Every morning I walk past a pub called the Bow Bells which is a great, traditional, quite earthy east end boozer painted bright orange and with the full nursery rhyme written outside stuck to the wall on a green board.

The pub is also just down the road from ‘Bow Church’ which is thought by some to be the location of the ‘Great bell of Bow’. This is the last bell to be mentioned in the nursery rhyme. Unfortunately for Bow Church however the common consensus has it that the real location of the Great Bell of Bow is actually at the St Mary le Bow church on Cheapside in the city which is about 3 miles the other way. Bow church though is old enough to have been around when the rhyme was written and its bells would certinaly have been heard by many.

But then that’s part of the fun of the nursery rhyme. What does it mean and where did those lines come from? The words were written at a time when London was very different and the churches of the city would have been utterly dominant not only in terms of their impact on the skyline but in terms qof their influence on social life as well.

In terms of genealogy it appears that the first recorded version of the rhyme appeared in 1744 but not in the form that it is known now. Prior to that it is likely that it will have been well known and there is evidence that a dance known as oranges and lemons dates back to 1655.

So let’s go through the rhyme, the rest of this blog post will look at the churches, where they are and what the words refer to. There are lots of theories about why the song was written in the first place and a quick search of google will come up with loads of them. My favourite is that the the rhyme simply developed over time as a means to remember the different areas of London which will have been defined by their churches. So onto the rhyme and in homage to the Bow Bells pub, the version I’ll be using is the version written on the outside of the pub.

‘Happy go up, and happy go down
To ring the bells of London Town’.

‘oranges and lemons say the bells of St.Clements’

St. Clements Church on Eastcheap is where we start our journey. There is some debate over whether the true 'oranges and lemons' church was here or St. Clements Dane in the Strand. It would seem however that the majority of opinion places the iconic bells here on Eastcheap. The oranges and lemons of the song refer to the cargo that would have been offloaded close to the church when the Thames was a lot further in than it is today.

‘Bullseyes and targets say the bells of St. Margarets’

In the heart of the city and next door to the bank of England, St Margaret Lothbury sits unobtrusively amongst the buildings around it. The church was burnt down in the great fire but rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren in 1690. It is thought that the bullseyes and targets refer to the fact that archery was practised in fields nearby.

‘Brickbats and tiles say the bells of St. Giles’

Bang in the heart of the Barbican, St. Giles looks striking against the brutalist backdrop of the Barbican high rises. The reference to brickbats and tiles are thought to refer to materials used by builders nearby. As a church its probably also one of the most interesting. Oliver Cromwell was married here. Sir Martin Frobisher, John Speed and John Milton are buried here and Ben Johnson, John Bunyan and Daniel Defoe were baptised here.

‘Halfpence and farthings say the bells of St. Martins’

St. Martins Orgar on Martin Lane was pretty much destroyed in the Great Fire of London leaving only the bell tower which is now occupied by a firm of solicitors. It is thought that the reference to halfpence and farthings is a nod to the money lenders who operated in the area. The line of the rhyme is sometimes better known as 'you owe me five farthings'.

‘Pancakes and fritters say the bells of St. Peters’

St. Peters on Cornhill is hard to spot, hidden as it is amongst a few tiny alleys. From Cornhill itself it doesn't look like much at all so obscured is the frontage. It is thought that the pancakes and fritters in the rhyme refer to the types of food that were sold nearby. Cornhill after all was the site of a corn market that dated back to the Roman era. Like many others the church dates back a long time but was destroyed in the fire of London and then rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren.

‘Two sticks and an apple say the bells of Whitechapel’

The only part of the rhyme that doesn't refer to a church is the bells of Whitechapel. This is because it was the Whitechapel bell foundry in which the bells of London were forged. Amazingly it is still operating today with the likes of the Liberty Bell and Big Ben on its resume. The origin of the 'two sticks and an apple' is hard to agree upon although it could be to do with the shape of the hand bells produced at the foundry which might have resembled toffee apples.

‘Maids in white aprons say the bells of St. Katherines’

St. Katherine Cree dates back to 1108 and takes its name from an abbreviation of Christ church. It actually survived the great fire of London although it destroyed a lot of Leadenhall market which was nearby. The 'maids in white aprons' are thought to refer to the costumes of women working in the market selling meat, fish and poultry.

‘Pokers and tongs say the bells of St. Johns’

St Johns chapel is the oldest church to be featured in the rhyme. It is located within the white tower of the famous Tower of London. It is thought that the pokers and tongs referred to might have something to do with the methods of torture used on prisoners in the tower.

‘Kettles and pans say the bells of St. Annes’

Now knowns St Annes Lutheran Church, it nestles up next to the remains of the old Roman fort and near to the old London Wall. It was destroyed in the great fire but then rebuilt by Wren. It then was hit in the second world war by a bomb and had to be rebuilt once more. The kettles and pans in the rhyme are thought to refer to the utensils from the local coppersmiths who worked in the area.

