On 12 February 1682 Thomas Thynne predecessor of the current incumbent at Longleat House and the Marquesses of Bath was shot dead in his coach on Pall Mall where now stands the Institute of Directors. Capt. Vratz, Lt. Stern and a pole called Boroski had been hired by Count Königsmarck who fancied Thynne’s wife. The killers were executed, but not so the Swedish count, Königsmark however was acquitted of the charge of being an accessory.

On 12 February 1554 Lady Jane Grey who claimed England’s throne for nine days was beheaded at the Tower after being charged with treason

Composer Ivor Novello spent time in Wormwood Scrubs Prison after being jailed for altering documents relating to his Rolls Royce car

Shoreditch probably takes its name from the ditch of Scorre or Sceorf as it was knowns as Scoredich in 1148

From a first floor room at St Mary’s Hospital on Praed Street, Paddington, Sir Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin

Sir Thomas More, executed by Henry VIII in 1535, was born in Milk Street. There is a statute on the Chelsea Embankment marking the place of the last home

Music hall great Marie Lloyd was born in Plumber Street, Shoreditch in 1870, she was showcased by her father at the Eagle Tavern in Hoxton and in 1884 making her professional début as Bella Delmere

Before Nelson’s statute was hoisted aloft in 1843 fourteen men dined on the platform at the top of the world’s tallest Corinthian column

In London 9 distinct football codes are played: Harrow, Eton (2), Association, Rugby Union and League, Gaelic, Gridiron and Australian rules

The London Hackney Carriages Act 1843 forbids a cabbie whose ‘For Hire’ light is on to seek trade whilst the vehicle is moving – fine £200

William Perkin, inventor of the first synthetic dye – mauve, lived at St David’s Lane Shadwell and was christened at St Paul’s Church Shadwell

On 12 February 1852 at 51 Bedford Street, Strand, plumber George Jennings opened London’s first female public toilets

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 5 February 1983 DynoRod were called out to a blocked drain near 23 Cranley Gardens, Muswell Hill. To the engineer the blockage looked suspiciously like human remains. When the police popped round the following day Dennis Nilsen confessed that 15 or 16 others had met the same fate since 1978. Nilsen became known as the Muswell Hill Murderer, sentenced to life imprisonment on 4 November 1983, with a recommendation that he serve a minimum of 25 years.

On 5 February 1924 the BBC broadcast the time check ‘pips’, a series of six short tones broadcast at one-second intervals, from Greenwich Observatory for the first time

During World War II HMP Wormwood Scrubs was used to store 26 drums of heavy water, which were to be used to make a nuclear bomb

Leadenhall Market stands on the site of a Roman Basilica, a building used for public administration. It first opened in the 14th century

Christopher Wren in a black marble sarcophagus that was originally made for Cardinal Wolsey, Lord Nelson and the Duke of Wellington are all buried in the crypt of St. Paul’s Cathedral

Fitzrovia is named after landowner Henry Fitzroy illegitimate son of King Charles II. The name comes from French ‘fils du roi’/son of the king

The only true home shared by all four Beatles was a flat at 57 Green Street near Hyde Park where they lived in the autumn of 1963

Thomas Carlyle lived at 5 Cheyne Row (now no. 24) Chelsea in 1834 where he entertained Browning, Dickens and Tennyson. He died there in 1881

An embankment behind Arsenal’s east stand gave the expression ‘spion kop’ (lookout in Afrikaan) from where 243 British troops had died so kop for terrace entered football’s lexicon

The eastbound and westbound lines on the Central Line are built above and below each other for much of the line

The Observer newspaper was founded in 1791 at 396 Strand by WS Bourne on the premise that “the establishment of a Sunday newspaper would obtain him a rapid fortune” is the world’s oldest Sunday

In 1610 Dame Alice Owen founded almshouses and a school on the Islington site where she narrowly missed being killed by an arrow

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.