On 5 October 1999 a train collided with a First Great Western train from Cheltenham at Ladbroke Grove, 31 people, including the drivers of both trains involved, were killed and 227 people were admitted to hospital. It was the worst accident on the Great Western Main Line.

On 5 October 1983 Cecil Parkinson, Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, admitted to an affair with his former secretary, Sara Keays

HMP Pentonville built in 1842 at a cost £84,186 12s 2d was intended to be a holding prison for convicts awaiting transportation

Cowcross Street is so named after the cows crossing on their journey to the slaughterhouses and butchers at Smithfield Market

Idol Lane, off Great Tower Street was formerly Idle Lane denoting an area of the city where loiterers would congregate

Christ Church Lambeth’s spire is decorated with stars and stripes commemorating the abolition of slavery, half the cost was borne by America

The album cover for David Bowie’s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars was shot outside 23 Heddon Street

Tossing the pie which apprentice boys tossed a coin to win a pie, if the pieman won he kept the 1d and the pie, losing he gave the pie away

In the sixties gangsters ‘Mad’ Frankie Fraser & Eddie Richardson played football for the Soho Ramblers, in 1965 they played HMP Parkhurst

Transport for London Byelaw 10(2): No person shall enter through any train door until any person leaving by that door has passed through it!

Friday Street (Fridei Strete in 12th Century) was named after the Friday market of fishmongers selling fish in memory of Good Friday

Covering in total 620 sq miles London is the biggest city in Europe and with 4,699 people per sq kilometre has Britain’s highest density

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 28 September 1666, Frenchman Robert Hubert was hanged at Tyburn for confessing to starting the Great Fire of London, unfortunately, he was not in England at that time.

On 28 September 1985 riots in Brixton following the shooting of Cherry Groce by police review led to a ban on CID officers carrying firearms

Sumptuary law prescribed precisely what different echelons of London society were permitted to wear only aristocrats could wear pointy boots

The 6,000-year-old timber piles visible at low tide in front of MI6’s building are remnants of a Mesolithic structure beside the River Effra

Below Greenwich Park at Croom Hill Gate is a Bronze Age cemetery, excavations in the 18th century found glass beads, wool and hair, as well as shields and swords

More than 1 million bees were evacuated from London during World War II, as their hives were disrupted by the shocks of the Blitz

Whitechapel’s Marcus Samuel sold painted seashells, which is why he called his later oil industry concern Shell

The Thames has frozen completely 24 times the last Frost Fair in February 1814 an elephant was led across the river below Blackfriars Bridge

Richmond Golf Club’s 1940 rules: ‘During gunfire or while bombs are falling, players may take cover without penalty for ceasing play . . .

The unique London Underground mosquito was notable for its assault of Londoners sleeping in the Underground during the Blitz

Gentleman’s Magazine was the world’s first magazine, it was printed at St John’s Gate, Clerkenwell, it ran uninterrupted for almost 200 years, until 1922, and was the first to use the term ‘magazine’

London’s oldest shrub is the 200-year-old wisteria at Fuller’s Griffin Brewery in Chiswick, planted in 1816, its twin at Kew Gardens died

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 21 September 1875, Henry Wainwright a shopkeeper of Tredegar Square was charged with the murder of his mistress. Her body was discovered when a youth carrying some parcels for him discovered a hand falling out.

On 21 September 1991 in round 4 of the WBO title fight at White Hart Lane, Michael Watson sustained brain damage from an upper cut delivered by Chris Eubank

In 1736 gravedigger Thomas Jenkins received 100 lashes for selling dead bodies from St Dunstan & All Saints, Stepney High Street

There are still 1,600 operating gas lamps in London examples are found in the charming Goodwin’s Court, Covent Garden

During the Great Fire of London in 1666, charred leaves of burning books were blown as far as Acton, an astonishing 20 miles distant

In 1938 it was found the Woolsack in House of Lords actually contained horsehair rather than wool – it was duly rectified

