JOST A MON

It's been a while since I hooked up with my old pals from TTPCom and Tuesday night seemed as good a time as any to see them. Nick needed to come in via Waterloo, Mark from Canary Wharf, and Mike from Waterbeach, so everyone agreed to meet at Moorgate. And what better place than that old historic watering-hole named Old Doctor Butler's Head?

Since the English banned smoking in public areas, including inns, taverns, and restaurants this summer, it has been a particularly pleasurable experience to socialise in a pub. No longer do I have to stagger home weighed down not only by litres of alcohol but also by lingering fumes of nicotinous smoke, a fug enveloping my hair and suffused through my clothes. One is still repelled by the insolence of City types in their favourite bars, but at least they don't breathe chemicals into one's face. So I waited with equanimity for Nick (lost, again, en route), smiling beatifically at the publican every time he wanted to know what draught he could serve me with.

The pub certainly was atmospheric. Check out a picture of it here. Old wood beams abounded, people milled about in a crush next to the bartender, the conversation was overlaid with the whispers of ghosts. Old Butler, William, an untrained hack became so popular in the seventeenth century with his patent medicines that he was made physician to the king, James I. In particular, his ales in aid of gastric ailments were wildly in demand, and he acquired a chain of pubs by permitting only those displaying an image of his head to purvey the tipple. He was known for other eccentric cures: firing pistols near an unsuspecting epileptic to scare the illness out of him, or dropping plague victims into cold water to cure them of the black death.

The current building is the only one surviving of Butler's empire. Originally it was built in 1610 and gutted in the Great Fire of 1666. It has suffered multiple renovations and restorations, and the frontage today is possibly a mock-Tudor built in Victorian times.

A beer everybody seemed to be drinking was the Spitfire. Indeed, the pub abounds with allusions to the mighty little fighter of the Second World War, and the eponymous ale. There are even reproductions of a funny, controversial (and banned) advertising campaign called Bottle of Britain all along the corridor to the gents' toilet.

Gary Pitts arranged a pub crawl for us last night. This was not just an excuse to get drunk on company money, I must hasten to add. Indeed, the social and sports club organises regular historic tours. The nosh and tipple are just an added benefit.

Gary is a Guide with the City of London. He took the twelve month-long course a dozen years ago - complete with classes in the Guildhall, practical and theoretical exams. He is a full-time employee where I work but likes to run the occasional tour on the side. A sort of paying hobby, don't you know. When he announced yesterday's tour, and my colleagues at work professed an interest in it, I decided to join them. He said he would take us to five pubs, four of which have an interesting history, and one which does not; three of which are south of the Thames, and two that are north.

A bus took us from Bishopsgate to the Angel pub in Rotherhithe. On the way, on Tooley street, Gary pointed out where Michael Caine was born and raised. It is not the most salubrious area, but then not much of the East of London has been overly posh. We tried to ignore the usual tourist traps, London Dungeon among them, as we crept past in the evening traffic.
Just outside the Angel pub are the remains of a hunting lodge of Edward III. Not much remains of it, except a low stone wall half-buried in a grassy mound. There have been pubs at the location of the Angel for centuries, but the most recent one is only about a hundred-odd years old. The place used to seethe with smugglers and low-life of every description. These days it is getting gentrified - as is much of the East End. Samuel Pepys frequented this pub, as did Turner, who painted his wonderful Fighting Temeraire after watching the valiant little ship being towed up the Thames past here before being broken up. The superb views of the river, especially towards Tower Bridge, attracted the likes of Whistler. Captain Cook is said to have set sail from here on his trips of discovery, and Captain Jones of the Mayflower recruited his crew from here before setting out with the Pilgrim Fathers to the New World.

It is an old pub, originally run by monks from the nearby Bermondsey monastery. In mediaeval times, the good brothers seem to have had a monopoly on brewing. This part of the city came to be known as Smelly London, after the pong emanating from the breweries, tanneries, glue factories and docks that were established here over the centuries. The City Fathers preferred to keep the stinky professions outside of where they made their money from business. Thankfully, not much of the stench remains today, what with the riverside buildings having been converted to posh residences.

