One Hyde Park squatted next to the Mandarin Oriental Hotel like a stack of office furniture, and with all the elegance and charm of the inside of a photocopier. Albeit a brand new photocopier that doubled as a fax and document scanner.
Ben Aaronovitch (b.1964), The Hanging Tree
On 18 February 1478 George Duke of Clarence was drowned in a butt of Malmsey wine at the Tower of London. Convicted of treason against his brother, Edward IV, and was executed by this dubious method. It was said to have been instigated by his brother Richard Duke of Gloucester. It was Dick, the last Plantagenet who on 22 August 1485 would die on Bosworth Field, presumably more sober than his late brother did.
On 18 February 1901 Winston Churchill made his maiden speech in The House of Commons, justifying the burning of Boer farms
In the 16th century, a London law forbade wife beating after 9:00pm, but only because the noise disturbed people’s sleep
The settled road surface of Charterhouse Square, laid down in the 1860s has been given Grade II listed status by English Heritage
Playwright Ben Jonson couldn’t afford normal burial in Westminster Abbey determined by plot size was buried upright standing for an eternity
During the outbreak of World War II London Zoo killed all their venomous animals in case the zoo was bombed and the animals escaped
The Reform Club in Pall Mall is the fictional start to Jules Verne’s book Around The World In Eighty Days later made into a film
London has the oldest bicycle shop in the world (Pearsons of Sutton, established as a blacksmiths in 1860), and the second oldest cycle track in the world, Herne Hill, opened in 1891
Twickenham and Harlequins home Twickenham Stoop are a mere 700 yards apart, nowhere in London are two such high profile stadiums in such close proximity
The first crash on the Tube occurred in 1938 when two trains collided between Waterloo and Charing Cross, injuring 12 passengers
Gropecunt Lane once ran north from Cheapside so called as it was a famous haunt of prostitutes it was renamed by kllljoys in the Reformation
On 18 February 1888 the very first Salvation Army hostel was opened by General William Booth at 21 West India Dock Road
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.
For those new to CabbieBlog or readers who are slightly forgetful, on Saturdays I’m republishing posts, many going back over a decade. Some will still be very relevant while others have become dated over time. Just think of this post as your weekend paper supplement.
This little alley close to Charing Cross Station commemorates York House which once occupied a 7-acre site overlooking the river Thames.
Originally owned until the Dissolution in 1536 by the Bishops of Norwich, Henry VIII then passed it on to an old friend the Duke of Suffolk and in 1624 the estate eventually came into the possession of George Villiers, The Duke of Buckingham.
Villiers restored the bishop’s old estate and built the magnificent York Watergate which survives marooned in Embankment Gardens.
Villiers was murdered in 1628 by a Puritan fanatic, but the Duke’s wife lived there until she lost the property in the Civil War. Her son, the second Duke, fortuitously fell in love with the daughter of York House’s new owner and on marriage regained his family’s home.
He had a better eye for heiresses than finance, for by 1672 he found himself in hoc up to his neck and sold the house to speculators to redevelop the site. The second Duke of Buckingham secured £30,000 for the house and gardens to repay his debts.
But one stipulation of the sale Buckingham insisted upon was that the developer Nicholas Barbon record literally every sound and syllable of his Grace’s name and title; Buckingham Street; Villiers Street; Duke Street and George Street still remain.
But unfortunately the Burgers of Westminster don’t possess the wit of Nicholas Barbon when he named the streets, for Of Alley has been given the rather prosaic title of York Place.
A footnote: George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham started the first foxhunt in England, The Bilsdale Hunt in 1668 and later started the Sinnington Hunt in 1680. He died from a chill after digging for a fox above Kirkbymoorside. At his death in 1687, the title again became extinct.
The most often asked of cabbies is the question “Who you had in the back?” A rather indelicate way of phrasing the request to my mind, but this week with the untimely death at 69 of Steve Wright got me reminiscing.
My first brush with celebrities wasn’t very auspicious. Soon after gaining my badge, I picked up DJ Steve Wright and his young son from a restaurant. Upon arriving near Swiss Cottage he asked his 10-year-old son if he had the front door key. Needlessly to say the lad didn’t but suggested that they returned to the restaurant to see if the keys had been left on the table. A futile trip back to central London ensued with Steve returning from the restaurant to say the keys hadn’t been handed in, then it was back to their house with the pair of them walking off to a securely locked home.
My neighbour was burgled recently, and within 10 minutes three police cars, and six coppers turned up. The next day, forensics arrived and by the third day, we had posted details of the break-in and advice through our letterboxes. Then nothing, I’m pretty sure this is the usual way police go about ‘reassuring the public’, reactive not proactive, that we once had from the boys in blue.
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