Old and New London, A Narrative of its History, its People and its Places. Illustrated with Numerous Engravings from the Most Authentic Sources. vol 3
Thornbury, Walter
1872-78
Chapter III: St. Clement Danes (continued):--The Law Courts.
Chapter III: St. Clement Danes (continued):--The Law Courts.
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It is scarcely necessary to remind our readers that in theory it is the sovereign who sits in his (or her) right in England to administer justice to all, and hence the place in which the law is administered in this country has always been styled a And, as in early times, when law was rude and simple, the king used often to sit in his own court to administer justice, it was the custom for the seat of law to be within the palace of royalty. Hence, very naturally, when, in the Saxon and Norman times, the king's palace was at , it was a matter of course that the | |
p.16 | courts of law should grow up around the very person of the sovereign, though occasionally they were moved wherever the king travelled and took up his abode; in this case they were said to be held , that is, in the presence of the king himself. |
A great impetus to the concentration of the courts of law in the metropolis was doubtless given by Henry VIII.; for, whereas down to his day courts of arbitration had been held from time immemorial to decide cheaply and simply small matters in dispute in the several baronies, such as questions between landlord and tenant, between master and man, he ordered these and other like cases to be brought up to London, and, as Mr. Froude tells us in his
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Gradually, however, as the English law shaped itself into a system and a science, which demanded a legal education in those who actually followed it as a profession, other of law arose nearer to the Inns of Court and the abodes of the gentlemen of the long robe; and down to the present day, portion of both law and equity has been administered in the rooms adjoining Hall, and another in other courts at . But this division and distribution of the headquarters and fountains of English justice between localities, a mile at least apart, has long been a matter of complaint among most practical Englishmen; and from time to time, especially during the present century, there have arisen murmurs on account of the loss of time involved to both judges and counsel by this unhappy local severance. And it can be no matter of surprise that, from time to time, various proposals have been made to concentrate in a single spot the scattered forces of the law. With a view to carrying out this national undertaking--as far back as the year , as we learn from the evidence printed by order of the House of Commons--the late Sir Charles Barry designed a large building of Grecian architecture, which he intended to have placed in . It was to have contained a great Central Hall, about equal to Hall in size, around which smaller courts should cluster; the entire group of buildings, if it had been carried into effect at that time, would have covered a of the area within the rails of , and have been surrounded by a belt of plantations, in order to keep up the delusion of rurality. Funds, however, were most fortunately wanting; and great objections were made to the plan of blocking up so large an open space, where open spaces were so rare; in fact, persons who lived about , the Strand, and , had long considered this open area, though enclosed, as their and seriously asserted that to all intents and purposes, they had been in the country when they had completed their early morning tour round
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At length, when the patience of the lawyers, and of the rest of the public, had been nearly worn out, and when attention had been frequently called to the subject in Parliament, Her Majesty was pleased in , to order a Royal Commission to be issued, The Commission accordingly recommended the selection of the site on the northern side of the Strand, between and . In a Bill was introduced in order to carry this recommendation into effect; but it was thrown out by a narrow majority, and the question slumbered until , when the urgency of some such provision for the due administration of the law had again made itself practically felt. Acts of Parliament were passed in consequence, to carry out the recommendations already mentioned. The Act empowered the Commissioners of Works and Public Buildings to acquire the site which had been recommended, and the other provided the funds necessary for the cost of the building itself, partly by a contribution of of unclaimed interest on stock standing to the credit of suitors in the Court of Chancery, and partly by a small tax to be imposed on litigants in the other courts. | |
Another body of Commissioners was next appointed, consisting of eminent members ot the legal profession, including Lords Cranworth, Hatherley, Cairns, and Penzance, Vice-Chancellors Stuart, Malins, and others, in order to advise the Treasury in its choice of an architect and plans for the new The next step was to nominate a smaller body, consisting of individuals of high standing-Mr. Gladstone, Sir W. Stirling-Maxwell, the Lord Chief Justice Cockburn, Sir Roundell Palmer (now Lord Selborne), and the Right Hon. W. Cowper-Temple, along with professional architects-Mr. John Shaw and Mr. George Pownall, who were to act as and a limited competition among the | |
p.17 | best architects of the day was invited. designs were sent in, and these were exhibited to the public, in , in a temporary building put up in , ; and in the end the design of Mr. G. E. Street, R.A., was acceptednot, however, until after a very strong feeling had been shown in favour of that of Mr. E. M. Barry, a son of the architect of the Houses of Parliament. |