We partook of a brief buffet dinner here before we walked, maybe a couple of hundred yards, to the next pub on our list. The Americans in our group were quite agog, having been given advance notice of it. The Mayflower is right by where the Pilgrim Fathers began their escape from England and its persecution, and founded the colonies in the Eastern US Seaboard, whence stemmed the hard-working ethic and associated guilt of taking holidays that informs US life today. There are nautical items dotting the interiors, and a brick fireplace, and fairly comfortable seating. There are quotations from various people painted in gold on the walls and wooden pillars. One particularly apropos one is about the seats being like a barber's chair that fits all buttocks (Shakespeare).

It was not always called the Mayflower, of course. When the Puritans began their great emigration, it was called The Shippe. It changed its name in the 1950s, after a restoration, in a fit of enthusiasm for attracting American tourists in search of their roots. Those with a mania for trivia would probably know that it is famous too for being licensed to purvey US postage stamps, although what one would do with said stamps once one procured them is anybody's guess. In 2003, the Post Office issued a stamp in honour of the ship (and by association, of the pub).

The lovely church of St. Mary Rotherhithe stands near the pub. It has been built on slightly elevated ground, with walls around it. As the area is part of the Thames' flood-plain, the walls need to be high enough to prevent damage to the building from the frequent floods.

We piled back into the bus and headed towards Greenwich, passing Deptford. This is the westernmost part of Kent, and derives its name from Deep Ford, a dip in the old Roman Watling Street that ran to Dover from London. A more depressing dump is hard to find, I dare say. Filled with council tower blocks and dirty streets, seedy shops and violent gangs, it is rarely on a tourist itinerary. An intrepid soul might like to take a look at St. Nicholas' church, where Kit Marlowe is buried. I felt no immediate hurry to join him in that graveyard, and it was with a sense of renewed appreciation for the beauty of London that we arrived in Maritime Greenwich.

We entered the lovely Georgian Trafalgar Tavern. There is a little statue of Admiral Nelson outside the entrance, and Gary regaled us with a story. After Nelson's death at the Battle of Trafalgar, his men didn't want to bury him at sea, so they pickled him in a vat of brandy to preserve his body during the voyage home. Being sailors who appreciated their grog, the presence of his corpse in their drink didn't bother them overmuch, and they drank up all the brandy in the vat. So they had to transfer him to another vat. By the time that vat was emptied, the fleet arrived in England, and Nelson could still be recognised, well-preserved as he was, by his blond hair. Dickens and Thackeray frequented this tavern. In 1878, James Tissot produced this beautiful image of the Terrace of the tavern. The pub became famous for its Whitebait Dinners, originally organised by the likes of Gladstone and Pitt, which continues to this day in the Nelson Room, where the Saints and Sinners Club of London (an educational organization dedicated to true crime investigation methods and results) congregates to enjoy the small Thames fish in its traditional sauce (or for the adventurous, Cajun style).

[The wife, her sis, her bro-in-law and I have been to this pub before. At time the place was filled with cigarette smoke, but driven by hunger, we had to bear it. After this year's smoking ban in England, it is a fresh pleasure to be able to visit the lovely old watering holes.]

By now, I had consumed a couple of beers, a Bacardi Breezer (Oliver, an intern, assured me that this tipple is mainly consumed by teenage mothers) and a lemonade, while my colleagues had downed several pints and were increasingly raucous. Simone announced that this sort of behaviour would be considered alcoholism in Germany, but the Dutch and the Australians in the group were ready for much, much more. Party-time, they roared, and protested when Gary urged us to hurry up to get to the next two pubs on our itinerary.

We drove back north across the river via the long Blackwall tunnel to Canary Wharf. En route, Gary pointed out the monstrous Millennium Dome and the New Billingsgate Market. A couple of decades ago, when land around here was toxic and cheap, the old fish-market had been moved from its original location in the City. It was used as a beacon to attract investment and construction in the Docklands. Now that the area is upscale and rich and self-sustaining, there's talk of moving Billingsgate farther out. And yet another bit of London's history will fall by the wayside.

