Old and New London, A Narrative of its History, its People and its Places. Illustrated with Numerous Engravings from the Most Authentic Sources. vol 2
Thornbury, Walter
1872-78
Chapter XXIV: Leadenhall Street (continued).
Chapter XXIV: Leadenhall Street (continued).
The original Leadenhall Market was a mansion which belonged to Sir Hugh Neville, in , and was converted into a granary, and probably a market for the city, by Sir Simon Eyre, a draper, and Lord Mayor of London in . It appears to have been a large building roofed with lead, and at that time thought, we presume, grand and remarkable. | |
There was a large chapel on the east side of old Leadenhall Market, dedicated to the Holy Trinity, by Sir Simon Eyre. To this chapel were attached, for daily service of the market people, master, secular priests, clerks, choristers, and schoolmasters, for whose support Eyre left . In the reign of Edward IV. a fraternity of priests was established in this chapel. During a scarcity in (Henry VIII.) a great store of corn was laid up in the Leadenhall granary, and the mayor used to attend the market at a.m. In the year it was proposed to make Leadenhall a merchants' Bourse, but the plan dropped through. At Henry VIII.'s death, in , the Bishop of Winchester, the king's almoner, gave alms publicly to the poor at Leadenhall for consecutive days. In Strype's time [extra_illustrations.2.188.1] ) was a market for meat and fish, a market for raw hides, a wool market, and an herb market. | |
says Strype,
| |
[extra_illustrations.2.189.2] , says Pennant, When Don Pedro de Ronquillo, the Spanish ambassador, visited Leadenhall, he told Charles II. with admiration that he believed there was more meat sold in that market than in all the kingdom of Spain in a whole year. In Leadenhall Market was partly rebuilt, and in the leather-market was restored, the chapel and other old buildings being removed. | |
The engraving on page shows an old house formerly standing in . The door at the side appears to have been the entrance to an old Jewish synagogue. | |
[extra_illustrations.2.189.3] is the memorable building where Archbishop Laud performed some of those dangerous ceremonials that ultimately contributed to bring him to the scaffold. Between the years and this church was built as a chapel for the parish of St. Catherine, in the churchyard of the priory of the Holy Trinity, , founded by Matilda, wife of Henry I., who united the parishes of , St. Michael, St. Catherine, and the Trinity. Of the church of St. Michael (at the angle formed by the junction of Leadenhall and Fenchurch Streets) the crypt existed at the date of Mr. Godwin's writing in , with pointed arched groining and clustered columns, the shafts of which were said to be sunk about feet deep in the earth. | |
Henry VIII., at the dissolution, gave the priory and the church to Lord Audley, who bequeathed it to Magdalen College, Cambridge. In Stow's time the high street had been so often raised by pavements round , that those who entered had to descend steps. In the year the church, all but the tower was pulled down, and the present building commenced. The new building was consecrated by Archbishop Laud, then Bishop of London, -. Rushworth gives the following account of the opening: | |
| |
In the Middle Ages morality plays were acted in the churchyard of St. Catherine Cree. In an old parish book, quoted by Malcolm, under the date , there is an entry of certain players, who for licence to play their interludes in the churchyard paid the sum of | |
The most interesting ceremonial to be witnessed in this church is the annual [extra_illustrations.2.190.1] on Whit-Monday, which is largely attended: the congregation all wear flowers, and a large bouquet is placed on the pulpit before the preacher. | |
It is generally thought by good authorities that this church was restored under the direction of Inigo Jones. The building displays a strange mixture of Gothic and Greek architecture, yet is still not without a certain picturesqueness. The east window is square-headed; Corinthian columns support a clerestory, and the groined ceiling is coarse and ugly. The chief monument in the church is to the memory of Sir Nicholas Throgmorton, chief butler of England, a chamberlain, and | |
an ambassador to France from Queen Elizabeth. The tomb, of marble or alabaster, says Mr. Godwin, There is also a small tablet, supported by figures of monks (beginning of century). At the west end is an indifferent bas-relief by the elder Bacon. There is also a man more illustrious than these said to be buried here, and that is the great Holbein. The great painter is said to have died in the parish of St. Andrew , and Strype gives this as the place of his interment, adding that the Earl of Arundel had wished to erect a monument to his memory, but was unable to discover the exact spot of his grave. The close of Holbein's career, however, is wrapped in obscurity. Walpole observes that and he might have added, that there is quite as much doubt about the time. | |
, so called originally from a shop with the sign of an axe, is a street which runs from into , on the line of the old Roman wall, and so named (like ) from the rough herbs that grew among the old Roman stones. The church of St. Mary, long since vanished, was, says Stow, after the union of the parish with that of St. Andrew , turned into a warehouse. The Smiths, in of the best of the in imitation of Crabbe, play very wittily on the name of - | |
p.191 | Near this spot stood, in the reign of Henry V., the London residence of the De Veres, Earls of Oxford. Richard, Earl of Oxford, fought at Agincourt, and died in France, , years after that great victory. |