First crafted in 1951, James Bond’s aftershave was Floris No. 89 – so-named because Floris’s shop is at 89 Jermyn Street, Mayfair

As a bet, Lord Lyttleton slept in the attic of 50 Berkeley Square in 1872, with his shotgun, he apparently fired his gun at several apparitions throughout the night

London has more functioning public baths and indoor pools that date from prior to 1939 than any city in the world – 18 public; and 5 private

The Victoria Line that runs between Brixton and Walthamstow Central, and is coloured light blue on the Tube map, is one of only two lines on the Underground that is completely underground

On Albert Bridge, a sign asks soldiers to break step as synchronised marching caused too much vibration! Wags change the sign to ‘break wind’

Gas street lights widely used in 1850 each with a luminousity of a 25 watt bulb, but by the 1930s only half of London’s streets had electric

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 14 September 1974, Chia Chia and Ching Ching, two giant pandas which had been presented to Prime Minister Edward Heath during his visit to China, arrived in London destined for London Zoo.

On 14 September 1680 Roger Crab, hermit of Bethnal Green, and inspiration for Lewis Carroll’s Mad Hatter, was buried at St Dunstan’s

In the early 1900s police used the ‘Bischoffsheim’ hand ambulance, basically a long handcart, to move awkward prisoners to the station

Westminster Cathedral (the Catholic one on Victoria Street, not the Abbey) contains 12 million bricks – two million more than the Empire State Building

St. Thomas’s, a medieval foundation, had to move to make way for a railway line; its new site was beside the Thames, where the air was now pure

“The dreadful truth is that when people come to see their MP they have run out of better ideas” – Boris Johnson, Mayor of London

The chimes of Big Ben broadcast by the BBC every evening since 1923 are live, transmitted via a microphone hidden behind the famous clock

The Penderel’s Oak PH, High Holborn is named after yeoman farmer, Richard Penderel, who helped King Charles I escape by hiding him in a wood

Before 1914 corner pavilions were common in British clubs. Fulham FC’s ‘The Cottage’ which opened in 1905 is the sole survivor

Victoria Line the world’s first full-scale automatic railway enables a driver to close doors travel to next station at the push of a button

The Swiss Re: or Gerkin Tower’s upper windows can only be cleaned by steeplejacks absailing by ropes from a trapdoor in the roof

A Cockney is defined as being born within the sound of the bells of St Mary-le-Bow Church, Cheapside in The City of London not East London

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 7 September 1931, the Granada Cinema on Tooting Broadway opened, it was the first cinema to be given Grade I listing due to its marble interior, hall of mirrors and sumptuous decor. Fred Astaire once performed there.

On 7 September 1978 Bulgarian writer Georgi Markov was stabbed by poison umbrella on Waterloo Bridge, he dies 4 days later

In 1999 a man tested his right as a Freeman of the City of London to drive two sheep named Clover and Little Man, across London Bridge

79 Pall Mall is the only building in the street not owned by the Crown. Charles II gave Nell Gwynn the freehold after she refused its lease

From the lower office windows of 16 Farringdon Lane can be seen the original medieval medicinal drinking water of ‘Clerks Well’ from which Clerkenwell takes its name

The future Mary II is said to have wept for a day and a half when she was told that she would have to marry William of Orange in 1677

Lambeth Bridge’s statutes symbolise human virtue: for men ironworking building working honour; for women agriculture housework cooking power

The oldest baths building in London which still serves the needs of a functioning swimming pool is the entrance block of Forest Hill Baths

Britain’s earliest supplier of rackets balls in the 19th century Mr Maling of Woolwich learnt his craft as an inmate at King’s Bench Prison

In 1989 a version of the famous FX-4 London taxi went on sale in Japan badged as the ‘Big Ben Novelty Car’, no records exist as to the number of buyers

During World War I a giant postal sorting office was located in Regent’s Park handling 2 billion letters in the world’s largest wooden structure

London has a population density ten times higher than anywhere else in Britain with its residents speaking over 300 languages

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.