We arrived at the wonderfully named Prospect of Whitby at around half past nine in the district of London known as Wapping. An old Saxon settlement (literally the place of Wæppa's people), by the 16th century, this was a warren of filthy streets and inhabited by sailors and smugglers. These days, Liam lives there, and it's not the same anymore (and I mean that in a good way, heheh). The famous Execution Docks are in the vicinity, known for the hanging of maritime convicts in the river till the rising waters rose over their heads thrice. I expect the first immersion would have proven fatal, but the English are thorough in what they do. Hanging Judge Jeffreys plied his trade here, and indeed would repair to our tavern after his latest fit of meting out punishment, where he liked to watch the convicts being hauled up on the gallows behind the pub.
The Prospect of Whitby is named after a boat that was moored nearby (the boat was constructed in Yorkshire, hence the name). In a previous incarnation, the pub was called The Devil's Tavern, being known as a meeting place of smugglers and villains. Its timber beams and pillars appear to be from a ship's mast. A small balcony over the river is pleasant to sit in during summer, and the sight of a hangman's noose adds a touch of romance, were one dating Morticia Addams.

The last pub on our crawl - the only one without much of a history - was Captain Kidd, named after the 17th centuryprivateer, and pirate. Though he had become a pirate in the employ of the Royal Navy, and operated with the permission of the King of England, he was hanged at Wapping (the rope broke during the first attempt, after which he was strung up again, left in the river to be immersed thrice, then fished out, and tarred and preserved in gibbets for public display. The pub itself is quite recent, spacious to host a large (and by now unruly) crowd of crawlers, and has a nice river view to recommend it.

We have a last pint here (I abstain) and trundle back, a bit worse for the wear, to Bishopsgate. Enthusiastic risk types such as Silke are keen to go on to the Abacus, the City meat market (I am told), but I don't join them. Heigh-ho for home, I always say.

And so to bed.

You have to hand it to Dr. Johnson. Rapier wit, eh? He was referring to the commission of the construction of Blackfriars Bridge to a young upstart Scots architect named Robert Mylne, who was preferred over his friend John Gywnn... With that, I continue with my summary of London's bridges, with frequent reference to the superb Cross River Traffic, by Chris Roberts.


The first Blackfriars Bridge was finished by 1769, its main purpose being to gentrify the north side. At the time, Bridewell Prison stood there, surrounded by dismal slums. The notorious Fleet Prison was on the other side of the road, another hellhole famous for its debauchery and thuggish wardens.

The prisons were close to where the lawyers worked, in the Inns of Court at Newgate, but also because the district was a crime-ridden ghetto. Under ecclesiastial law (finally abolished in 1697), asylum could be granted in Church grounds to criminals fleeing from the police. The Alsatia sanctuary at Whitefriars was notorious: thugs would repair their in the evenings to spend the night after a bountiful day mugging and pillaging. More interestingly, the area was famous for unlicensed, often bigamous, marriages performed by bankrupt priests locked up in one of the prisons. These Fleet Marriages were outlawed only shortly before work on the bridge started.

Originally, the bridge was intended to be named after William Pitt, but by 1769, his star was fading, so instead it was christened after the Dominican monastery that used to stand at the north bank. It didn't last quite as long as the monastery, however, owing to the polluted Thames and the contaminated Fleet eating away at its foundations, eroding the Portland stone. A replacement was constructed only in the late 1880s and was accompanied by a railway bridge which the London, Chatham and Dover railway wanted. The sculptor, J.B.Philip decorated the columns with freshwater creatures and land birds on the upstream side, and marine life and seagulls downstream, reflecting Blackfriar's former position as the tidal turning point. A Venetian-Gothic flair is imparted by the cast-iron balustrade; indeed, contemporaries complained that the bridge was far too ornate.

Queen Victoria opened the new bridge, but she didn't linger long, as a rowdy crowd jeered her throughout the opening ceremony. The London mob went so far as to chuck missiles at her, no doubt seized with a momentary republican impulse.

Chris Roberts recommends the Blackfriars pub at the north-side of the bridge. Supposedly, it is the only Art Nouveau pub in London. Check out its gilt interiors, gorgeous mirrors, ornate fittings and pictures of fat monks drinking ale.