In , opposite the , in , was found the most magnificent Roman tessellated pavement yet discovered in London. It lay at only and a half feet below the street, but a side had been cut away for a sewer. It appeared to have been the floor of a room more than feet square. In the centre was Bacchus upon a tiger, encircled with borders (inflexions of serpents, cornucopiae, and squares diagonally concave), with drinking-cups and plants at the angles. Surrounding the whole was a square border of a bandeau of oak, and lozenge figures and true-lover's knots, and a fivefeet outer margin of plain red tiles. was broken in taking up, but the pieces were preserved in the library of the East India Company. A fragment of an urn and a jawbone were found beneath corner. says Mr. Fisher, who published a coloured print of it, In connection with this interesting discovery, it may be mentioned that another fine Roman pavement, feet square, was found in in , on taking down the . It lay about feet lower than the foundations of Gresham House, on the site of which the was built. says a description of it inserted by Mr. Timbs, in his ,
| |
Perhaps of all the old churches of London there is scarcely so interesting as [extra_illustrations.2.191.1] , nearly opposite the site of the old , the very name itself suggesting some curious and almost forgotten tradition. Stow is peculiarly interesting about this church, which he says derived its singular name from (hence shaft), which used, early in the morning of May Day, the great spring festival of merry England, to be set up and hung with flowers opposite the south door of St. Andrew's. | |
This ancient Maypole must have been the very centre of those joyous and innocent May Day revelries sung of by Herrick:--
| |
p.192 | |
The venerable St. Andrew's Maypole was never raised after that fatal in the reign of Henry VIII., which we have mentioned in our chapter on . It remained dry-rotting on its friendly hooks in Shaft Alley till the year of Edward VI., when the Reforming preachers, growing unusually hot and zealous in the sunshine of royal favour, and, as a natural consequence, considerably intolerant, Sir Stephen, a curate of the neighbouring St. Katherine's , , preached against the good old Maypole, and called it an advising all men to alter the Popish names of churches and the names of the days of the week, to eat fish any day but Friday and Saturday, and to keep Lent any | |
time but between Shrovetide and Easter. The same eccentric reformer used to preach out of a high elm-tree in his churchyard, and sing high mass in English from a tomb, far from the altar. The sermon denouncing the Maypole was preached at Paul's Cross, when Stow himself was present; and that same afternoon the good old historian says he saw the Shaft Alley people, Thus was the mangled and burned. Not long after there was a | |
p.193 | Romish riot in Essex, and the bailiff of Romford was hung just by the well at , on the pavement in front of Stow's own house. While on the ladder this poor perplexed bailiff said he did not know why he was to be hung, unless it was for telling Sir Stephen (the enemy of the Maypole) that there was heavy news in the country, and many men were up in Essex. After this man's death Sir Stephen stole out of London, to avoid popular reproach, and was never afterwards heard of by good old Stow. And this is the whole story of St. Andrew's Maypole and the foolish curate of Catherine Cree. |
Many eminent citizens were buried in this church. Among them we may name John Kirby, the great Elizabethan merchant tailor, and Stow himself, Stephen Jennings, Mayor of London, another worthy merchant tailor, who, in , rebuilt half the church, but sought a grave in the Grey Friars (). An old chronicler mentions of this church for chance readers; and there still is a desk with curious old books (mostly black letter), which formerly were chained to open cages. The present church, rebuilt -, consists of a nave and aisles, with a ribbed and flattened perpendicular roof, painted and gilt, with flowers and emblazoned shields. The chancel has also paintings of the heavenly choir, landscapes, and buildings. St. Andrew's boasts much stained glass, particularly a large painted window at the east end, containing whole-length portraits of Edward VI., Elizabeth, James, Charles I., and Charles II. This church was pewed soon after . It contains many valuable brasses, tablets, and monuments, as might be expected in a celebrated city church lucky enough to escape the Great Fire. The most special and memorable of these is the terra-cotta monument to worthy, indefatigable, honest old Stow. [extra_illustrations.2.194.1] was erected at the expense of his widow, and the effigy was formerly painted to resemble life. The worthy old chronicler is represented sitting at a table, as he | |
p.194 | must have spent half his existence, with a book before him (an old parish register, no doubt), and he holds a pen in his hand, as was his custom. The figure is. squat and stiff, but the portrait is no doubt exact. There was formerly, says Cunningham, a railing before the tomb. That Stow was a tailor, born about , in the parish of St. Michael, , we have stated in a previous chapter. That he lived near Pump we have also noted. He seems to have written his laborious and
amidst care and poverty. He was a friend of Camden, and a of Archbishop Parker, yet all he could obtain from James I. was a license to beg. He died a twelvemonth after this effusion of royal favour, and was buried at St. Andrew's in . In his body was removed, says Maitland, His collection for the in quarto volumes, are now in the . Wonderful of topographical facts! Peter Anthony Motteux, the clever translator of already mentioned by us, was buried here, but there is no monument to his memory. |
Footnotes: [extra_illustrations.2.188.1] Leadenhall (now celebrated for its poultry [extra_illustrations.2.189.2] Leadenhall Market [extra_illustrations.2.189.3] St. Catherine Cree (or Christ Church) [extra_illustrations.2.190.1] flower sermon [] quote missing in original. [extra_illustrations.2.191.1] St. Andrew Undershaft, Leadenhall Street [extra_illustrations.2.194.1] The monument to Stow |
