London in Quotations: Charles Dickens

Quote 24 May, 2021 Gibson Square 2 Comments

If the parks be “the lungs of London” we wonder what Greenwich Fair is – a periodical breaking out, we suppose — a sort of spring rash.

Charles Dickens (1812-1870), Greenwich Fair

London trivia

London Trivia: It’s, it’s Monty Python

23 May, 2021 Gibson Square 3 Comments

On 23 May 1969, the BBC commissioned an initial series of 6 episodes of Monty Python’s Flying Circus. Its members unusually had complete creative control, allowing them to experiment wildly, disregarding the conventional rules of television comedy. Two of its trademark images are a large foot taken from a 16th-century Italian painting squashing the title and everything around it, and a naked man playing the piano.

On 23 May 1701 the Scottish pirate Captain Kidd was executed at Wapping despite having been promised a Royal Pardon if he gave himself up

In 1415 following the Battle of Agincourt the Duke of Orleans, prisoner in the Tower of London, sent his wife the first ever valentine card

Baker Street is named after Sir Edward Baker of Dorset who was responsible for building a number of streets and squares in 18th century London

Approximately 50 passengers a year kill themselves on the Underground, the worst-affected station is King’s Cross St. Pancras

St. Stephen’s Chapel in the old Palace of Westminster was the chamber of the House of Commons from late 18th century to 1834

At 58,000 sq ft Bermondsey Street’s White Cube Gallery is Europe’s largest commercial art space displaying Damien Hirst, Antony Gormley etc

The Apple Store on Regent Street near Oxford Circus, makes more profit per square foot than any shop in the world

The first purpose-built ‘model baths’ were on Old Castle Street opening in 1847, a year late after the foundations sank into an old cesspool

The Underground’s deepest station is Hampstead which runs down to 58.5 metres. In Central London, it’s the DLR at Bank at 41.4 metres below

Coming 4th on the global list for the number of billionaires London generates 20 per cent of the UK’s gross domestic product

In the 19th century Windsor Castle could be seen from the Windsor Castle public house on Campden Hill Road, hence its name

Trivial Matter: London in 140 characters is taken from the daily Twitter feed @cabbieblog.
A guide to the symbols used here and source material can be found on the Trivial Matter page.

Puppydog tails

Protected: Created in London

21 May, 2021 Gibson Square

Thinking allowed

Giant deserves a watery grave

18 May, 2021 Gibson Square 2 Comments

The Hunterian Museum in Lincoln’s Inn Fields holds collections of human and non-human anatomical things as varied from a pig’s penis to the oesophagus of a whale, the museum also owns the skeleton of a famous giant. The skeleton once on display stood seven foot seven inches tall in its display case and towered over the rest of the museum’s collection. This is, or was, Charles Byrne, a genetic giant who suffered from the growth disorder now known as acromegaly.

The Hunterian Museum, currently undergoing renovation, and not set to reopen until 2022 has announced that “plans for all the displays in the new museum will be issued in due course”.

Which begs the question as to the museum’s giant who wasn’t meant to be there at all. Byrne didn’t want to spend an eternity on public display. From the rural Ireland of his upbringing to the streets of London, he had spent his whole life exhibiting himself. People paid to visit him in his London lodgings and he performed tricks in public, like using street lamps to light his pipe. After years of making a living from his remarkable height, he was desperate that his bones did not endure the same indignity. Byrne’s Will explicitly stated that he wished to be buried at sea in a heavy lead coffin.

The Hunterian has made no secret of the fact that they’d come by the skeleton illegally and against the man’s last wishes. The museum’s founder, the surgeon John Hunter, had followed Byrne closely when he moved to London. As the giant’s health deteriorated and he began to drink, Hunter moved in like a vulture. When Byrne contracted tuberculosis and died aged just twenty-two, it was Hunter’s men who waylaid the giant’s coffin on its way from London to Margate. The undertaker was bribed and the body returned to the surgeon.

Instead of the anonymity of the North Sea, the giant ended up immersed in Hunter’s grim cauldron, where the flesh was literally boiled off his bones. Once reduced, the skeleton was pinned together and put on display, black numerals stamped on it like a prisoner’s identification printed on bone. Byrne has endured the ignominy of his glass cabinet for over two hundred years.

Any scientific value the body once possessed has long since been quarried, DNA from the teeth analysed, and countless photographs and X-rays were then taken to document every inch of the skeleton. Even if the museum one day honours Byrne’s final wishes, you could say the damage has already been done.

Featured image: Choppy cold grey sea by coolwallpapers (CC BY-SA)