‘Old father baldpate say slow bells of Aldgate’

St. Botolph without Newgate is on the edge of the city and at one point became known as the prostitutes church because it was here that they would solicit their wares. It is thought that the reference to old father baldpate relates to st botolph who apparantely had a bald head. Another interpretation however links old father baldpate to the prostitutes of the area with old father baldpate meaning something else entirely.

‘You owe me ten shillings say the bells of St. Helens’

St. Helens Bishopsgate can be found directly underneath the imposing landmark of the Gherkin. It is thought that the 'you owe me ten shillings' refers to a former lord mayor of london called John Spencer who had a notorious reputation as a money lender.

‘When will you pay me say the bells of Old Bailey’

The bells of Old Bailey are actually the bells of St. Sepulchre without Newgate which is opposite the Old Bailey, the site of which stands on the former Newgate prison. The bell of St. sepulchre rang out during executions. It is thought that the phrase 'when will you pay me' refers to the debtors interred at Newgate.

‘When I grow rich say the bells of Shoreditch’

St. leonards in Shoreditch was located in the old theatre district of London and frequented by actor types. Shakespeare had his first theatre nearby and Richard Burbage a contemporary of his from the time is buried there. The area itself was very poor and it is thought that the phrase 'when will I grow rich' refers to the hope of riches that the inhabitants of Shoreditch must have had.

‘Pray when will that be say the bells of Stepney’

St. dunstans of Stepney was an important church for mariners and is one of the oldest churches in London. it is possible the the phrase 'when will that be' might refer to the hopeful wishes of loved ones wondering when their sailor sons or husbands would be coming back from sea.

‘I do not know say the great bells of Bow’

Probably not the church referred to in the nursery rhyme but Bow Church is historic and situated just on the old border with Essex.

The more likely option and certinaly the location of the famous Bow Bells which, if born within the sound of them, make you a true Cockney. The great bell of Bow could also refer to the principal curfew bell that was located in the church and rung each day at 9pm

The rhyme has obviously changed throughout the years but still retains its echoes of yesteryear remembering as it does the areas in which the churches stood and what defined them.

Some great links on the internet that helped with the research for this piece are:

www.Rhymes.org

Greenford Magna

I have to confess that this was my first ‘radio play’.  In the US, I think they went out of fashion pretty much as soon as the TV became available.  I’ve heard the stories about Wells War of the Worlds being performed and the audience thinking aliens had actually attacked Earth. But that was 80 years ago. There haven’t been regular radio dramas in the US since the ’60s. In a lot of other countries they are still really popular though (even countries with TVs!), so perhaps I’m missing out. In explaining to people that I was going to listen to a radio play based on Neverwhere, I was met with confusion.  “So, is it filmed or not?” was the reaction–partially because I kept mistakenly saying I was going to watch it rather than listen.  It’s a confusing proposition for a Yankee.

And after watching listening to it, I can’t say I love the format.  It has definite merits.  The voices of the actors become far more meaningful and it is easy to catch small moments and equivocations in a pause or a wavering syllable.  It demands more attention, and I’m always happy to give attention to stories that require it of me.  On the other hand, I did continue to wish I could see what I was witnessing.  With a book, the self-determined pace of reading allows for imagination to flourish and to flesh out the world with your own ideas. With film, the auteur’s version of the story is presented and our imaginations aren’t required.  With a radio play, it was as quick as a film and left little time for my mind to sit and contemplate how the space might look or feel, but also lacked narration or description to fill in gaps.  Occasionally, it was difficult for my imagination to keep up with the changing locales. Because of that, I’m not sure it’s the medium for me.

Nevertheless, I really enjoyed this play.  It was clear that there was a lot of money and skill going into this production.  The cast is spectacular, the writing impeccable and whoever is in charge of background sound and prop sound did a wonderful job of creating the impression that this existed in the real world and not in the vacuum of a sound stage.  I really enjoyed it, and cannot wait to read Neil Gaiman’s novel Neverwhere on which this is obviously based.

Enough rambling about format, what’s the story?

Richard Mayhew is a young Scot who moves to London to start a business job. He’s voiced (in his fabulous natural Scottish accent) by James McAvoy.

He has a good life there, by any standard.  One day, he meets a woman named Door, who is hurt and needs help.  He takes her in and hides her from two villains out to kill her.

These villains are the impeccably vile and heinous Croup and Vandemar, hired henchmen/assassins of a most sadistic and unfeeling nature. In this play, they are voiced by Anthony (Stewart) Head of Buffy the Vampire Slayer fame and David Schofield,an English character actor who has been in approximately 9000 films and shows.

From that moment when Richard protects Door, he is drawn into her world, London Below.  The real geography and landmarks of London are used brilliantly to color and flesh out this underworld.  The characters navigate through underground tunnels and sewers. There is an actual Earl of Earl’s Court (voiced by Sir Christopher Lee),

some friars at Blackfriars, the Shepherd of Shepherd’s Bush, the Angel Islington, Hammersmith, etc. For those who have ever spent time in London, these names are familiar places.  It gives the idea that this world and these people existed long before the city above.