Even after the architect, however, had been chosen, a further delay arose, as a large number of the public, and some of the competitors-Mr. Street himself among the rest-expressed an opinion that a space between the Strand and the Thames , to the east of , would be a preferable site to that already chosen, and which had been prepared and cleared by the removal, in -, of no less than close, foul, and filthy courts, yards, lanes, and alleys. And at last, after all the above mentioned delays had come to an end, the brick of the --the great central National Palace of Justice--was actually laid, on the last day of , at the north-east corner of the chosen ground, at the junction of and . The site, which had then been cleared for several years, comprised the surface of nearly acres, which had previously been covered by about small streets, courts, and alleys, such as those which we shall presently endeavour to picture to our readers' eyes. The substratum of solid concrete, which had been laid or years previously, covered about acres and a half of this space, the rest being destined to be left open, with the idea of being laid out as a garden, in case it should not be required, in course of time, for building purposes. | |
The buildings themselves are thus minutely described in the of : | |
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Mr. Street, in a printed minute, dated , thus sums up the chief aestheticall advantages, :-- | |
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With such a plan before us, the imagination can easily paint, in vivid colours, the rise of a stately pile, wherein the majesty of the law shall be fitly represented. | |
It is unquestionably true that any great public good can only be achieved at the cost of much private inconvenience; and the New Law Courts cannot claim to be any exception to this general rule. No sensible man can doubt that the destruction of so many filthy slums must ultimately prove a gain to the community at large; yet it is also undeniable that the present effect of the work of demolition has been, firstly, to render persons homeless, and subsequently to drive | |
p.19 | threefourths of them into other courts and alleys in the immediate vicinity, which, being previously well filled, must speedily, from the overcrowding consequent upon so enormous an influx, be rendered as unhealthy as the squalid dens from which the immigrants have been routed. It is also true that a liberal compensation was awarded by Government, even in cases where no legal claim could have been made, and that the utmost kindness and forbearance was shown by the Commissioners and officials entrusted to administer that compensation; but it may be doubted whether, |
in the case of this class, who live from hand to mouth, the unwonted possession of so large a sum was not rather the reverse of a benefit. We are told that about was paid to each weekly tenant, and this being in many instances squandered in the course of a few days, the recipient appeared, with drunken imprecations, before the distributors to demand more. | |
Many ingenious plans have been mooted, by philosophers and philanthropists of all ages, for the effectual cleansing of certain Augean stables; but the summary of pulling down the building, | |
p.20 [extra_illustrations.3.20.1] |
and turning its denizens adrift to seek shelter where best they may, is a bold stroke, which has at least the advantage of novelty, if even it savour a little of the line of policy familiarly known as
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And now, having gained some slight idea of the appearance which these acres-now only suggestive of may be expected to present in the future, let us take a brief retrospective view of them as they were not only in their last stage of decay, but in their palmy days, when St. Clement Danes was a favourite abode of
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The truth of the old proverb, has been proved by our time-honoured, if somewhat cumbersome, old acquaintance, , which still remains , frowning defiance on the menaces of destruction, with which it has been periodically assailed for more than a century. Of this relic of the past Mr. Thornbury having already given, in a previous volume, a full and exhaustive history, which leaves nothing to be added or desired, we will leave it still blocking up the thoroughfare, and pass on at once to our task of rebuilding and peopling, in fancy, the large waste space which lies on our right hand. | |
It would be equally tedious and unnecessary to give a minute description of all the lanes, courts, and alleys which have been swept away in the process of clearing these acres, many of them being remarkable only for the generally unwholesome atmosphere, both moral and physical, which pervaded them; we must, therefore, be contented to particularise such among them as are sufficiently interesting, from historical associations, to make their memories and names worth preserving. | |
On the north side of the old gateway stood, a few years ago, a quaint, narrow wooden house with projecting gables, and a physiognomy all its own. Here generations of fishmongers had plied their scaly trade, and here a certain Mr. Crockford, erst dealer in shell-fish, and subsequently gamblinghouse keeper and millionaire, laid the foundation of his fortune. During his lifetime he refused to allow the old house in the Strand to be altered; but after his death, which occurred in , the gable roof and pent-house were removed. The fishmonger's shop afterwards became that of a hairdresser, and finally, reversing the old saying about it passedas we have stated-into the hands of the wellknown -hand booksellers, Messrs. Reeves and Turner, who owned it when it was doomed to come down to make room for the New Law Courts, in . | |
A few steps further on, between and the entrance of St. , nearly opposite to Messrs. Twining's bank, stood the house of Messrs. [extra_illustrations.3.20.2] , the great wholesale manufacturers of the pills which bear their name. It is said that for many years the firm spent upwards of a year for advertisements in the town, country, and foreign newspapers. | |
