Cheapside the notoriously busy street that it is. The sidewalk is wide enough for four people to walk in a row, though the area is too busy for that. The streets are also wide, and people walk there, too, deftly avoiding traffic. But the air is heavy, almost stifling, and not very clear. Smoke pours out from the chimneys and in cold weather or heavy rain, make for an oppressive atmosphere. There are so many horses, and dogs running freely through the street; the smell of their waste is inescapable. It is, after all, the busiest thoroughfare in London.

The most important sound on Cheapside is the bells. St Mary-le-Bow Church was built on one end of the street; all proper Cockneys are born within hearing range of her bells. At the other end of the street are the Mansion House and the Bank of England and its buildings. There is not much respite to be found here, no greenery and no quiet, but no one comes to Cheapside looking for either of those things.

February 28, 2021August 14, 2021 Sophie Garcia

The City of London: A Decreasing Population Reveals the District’s Emergence as a Major Business Center

The City of London stands out as one of the most interesting districts when it comes to population precisely because it experiences almost the opposite effect as all other districts of the metropolitan area. While a district like Poplar saw a 1890% increase in its population between 1801 and 1890 (from 8,278 persons to 156,510 persons), the City of London saw its population fall over the course of the 19^th century to a little more than a third of its original number of persons. While the district started out with 99,663 residents in the 1801-1810 period, it ended with only 37,218 in 1881-1890. The dramatic decrease, given its pointed divergence in the population activities of the city’s other districts, deserves a closer look.

Between 1801 and 1860, the City of London saw only nominal changes in its population; the number of persons stood consistently above 90,000, with a near-return to its original numbers during the 1851-1860 period. Each decade following this period, however, experienced severe decreases to the population. First, between 1861 and 1870, the population dropped by about 14%, and the population density underwent a similar drop. Then, that percent more than doubled in 1871-1880, with a 34% decrease in the City of London population. This was followed by another 34% decrease in the population in 1881-1890.

What might have caused such dramatic decreases in the City of London’s population, decade after decade? It seems these changes can most quickly be understood when placed in the context of the increasing populations in the expanding city’s outer districts; the population moved out of central London and into its suburbs. A large reason for this was possibly the burgeoning opportunities for work at the docks being built further along the Thames (i.e. in Poplar), but another important consideration was the fact that the City of London was becoming a major financial center. Important landmarks within the district already included the Royal Exchange, the Bank of England, and the East India House. The area was thus becoming less residential and more conducive to business, and less hospitable especially to the lower classes who could now travel outside the city’s center to find work.