The people who make up London Below are the fringes of society, those that look like homeless people and the destitute to us, but they live in a complex society with magic, beasts, angels, all the things you can imagine when you think about the history of London anyway.  Once Richard crosses into Door’s world, he is invisible or unknown to the other above-world people (including his landlord, his fiance, and his boss). He has no choice but to go along with Door on her quest and to explore the world below.

They meet many characters that inhabit London Below. Some are nefarious, some are kind, some are inscrutable.  Door is trying to get revenge on the persons responsible for the death of her family members, Richard only wants to go back to the above-world.  They are joined by the Marquis de Carabas (voiced by Homeland’s David Harewood) and Hunter, employed as Door’s bodyguard. Together, they go off in search of the Angel Islington believing he may be able to help. It’s a quest story, essentially, and Islington acts as the Wizard of Oz.

A word about the Angel Islington.  He is voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch, and was one of my main reasons for listening to this play.

Obviously, I’m a big fan of his work.  But this is also a great medium for him, because of the tenor of his voice. I have to say, actually, that Christopher Lee’s voice far outstripped Benedict’s in terms of the amount of power and presence that came through, but I can’t think of anyone with a more incredible voice than Christopher Lee.

The Angel Islington is a bit ineffable as a character.  He is an actual angel, an embodiment of an angel that very much goes along with Romantic tradition and their images of Michael or Lucifer. He says he looks after London, is its caregiver. His first city was Atlantis, which obviously didn’t go that well.  So is he on a mission of redemption with this second city?  I don’t want to give anything away, but his character is complex and other-worldly, and I really enjoyed Benedict’s work in this.

Everyone gave wonderful performances and I was shocked at how easily I could pick up on small moments and pivots of emotion just through voice alone.  It denotes serious acting chops, and they must put in a lot of thought about how to convey emotion without the use of the most obvious tools (expressions).

The writing struck an excellent balance between humorous and fantastical. Through all the unbelievable and other-worldly things and people they encounter, Richard acts as a thoroughly average person who is just as clueless as we are in this new place.  It’s very similar to Arthur Dent, guiding us through his adventures in the Hitchhiker’s Guide trilogy.  And any similarity to Douglas Adams is a huge plus in my book.

I can’t help but wish this was a full movie or TV series.  I wanted them to show more, to take more time with the story occasionally. I wanted to learn more about London Below.  But I think the reason they were able to get such incredible talent to act and write and produce this is because it was a short and cheap endeavor, as radio plays must be when compared to film or TV.  There was in fact, a BBC series, Neverwhere, and I’m ashamed to say I didn’t make it very far into the show.  I love the BBC, but their special effects budget is apparently quite paltry, and the production values for the show were just too terrible to be ignored. But I’m glad the show existed because it actually came before the novel. It prompted Neil Gaiman to novelize the story.  And there is a pretty rabid fan base around this story that are very grateful he did.  I imagine one day soon, I will join them, since I fully intend to read the novel.

For those of you who wish to listen, the entire 6-part play is available (free) on iTunes (under podcasts). It may be under BBC Drama of the Week.  I highly recommend it if you like London, or fantasy stories, or anything Neil Gaiman.

The 20 tonne gilded statue of Justice by F.W. Pomeroy.

On a bitterly cold March evening, a group of London Historians had the opportunity to look around the Old Bailey – London’s most famous and historic criminal court.

There’s been a court on the site since the 1500s and much of the pomp and gravitas attached to this venerable institution survives. Dressed in an elaborate lace bib over a specially tailored suit, a black rosette hanging down from the collar at the back (a wig guard, for catching the powder from the syrup someone in his position would traditionally have worn) our guide and host had a title as elaborate as his garb.

Charles Henty, Secondary of London and Under Sheriff, High Bailiff of Southwark, is an ex-military man who’s been running the Bailey for the last eight years. Disarmingly, when asked how long it took him to master the job, he replied that he is still learning.

And it is quite a job. The Bailey contains 18 courts and what the Secondary’s talk made clear above all else is that it’s a business. Each court costs around £80-100 per minute to operate and keeping courts running, with defendants, counsel, judges, press, relatives and public all in the right place at the right time, is a mighty exercise in logistics and security.

The Bailey – so known for the street on which it sits, is in its current incarnation an architectural mix, with the old building opened by Edward V11 in 1907 and the ‘new’ extension built in the 1970s. Its courtrooms and steps are familiar to all of us through television dramas and news programmes; trials ranging from the Kray twins to that of Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe, and the quashing of the convictions of the Guilford Four, have occurred here.

In the sombre grandeur of court number one with its scarred wooden desks, curtained witness box, wide dock and under a dome through which pours what looks like natural light but is in fact electric light, Secondary, as he is addressed, gave a witty and passionate talk about an institution which lies at the heart of British justice. He expressed his concern over the ever-younger ages of defendants. Eleven and twelve year old children have in recent years appeared in this dock charged with murder, and rape.

Outside the main courts, briefs congregate in a magnificent marbled hall, its domed ceilings decorated with painted allegories of justice by the artist Gerald Moira. (Moira slipped in his own face in to a couple of these, showing himself as a artist in one and, in his painting of the Blitz, a tea-drinking crone.)