As near as possible on the site of the shop of Messrs. Holloway stood, formerly, an old house with gable roof and an ornamental front, engraved in Smith's It was famous as being the reputed residence of the Duc de Sully, when ambassador here, before he could be accommodated at Arundel House. At that time it is said to have been inhabited by Christopher Harley, Count de Beaumont, ambassador from France in . In another house, a few steps still further westward, the (the of the penny daily papers) was originally published, by its founder, Colonel Sleigh. | |
Returning to , we now make our way northwards, following the eastern side of the new block of buildings, and--with some latent suspicion that we may even meet with foul play from the ghosts of its former inhabitants--up Shire or Shere Lane, from which many of Addison's and other papers in the are dated. | |
The western side of was in the parish of St. Clement Danes; and therefore the meetings of the Club at the which were noticed in the early part of this work, belong properly, and strictly speaking, to this place; but it will be sufficient here to note the fact, and to refer our readers to the description previously given for fuller details on the subject. We may mention, however, that it was a thoroughfare for foot-passengers only, very narrow and filthy, and well deserving the character given of it in the (No. ), as On the left side especially the houses were of and Mr. Diprose, in his informs us that many years ago there existed a communication from of them with a house on the north side of the Strand, a few doors from , through which thieves used to escape after ill-using their victims. Higher up on the same side were houses which were made into by connecting passages, almost like a rabbit warren; this was known by the name of being the of beggars. A few doors higher up still was another double house, called the through which, we are told, there was a way for thieves to pass through into Crown Court, and so into the Strand. It is worthy of record that this lane retained its old character to the last, a man being prosecuted for a robbery committed in it as late as the year . | |
must have achieved an undesirable reputation at an early stage of its existence, as even in the reign of James I. it was called and in our own day the very name of had, in , become such an abomination that it was ordered to be henceforth known as Upper, Middle, and Lower Serle's Place. This change of name appears to have had, to some extent, a salutary effect, as we are told by Mr. Diprose that
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In , in the year , the delightful song writer, and oracle of the licentious wits of his day, [extra_illustrations.3.21.1] , saw the light. He was baptised in the old church of . | |
adjoined on the left. says Mr. Diprose, Some of them also were of great age and unhealthy, the entire locality being made up of such without any roadway. This locality was a colony of thieves; and Mr. Diprose tells us, on the authority of a of it, that the later remembered a time when capital punishment was constantly inflicted for robbery, and when an execution at Newgate seldom took place without someone from this spot being amongst the number. adds the same writer,
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We are told, in the by Nicholas, that and Chambers tells us, in his , that
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It is difficult to associate the neighbourhood of with pilgrims, clear springs, and running brooks, but we read in the of ., : --
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Round this holy well, in the early Christian era, | |
p.22 | newly-baptised converts clad in white robes were wont to assemble to commemorate Ascension Day and Whitsuntide; and in later times, after the murder of Thomas a Becket had made Canterbury the constant resort of pilgrims from all parts of England, the holy well of St. Clement was a favourite halting-place of the pious cavalcades for rest and refreshment. |
In the (Middlesex, vol. x., published in ), Mr. Nightingale says, Fitzstephen, in his description of London, in the reign of Henry II., informs us that
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, occupied principally by law publishers at the northern extremity, and towards the Strand by a medley of small, uninviting-looking shops, was more than a century ago the abode of Fortescue, who lived in a house at the upper end of the yard, which is further honoured by being described by Fortescue's friend, Pope, as Several of the small passages in this vicinity are worthy of no more particular mention than is contained in Seymour's written in . | |
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It is a common mistake to suppose that owed its name to the biographer of Dr. Johnson. Its age and its name are at least as old as the times of the Tudors, in whose day, and in those of the Stuarts, as we are told, it was the abode of
says Mr. Diprose, Another distinguished resident was Sir Edward Lyttleton, successively Solicitor-General, and Lord Chief Justice of England, in . From Boswell House, Gilbert Talbot wrote a letter of to his father, the Earl of Shrewsbury, in the reign of Elizabeth, a letter which is printed in Lodge's Among the other eminent inhabitants of this court was Lady Fanshawe, as we learn from her where she says, (her husband's)
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Ascending northwards towards was a flight of steps which led into New , a dreary-looking enclosure, although described by Hatton in as At the side of these steps might be seen to the very last a curious relic of other days, a watchman's box, the last box of the old which was drawn up from the pavement during the day-time. | |
