London (England) -- History -- 17th century; London (England) -- Social life and customs -- 17th century
We now cross over the Fleet and find ourselves in the classic regions
of Turnmill Street, Cow Cross, and Chick Lane. Here, however, we are
in a suburb which has been occupied and partly built over since the
twelfth century. North of Chick Lane is the new churchyard of St.
Sepulchre’s, re-discovered recently when excavations took place which
revealed stacks of human bones regularly laid and piled. I believe
that these bones were moved from the old churchyard, which seems the
only way to account for their great number, and the regular method
of laying them. They have now been moved to some consecrated ground,
and the place is built over. St. John’s Lane leads to St. John’s
Gate, and Berkeley House and Gardens are on the west side; the great
houses of the Elizabethan period are replaced by mean tenements. On
the south side of St. John’s Street is “Hix’s” Hall. Further south,
again, passing through the Bars, we are in Smithfield. The church of
Little St. Bartholomew was not yet within the Hospital; that of St.
Bartholomew the Great shows the ambulatory and the Lady Chapel, but
not the transepts. Charter House shows the Courts as at present; on
the east side of Charterhouse Yard are the houses and gardens of the
Marquis of Dorchester and Lord Gray. St. Bartholomew’s Close is a large
open space; Cloth Fair and the narrow streets around it are much the
same to-day as then; the whole area is covered with narrow alleys and
courts with narrow openings. Between Aldersgate Street and Little Moor
Fields lies a suburb thickly built over except on the northern portion
south of Chiswell Street, where the houses are more scattered and
there are gardens and, apparently, small fields. The same remarkable
abundance of open courts approached by narrow passages that has been
already mentioned may be observed here. East of Aldersgate, and just
under the wall at the Cripplegate angle, are the gardens of Thanet
House. North of Barbican are those of Bridgewater House. St. Giles’s
Church has taken over a part of the town ditch for an extension of its
churchyard; the wall is encroached upon on both sides by buildings,
but a strip on the south side is still left free from buildings. As
regards the portion of the City included in this street, it will be
noticed farther on. The upper field has trees planted along its sides
and diagonally from point to point shading two intersecting fields;
the lower field has also trees along its sides and two paths across
at right angles, also planted with trees. On these fields the people
turned out by the Fire encamped until they could rebuild their houses;
it is, however, impossible to describe the great number of streets east
and west of the Fields, without feeling sure that the houses afforded
lodgings, better or worse, for the great majority of the homeless. On
the south of Moorfields stood the New Bethlehem Hospital, a long narrow
building on the outside of the wall, a piece of which has been cut down
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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