High on a wall in the new building, an embedded shard of glass has been allowed to remain; it’s a tiny and telling reminder of the IRA bomb that partially destroyed the building in 1973.

Down two or three storeys, in the bowels of the building, carpet gives way to quarry tiles. Here the walls are not Carrera marble but the most utilitarian painted brick. Here, in small cells, prisoners are held on their way in to and out of court.

And beyond this holding area, outside the building, in the most sombre and spine-chilling aspect of the visit, Secondary walked us by torchlight down Dead Man’s Walk – a series of brick doorways of ever decreasing size through which condemned prisoners once made their lonely way to the gallows.

The Old Bailey seems to indicate in its architecture the range of social positions, from the most exalted to the lowliest. One can’t help wondering how many of the defendants down the ages – if they’d had the advantages of those who run the system – would never have been ended up in the dock.

_____________________________________________________

Wendy Wallace is an author and journalist, whose first novel – The Painted Bridge – was published in 2012.

_____________________________________________________

Our visit was also covered by London Historians member, the writer Vic Keegan here.

Here’s a video clip showing interiors of the Old Bailey and featuring Charles Henty, Esq - Secondary of London and Under Sheriff, High Bailiff of Southwark.

Moments after taking this photo I discovered that the gray and ochre pens I was so excited about aren’t water proof, but I can’t complain as it led to some happy accidents and interesting effects. Why doesn’t Micron make gray or ochre pens? Someone out there should…

Anyhow, my favorite purchase was a Derwent Inktense pencil in neutral grey. It’s like a watercolor pencil, but ink, so once it’s dry you can work over it with other media. I loved the textural sooty effect and ended up straying from my portfolio work to create this little sketch based on the Old Bailey character from Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere. Which I’m currently reading and which I love.

Old Bailey was not, intrinsically, one of those people put in the world to tell jokes. Despite this handicap, he persisted in trying.

Okay, that requires a bit more context…

…which Gaiman’s wonderful text can give far more humourously than I ever could. Witness:

‘Dear Diary…On Friday I had a job, a fiancee, and home, and a life than made sense. (Well, as much as any life makes sense.) Then I found an injured girl bleeding on the pavement, and I tried to be a Good Samaritan. Now I’ve got no fiancee, no home, no job, and I’m walking around a couple of hundred feet under the streets of London with the projected life expectancy of a suicidal mayfly…

…There are hundreds of people in this other London. Thousands, maybe. People who come from here, or people who have fallen through the cracks. I’m wandering around with a girl called Door, her bodyguard, and her psychotic grand vizier. We slept last night in a small tunnel that Door said was once a section of Regency sewer. The bodyguard was awake when I went to sleep, and awake when they woke me up. I don’t think she ever sleeps. We had some fruit cake for breakfast; the Marquis had a large lump of it in his pocket. Why would anyone have a large lump of fruit cake in his pocket? My shoes dried out mostly while I slept.

I want to go home.’

Neil Gaiman, Neverwhere, Author’s Preferred Text, Review, 2005, pp135-6

Right, that’s enough to be getting along with for now. (Yes, I know it’s the introductory quote on the Tv Tropes page as well, but it does a very good job of establishing things, even if it does leave out the psychotic assassins, the old man who lives on a roof with his pigeons, the earl holding a court on a train carriage and the angel in Islington. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.)

Neverwhere began life as a tv script that Gaiman wrote for the BBC back in 1995. Then, as the series was produced and Gaiman watched as scenes had to be cut, things had to be left out and the whole thing fell a bit short of what had been in his head, he made the decision to write the story again…and this time, as a book.

Which he did. And lo, it was bloody brilliant. Not that the tv series wasn’t good; I still really enjoy it. The actors - in particular Paterson Joseph as the Marquis de Carabas and Hywel Bennett and Clive Russell as Mr Croup and Mr Vandemar - turn in stellar performances. Really, the only character that I felt didn’t fit their role was…

…wait a second. Peter Capaldi as the Angel Islington?!?!?

How did I not realise that until now?!?!?!?!?!

…um, yeah, and that wasn’t any fault of Capaldi’s, he’s a great actor and I am highly anticipating his portrayal of Cardinal Richelieu in the BBC version of The Three Musketeers next year – it’s just that, talented though he is, he never sold me on his being an immortal, gracious and beautiful angel.

I know, I know, I’m very shallow.

The show’s fairly funny, intriguingly designed, some of it’s actually filmed in disused Tube stations…but I can see why Gaiman thought it couldn’t capture the story that he really wanted to tell, because it couldn’t. It did it’s best, but it’s not the book.

The graphic novel adaptation of Neverwhere by Vertigo comics was…interesting. There were certain stylistic choices that rather threw me for a loop and left me going , ‘Wait, what???’ It wasn’t a bad run, but it wasn’t anything spectacular either.

Then, some time last year, I heard that the BBC was making a radio drama, possibly from Neil’s own blog. I thought something along the lines of ‘Huh, a radio drama, that should be interesting, I wonder who’s going to be in itwoooAAH that’s a lotta big name actors. James McAvoy as Richard? Natalie Dormer as Door? Bernard Cribbins as Old Bailey? Benedict Cumberbatch??? Christopher Lee????????????

