On 6 May 1902 the last hanging was enacted at Newgate Prison. Aware of the extortionate cost of stringing up criminals, the apparatus was moved to Pentonville for future use. The last to avail themselves of this fine piece of engineering was George Woolfe, for the murder of Charlotte Cheeseman. The scaffold didn’t go to waste, 121 men were hanged at Pentonville the final execution at took place on 6 July 1961.

On 6 May 1990 after changing names for numbers, then adding the prefix 01, eventually 071 and 081 were introduced on this day, before going on to add 020

In May 1760 Earl of Ferrers became the only peer to be hanged for murder, wearing his wedding suit and taken in his carriage from the Tower to Tyburn

A small section of the old London Wall survives in the trackside walls of Tower Hill station at platform level. One of the largest pieces of the wall also stands just outside this station

When the Bishop’s Geese-prostitutes-had ‘goose bumps’ it did not mean they were cold or scared but had unfortunately caught venereal disease

The Royal Observatory, home of Greenwich Mean Time and the Prime Meridian line, was founded by Charles II in 1675

The folk tune London Bridge is Falling Down refers to Norwegian King Olaf who suggested destroying the wooden bridge while occupied by Danes

Buck’s Club, the London gentlemen’s club which once boasted Churchill as a member, is where the Buck’s Fizz was invented

London Marathon’s youngest male winner was 22-year-old Kenyan Sammy Wanjiru in 2009, he died two years later after falling from a balcony

The escalator at Angel station is not only the longest on the Tube network, but the longest anywhere in Western Europe

When Sir Christopher Wren his and craftsmen took 35 years to rebuild St Paul’s Cathedral they were criticised for taking too long

In May 2013 London was deemed as the city with the most multi-millionaires more than in the whole of France (4,224 against 3,800)

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.

On 29 April 1826 a public meeting was held chaired by Sir Stamford Raffles. Its purpose was to ascertain the viability of importing animals and putting them on display to the public. Sir Stamford had his reservations as to the zoo’s location “The Regent’s Park is to be the headquarters . . . though we do not know how the inhabitants of the Park will like lions, leopards and lynxes so near their neighbourhood”.

On 29 April 1968 after 139 years of operation the Metropolitan Police’s first black woman, Fay Allen (21) started work in Croydon

The term ‘down-under’ comes from a tunnel on Millbank which deported prisoners were led in chains to barges on their first leg to Australia

Chiswick House built to house Lord Burlington’s art collection became a lunatic asylum before being listed for demolition in the 1950s

In 1974 Cass Elliot died of a heart attack in Harry Nilsson’s Mayfair flat the same block that The Who drummer Keith Moon died 4 years later

The Lamb and Flag pub at St Christopher’s Place in the 19th century was reputed to be the haunt of anarchists

Naked statutes outside Zimbabwe House caused an outcry when unveiled in 1908 the building opposite replaced its windows with frosted glass

Pasqua Rosee a Sicilian servant first introduced coffee to London first to his master’s guests then in a shed by St Michael Cornhill in 1652

Set up in 1869 the Hurlingham Club originally hosted pigeon shooting before becoming a major venue for tennis

The longest tube journey one can take without changing trains is Epping to West Ruislip a distance of 34.1 miles

In April 1755 after 9 years work and payment of 1,500 guineas Samuel Johnson’s A Dictionary of the English Language was published in London

Zizzi is French for willy at Zizzi’s on the Strand in April 2007 a man ran in took a knife jumped on a table dropped his trousers and cut off his penis

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.