This ancient order of watchmen was instituted about the middle of the century, and carried on its functions, growing yearly more feeble and inefficient, until, in , the as they were termed in the slang of the day, found themselves superseded by the new police, organised by Sir Robert Peel. These midnight guardians of the peace-and it may be observed that the only qualifications necessary for the post would appear to have been extreme old age, and general incapacity- suffered many things at the hands of the young and of the Regency. A watchman found dozing in his box in the intervals of going his rounds to utter his monotonous | |
p.23 | cry, was apt to be overturned, box and all, and left to kick and struggle helplessly, like a turtle on its back, until assistance arrived. Or he would be kindly offered a dram to keep him awake, and this dram being drugged, quickly sank him in deeper sleep than before, in which state and his box, being transferred to a truck, were forthwith trundled into another quarter of the town, and left to awake at leisure. |
Old , from having been the chief abode of the gradually came to be let out in chambers and apartments. The houses were mostly of red brick with carved doorways. The house at the southern end was, for the last years prior to its demolition, the printing and publishing office of Messrs. Kelly's of London and of the several counties of England. | |
The old entrance to St. from the Strand was through an open gateway flanked by massive pillars of stone. This archway was erected by the Corporation of London, as a tribute of respect for Alderman Pickett, through whose exertions the thoroughfare of the Strand was widened, at an expense of more than a quarter of a million sterling. The new thoroughfare was named , after the public benefactor, but the name never became popular, and soon passed away, the houses being reckoned as part of the Strand. A little beyond the gateway the lane bore off to the left, and led to the back of Hospital, merging in and Gilbert Passage, which opens through , into the south-west corner of . The line of this lane flanks the western extremity of the site now laid level for the erection of the New Law Courts, and it is to be hoped that it will soon be superseded by a wider thoroughfare, the dark and obscure outlets by which it still communicates with and New Inn being swept away. | |
Among the other residents in this lane was Sir John Trevor (a cousin of the infamous Judge Jeffreys), at time Speaker of the , and twice Master of the Rolls; the same who was expelled from the House for bribery, though he had the good sense to warn James II. against his arbitrary conduct. He died here in , and was buried in the Rolls Chapel on the east side of . Another distinguished inhabitant was Oliver Cromwell, in his early days. The Lords Paget also had their town mansion here, as appears by the parish registers. | |
In the course of time, however, the lane, | |
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It has been very appositely observed that
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Mr. Diprose-who, as an old inhabitant of the parish, is well qualified to speak on the subjectgives a list of the courts, alleys, and streets which have been quietly removed and effaced, in order to form the site of the new Palace of Justice. | |
p.24 | They are as follows, nearly in all :--, Bear and Harrow Court, , Old and New Boswell Courts, Boswell Yard, , Chair Court, Clement's Court, Foregate, , , Crown Court, , Hemlock Court, Great and Little Horseshoe Courts, , Pickett Place, , Robin Hood Court, Upper, Lower, and Middle Serle's Place, , Ship and Anchor Court, , and Star Court, all of them more or less dirty and overcrowded. |
Besides these, however, there have disappeared a considerable part of the Strand (), Crey Street, Yates' Court, and St. , nearly all of which have histories still | |
attaching to them, although all traces of them have disappeared, and their place knows them no more. | |
The demolition of so many small tenements, in order to make a site for the New Law Courts, has not had so great an influence as might be supposed upon the people living in the parish of , which still swarms with a poor population. Previously it stood at about , and now, after all this clearance, it is about , a great number of the inhabitants of the old lanes and alleys having removed only into the neighbourhood of , which, it is to be feared, are almost equally close and filthy, and sadly overcrowded. | |
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In the reign of Charles II. was the of London, and several of its houses were the haunts of those royal and noble intrigues which figure so largely in the anecdotememoirs of the time. says Mr. Diprose,
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We will conclude this chapter with a few words quoted from an article in in , styled, : | |
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Footnotes: [extra_illustrations.3.20.1] Holloway Sanatarium [] Since the above was written, the condition of Temple Bar has created considerable alarm, from the fact that, owing to the removal of the houses on the north side, and the excavations that have been carried on close to it for the foundations of the New Law Courts, the ground beneath had given way to such an extent as to cause great fear of the structure falling. In August, 1874, the arch was therefore immediately shored up with beams, and other means taken to ensure the safety of passengers through the Bar. [extra_illustrations.3.20.2] Holloway [] With reference to this assertion, Malcolm states that such a report arose from the fact of one of the houses in that narrow street bearing on its front the fleur-de-lys of France, and suggests that this was put there, not to commemorate Sully's arrival, but in compliment to our Henry V., the conqueror of France. [extra_illustrations.3.21.1] Sir Charles Sedley |