Oh, I’m there.’

So, after many months of waiting until the programme debuted on BBC Radio 4, March 16th, and much elaboration on this post up until now: does Neverwhere make a good radio play?

It’s only the first episode as of yet, but…yes, I have to say I think it does.

This is no mean feat. Even though Neverwhere is a very action filled book, a lot of the story and the humour comes either from the thoughts and backstories of characters, or from narration, which can’t easily be translated into dialogue or sound effects. For example, there’s a bit early on in the book which goes on a short ramble about how very unkeen on heights Richard is, which is amusing and informative and which just wouldn’t work in a radio drama, so it’s summed up as Richard, when asked if he’d not very good with heights, gasping in reply ‘Is Jupiter bigger than a duck?’

In short, the story works well in radio. Things are described naturally with enough detail that you can get a fair idea of them, but not in an overblown manner that could be awkward. Characters state their experiences or thoughts fairly fluently without sounding hackneyed, whether it’s recalling what exactly ‘widdershins’ means or stating the memory they were forced to experience of someone else’s death. The plot moves quickly through different locations, switching between characters at a rapid pace, but not so fast that you never lose track of what’s happening.

Then there are the ‘magical’ aspects. Sound and dialogue are used superbly wihen dealing with the supernatural elements in the story, particularly Richard crossing ‘Night’s Bridge’ with two companions – a journey that was a silent, agonizing mental experience in Richard’s head in the book and tv series - and the terror they feel as they realise that there’s something in the dark with them. One particular touch I really liked was the translation into radio medium of Door’s ability to open anything – while in the series and book this was a silent ability where she would touch a lock (or other things) and they would open, here she recites a phrase in Latin to signal an opening. Rather like the BBC adaptation of The Lord of the Rings back in 1981, which signalled someone putting on or removing the Ring by a noise that, frankly, always reminds me of a tuning fork being rapped against something.

Which is probably what it was, but still…

Making all this even better are the voices behind the characters. Natalie Dormer admittedly sounded a little old to play Door at first, but she managed the switches between good humour and grief very well. James McAvoy plays Richard wonderfully; David Harewood gives Paterson Joseph a run for his money as the perfect Marquis de Carabas; Anthony Head and David Schofield are extremely unnerving as Croup and Vandemar; Sophie Okonedo makes for a magnificent Hunter; Bernard Cribbins, in the short amount of time he got this episode, is a great Old Bailey. And what a surprise to find the story’s creator, Neil Gaiman, voicing two cameo roles! (One of which happens to be a bodyguard for hire called The Fop (With No Name), who gets to say such things as ‘Have at thee, nappy wearing imbecile!’ You just can’t make stuff like that up.)

All this, and I still had Christopher Lee and Benedict Cumberbatch to look forward to, along with plenty of twists, turns and dripping sewers in the gorgeously dark and twisted London Below. What more could you ask for?

Neverwhere aired on BBC Radio 4 on March 16 with a one hour pilot episode, and the story continues on BBC Radio 4 extra from March 18 to March 22 in five half hour episodes. It was written by Neil Gaiman and Dirk Maggs, directed by Dirk Maggs and Heather Larmour, and produced by Heather Larmour.

Learn more about Neverwhere, the book, here:
http://www.neilgaiman.com/works/Books/Neverwhere/

Learn more about Neverwhere, the tv series, here:
http://www.loony-archivist.com/neverwhere/frames.html
, hereh ttp://h2g2.com/dna/h2g2/alabaster/A471313 and here
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115288/

Learn more about the story of Neverwhere and evolution of the radio production, and listen to the episodes, here: 
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01r522y
 

Had my second day at the South London Press. We just moved offices so the place was a bit hectic to say the least! Although the phones weren’t wired up yet, so everybody remarked how peaceful and quiet it was. I am so proud to say that I got my second article published – avec byline! Pg 2 lead, and it was a story that I found myself. So I’m doubly proud to have found it, written it, and, well, bask in its black and white glory. I had one article published from diary, but it had no byline and 2 typos. In retrospect I’m glad it didn’t have my name on it! I’m working like a person possessed trying to hunt down news stories and get those juicy splashes.

I’ve submitted about a million FOI (Freedom of Information) requests, so fingers crossed I’m going to get some gossip back off that. I’ve resigned myself to the fact that for the rest of my working life I may be submitting a few a week, seeing what comes back. It’s a bit like casting a net I would imagine, but then again, I’ve never been fishing.

Sadly, I’ve had zero opportunities to hand out my business cards. Cue the sad face. Haven’t been able to hand them to people other than my family, friends, or people who are just propping up the rickety table leg. There is, however, a free pizza tasting event, which I’m going along to schmooze and network. It has nothing to do with the free pizza, honest. I’m secretly hoping that as I get more experienced I’ll be invited to pizza tasting, wine functions and steadily moving up to red carpet events.

We visited the courts on Thursday, namely the Old Bailey. This turned out to be quite a day. First off, myself and a few of my colleagues had been out the night before, networking you see, and had ended up at mine a little worse for wear in the morning. We had been briefed that we weren’t allowed phones, so we duly left them behind.

This proved to be the first mistake of the day, second if you count getting out of bed. Anyway, we trundle off and ask the clerk where they might be, in which courtroom. We’re told that it’s all full, so we couldn’t go in and we would have to wait. I don’t know if you’ve ever waited outside the public dock for the Old Bailey, but it’s basically down an alleyway. As none of us had our phones, we couldn’t even ring anybody to see where they were. Coincidentally, that also meant none of knew the time, and we genuinely played ‘guess the time’ during our 2 HOUR WAIT OUTISDE. We’d all guess a time, then someone would shuffle over and ask somebody, whoever was closest won respect, or something.

So as I said, we’ve been waiting for. a. long. time. The sign says it closed at 1pm for lunch, so we thought they must come out then! The clerk came down to shut the door for lunch, and we were like ‘but where’s everyone?!’ ‘there’s no one up there’ was the reply. We were puzzled, angry and still drunk. Our crafty plan to lie in wait for them had backfired terribly. After speaking to people in the main bit we realised there was another exit. So we had been standing out there for nothing, for ages.

Our new plan was to go to the next court, hoping to meet them there. As it turned out, during our phone-less wander down Fleet Street we bumped into some of our group. Which was entirely what were hoping, because our plans were sketchy at worst, and non-existent at best if we didn’t find them. Turns out we got more tours of the local pubs than actual courts. God bless our teacher. Spent a total of 25 minutes, asleep, in a courtroom. definitely not a waste of a day.

Shorthand is progessingly nicely. I’m attempting the 80wpm (shock!) now, so even though there’s more mistake than words and the paper is drenched with my tears, I’m giving it the best shot. Getting -11 on 70wpm, so I definitely don’t have massive hopes for the 80.

I’m due to have an ‘appraisal’ this week! Fingers, toes, arms, legs, eyes and anything else that I can cross is being crossed. Ow.

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I am told that 30 pairs entered the competition, and it makes me so glad to say my partner (Harry) and I consistently scored the highest in every round, and after Mooting against very worthy competitors, we managed to get to the finals which were being held in the Supreme Court in London-not forgetting to mention it is the highest court in the land!

Needless to say, the competition was tough in the finals- Will and Shelly’s performance was commendable, they made some very good arguments! The experience itself was such a privilege..not only getting the opportunity to moot in the Supreme Court in the first place, but to win the whole competition – is nothing short of being one of the highlights of my legal experience.

In fact I ought to express my gratitude to my awesome partner Harry, the Law Society, Vicky, and Tom and Farrah for not only being such an encouragement but also great Master and Mistress of the Moots! Not forgetting of course, the infamous Dr. Nicola Jackson for all her input and help, thank you!

The whole day was legally awesome (LAWESOME lol); we got to sit in on a very interesting murder trial at the Old Bailey in the morning, followed by watching a Ministry of Defence case in the Supreme Court where the likes of Lord Hope, Baroness Hale, and Lord Wilson were on the bench. I think only law students can truly appreciate what a privilege it is not only to sit in the same room as these legends, but to get to sit in Baroness Hale’s seat in the Supreme Court minutes after she got up out of it! (Okay that does sound a little weird lol) But seriously..we write about what these Supreme Court Judges have ruled and their thought processes behind the decisions in almost every assignment on the Law degree!

Here’s a link to the article about our experience by De Montfort University Press:

http://www.dmu.ac.uk/about-dmu/news/2013/february/dmu-students-moot-at-the-highest-court-in-the-land.aspx

All in all, it was a day I will remember for a very long time.

Well, until I sit in Baroness Hale’s seat for real one day, anyway.

May it please your Lordships, I hereby end my submissions on behalf of Miss Hunjan: soon to become Baroness Hunjan.

Mr Bradshaw, if he had been so-minded, could have named his tour through District IV as ‘Crime and Retribution’ – I leave you with that thought…

Mr Bradshaw and I set off from St Paul’s Cathedral again, ‘..through the great bookselling district..’, (other sources say it was a ‘book publishing‘ area – no doubt both activities took place). Apparently Britain became a net exporter of books in the 18th century, and the secret was ‘serial‘ publishing – an idea successfully exploited by Hyperion in our own times.  

Stationers Hall

Peering through a window at Stationers’ Hall

I headed for Stationers’ Hall in Ave Maria Lane, the building which has belonged to the Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers since 1670. Here all books were registered to ensure copyright.

We are in an area now known as the Ludgate Hill Conservation Area. Ave Maria Lane is the southern section of Warwick Lane, between Amen Corner and Ludgate Hill. What odd names, I thought, and then Wikipedia told me that ‘..On the feastday of Corpus Christi, monks would say prayers in a procession to St. Paul’s Cathedral. They set off from Paternoster Row chanting the Lord’s Prayer (Pater noster being the opening words of the prayer in Latin). They would reach the final ‘Amen’ as they turned the corner into Ave Maria Lane, after which they would chant Hail Mary (Ave Maria in Latin)..’! 

And Amen Court? The canons from St Paul’s Cathedral lived here.

Houses in Amen Court

A second gateway into Amen Court

Thomas Heatherwick brought us back to the present at Amen Corner:

Vents, by Thomas Heatherwick

Ave Maria Lane now continues as Warwick Lane, named after the Earls of Warwick, and this very charming plaque at the top of the Lane marks their association with the area.

The Earl of Warwick

The Royal College of Physicians, built by Robert Hooke in 1675, was in Warwick Lane but the physicians relocated to the more fashionable West end in 1799. The building was used as a butchery in Mr Bradshaw’s time and a foundry thereafter and was finally demolished in 1866. The site is now home to the Worshipful Company of Cutlers, with a wonderful freize on the facade of the building.

Royal College of Physicians, Warwick Lane

The Worshipful Company of Cutlers

The Creswick Freize on the Cutlers’ Hall facade

Newgate Market was the main meat market, as well as a slaughter house, for London and clearly very crowded and unpleasant – Mr Bradshaw was definitely in favour of the proposed move to Smithfield Market. ‘..Through the filthy lanes and alleys no one could pass without being either butted with the dripping end of a quarter of beef, or smeared by the greasy carcase of a newly-slain sheep. In many of the narrow lanes there was hardly room for two persons to pass abreast..’. None of this atmosphere now remains.

Newgate Market, Christmas 1845, from the Illustrated London News

Christ’s Hospital, the Blue Coat School, was situated almost opposite the Market. The School was founded by Edward VI to take children off the streets of London and opened in 1552, on the site of the Grey Friars Monastery. The school has been funded by various endowments, including King Charles II (to qualify boys for service in the Royal Navy) and Mr Samuel Travers who both supported maths education. The school moved to Horsham in 1908 and today more than 88% of its students receive means tested bursaries. The two institutions are marked by plaques, side by side, on Newgate Street.

Mr Bradshaw reports that four boys were sent to Oxford and Cambridge each year and, an example of sponsorship, there were two scholarships of £80, founded by the Pitt Club and the proprietors of The Times. 

Christ’s Hospital, 1770

Christ’s Hospital, early 19th century, with two scholars (headed for Cambridge & Oxford) giving orations in Greek and English

Christ’s Hospital, 1896

The Grey Friars was a Franciscan Monastery that existed from 1225 to 1538. It included a church, a university, and a library, and equalled Oxford in importance and status at the time. The monastery was dissolved by Henry VIII, the church was eventually destroyed in the Fire and rebuilt by Wren (but destroyed in WWII), and Christ’s Hospital School was created in the old monastery buildings.

Grey Friars site in early 16th century

Christchurch Greyfriars

Mr Bradshaw describes the improvements made to Newgate Prison in recent years: ‘..clean, well-whitewashed, and well-ventilated wards, its airy courts, its infirmary, its humane regulations, and its strict but intelligent officers..’. Nevertheless, executions still took place outside the prison and were public spectacles and which Charles Dickens described as ‘..a sickening idea of London..’ in Great Expectations 1861. Who to believe?

Newgate Prison

Newgate Prison, 1858, with the new single cell system

The Central Criminal Court was down the road from the Prison. It was situated on the street called Old Bailey, which was on the line of the old City walls, and was rebuilt several times between 1673 and 1907. Today is it is known to us as ‘The Old Bailey’, and the current building covers the site of both the old Newgate Prison and the previous Court. 

The Old Bailey

The Old Bailey

A church has been on the site of St Sepulchre’s Church, Snow Hill, since at least 1137, although rebuilt more than once. Because of the proximity to Newgate Prison and the Central Criminal Court there are close associations: the bells would toll as prisoners were taken for execution at Tyburn; and the Bell Man would go by underground passage to Newgate Prison and ring twelve tolls of the hand bell to the condemned prisoner on the eve of the execution. The current church, rebuilt by Wren in 1670-71, is the largest church in the City and nowadays associated with music, being the National Musicians Church.

St Sepulchre Church, 17th century

St Sepulchre’s Church

And in the surrounding railings of the church I found:

Newgate Prison and the Black Dog which is heard in Amen Court

One of the Drinking Fountains mentioned by Mr Bradshaw

And just beyond the church, in Giltspur Street, I notice this watch house, an early form of police station. The bust is of Charles Lamb, a student at Christ’s Hospital.

watch house, built 1791, destroyed 1941, rebuilt 1962

And a little further along the street is the Golden Boy of Pye Corner, marking the point at which the Fire was stopped.

The day so far had been rather depressing, and was certainly freezing cold; I needed some cheering up and took myself to Postman’s Park to check on the flowers.

Camellias in Postmen’s Park

St Bartholomew’s Hospital was founded, together with the Priory of St Bartholomew, by Rahere, a minstrel or jester, in 1123. Surely he must have been a remarkable man? In the early days the nuns and monks in the Priory cared for the sick, but by 1420 the two institutions had separated. It is now the oldest hospital in England which still occupies the site on which it was built. Mr Bradshaw tells us that the ill were received at all hours of the day and night, ‘..without charge or ceremony..’, and that the hospital was held in the highest regard. Mr Bradshaw also refers to a belief that ‘..a subterranean passage led from the  crypts below the hospital to the house of the priors situated at Canonbury..’. In 1253 land was given to the Canons of St Barthomew’s Priory, Canonbury, and this continued as open land until it was developed into residential developments (now a suburb of Islington) in the early 19th century.

St Bartholomew’s courtyard, early 1800s

St Bartholomew’s Hospital, early 1900s?

St Bartholomew’s Hospital, main entrance, Henry VIII Gate 1702

Part of Hogarth’s mural on the great staircase in the Museum at St Barts

St Bartholomew the Less is the only one of five chapels associated with the hospital to survive the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII

St Bartholomew the Less

St Batholomew the Less, the interior

St John’s Gate is all that remains of the Priory of St John of Jerusalem, or the Knights of St John, or Knights Hospitaller. ‘..The Order’s full title is The Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem. The Priory once occupied a 10-acre site, but it is very difficult to gain a sense of the site today. Its principal charitable foundations today are the St John Eye Hospital in Jerusalem, and St John Ambulance..’. (Good article and pictures here.)

St John Jerusalem, the original priory church

St John’s Priory, the Gate, 18th century

St John’s Gate

The Priory Church of St John of Jerusalem, destroyed in 1941

The robin following me around the garden

The first daffodils I have seen

Painted and carved 16th century panel from the old Priory

St John’s Square and the rebuilt entry to the Priory Church

Mr Bradshaw mentioned Aylesbury Street to the north which was named after the Earls of Aylesbury and it is suggested that Aylesbury House was situated in the grounds of St John’s Priory. As he did not suggest a deviation, and it was bitterly cold, I decided to curtail my walking for the day.

On 14 May 1838, eighteen-year-old George Williams was indicted and convicted at the Old Bailey in London of stealing one handkerchief to the value of two shillings. Sentence: transported for ten years.

Exactly 23,957 days later, on 17 December 1903, a few miles south of Kitty Hawk in North Carolina, Orville Wright piloted the Wright Flyer on the world’s first sustained powered flight. The aircraft travelled 37m at 11 km/h and at an altitude of 3m. Orville’s brother Wilbur ran alongside.

And 23,957 days after that, on 20 July 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin threaded the Apollo 11 lunar module Eagle through a boulder field to a safe landing on the Sea of Tranquility.

Sixty-five years and seven months elapsed between the Flyer lifting off from its starting rail and Eagle’s landing pads settling into the grey lunar regolith whipped up by the exhaust of the descent engine. This time between first takeoff and first landing was a period of rapid and significant technological growth, in no small part due to wars. I wonder whether history will ultimately christen it the Flyer/Eagle Delta or some such name.

These arbitrary time periods fascinate me: that we can make such a giant leap, so to speak, easily within the span of one life. That someone, many people, almost certainly watched Armstrong step onto the lunar surface while thinking back to when they first heard about the Wright brothers, or first saw a boxy wooden craft steer hesitantly above them.

It’s illuminating to place the Flyer/Eagle Delta onto other time periods and see how humanity fared: hence the opening to this post. Poor George Williams, nicking a grubby handkerchief and being sent to Australia for his trouble, exactly one delta before the first flight. I wonder, did he live to hear of the Wright Flyer at Kitty Hawk? He’d have been 83 or thereabouts, perhaps returned from Australia. He’d have lived through the rise of the railways, the telegraph and telephone, the US Civil War and Abraham Lincoln, Gladstone and Disraeli, Dickens and Brunel and Darwin, and Queen Victoria’s reign.

The next natural place for the delta: ending today, 7 February 2013. That makes its starting point 7 July 1947. Has humanity made such great progress since that time? In computing, certainly, from huge, clunking code-breakers to smartphones and the internet. In the time since World War II we have become global broadcasters, trackable and instantly contactable almost anywhere on the planet. We’ve increased pollution and population, too, and our ability to destroy ourselves by slow and fast means: but we’ve also made great strides in medicine. We’ve wiped out smallpox and almost wiped out polio. Do the changes feel as momentous as those between 1838 and 1903, or between 1903 and 1969? Not to me. But perhaps a delta feels different from within: we are frogs boiling slowly in the pan, and don’t notice the change.

And now let’s consider the delta that started when Armstrong stepped onto the moon’s surface. When does that end? Add 23,957 days and you reach 21 February 2035: twenty-two years from now. We’re 1947 to Apollo’s 1969, a few months before the first flight to break the sound barrier. We’re 1881 to the Wright brothers’ 1903, just weeks after the gunfight at the OK Corral.

To be precise, we’re 15,908 days into a delta: just under two-thirds of the way. And Thursday 11 April 2013 marks exactly two-thirds of the delta between Apollo 11 and… what? I can’t wait to find out.

Óglaigh Marian and Dolores Price, Republican prisoners in Armagh jail in the 1970s.
– [The photograph was taken with a camera smuggled into the prison and is part of a series of images given to Belfast Exposed]

POSTED ON BEHALF OF :  Irish Republican History & Remembrance.

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POSTED ON BEHALF OF :  Derry Sceal

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