In 1758 Richard Hall was living in the area of Southwark called the Bridgefoot when London Corporation decided “to do something” about London Bridge. Until 1749 it had been the only structure linking the North and South banks of the River Thames, but the medieval bridge was hopelessly outdated. I rather like the description of it as “a wall with holes in it” since ships were held up for days trying to pass through the narrow gaps between the arches. Pedestrians jostled and fought their way across the carriageway, threading their way round the shops and houses cluttering up the road.
A View of ‘London Bridge before the Late Alterations’ engraved 1758 by Samuel Scott and shown courtesy of the Tate Gallery
Parliament finally got round to tackling the problem in 1756 when it passed a Bill enabling the Corporation to buy up and demolish the buildings littering the superstructure, and to improve the access routes. A passage of thirty one feet open for carriages, and seven feet on each side for foot passengers, was to be constructed and it was directed that there should be a balustrade on each side. The Corporation were authorised to demolish one or more of the central piers so as to create the new Great Arch.
Pulling down the shops and tenements, and dismantling the central pier would have caused chaos if temporary arrangements had not been put in place to enable pedestrians to continue to be able to cross the river. A decision was made to construct a temporary wooden bridge immediately along the western side of the stone bridge, supported on the starlings (lozenge-shaped buttresses on either side of the piers).
The improvements didn’t go down too well with the ferrymen who made their living transporting people across the river: there is every indication that it was a disgruntled river worker who set fire to the temporary structure on the night of 11th April 1758.
A reward of two hundred pounds was offered to catch the culprit but no-one was brought to justice. The temporary bridge had been totally destroyed in the blaze and workmen had to start all over again.
Grace’s Guide has this picture of the fire , and I can well imagine Richard rushing down to the river bank at eleven o’clock at night to see the blaze which had just broken out.
In 2010 a remarkable house, situated south west of London, emerged from its chrysalis of scaffolding and protective cladding and was revealed in all its original glory: Strawberry Hill House. It has been likened to a wedding cake on account of its beautiful white exterior finish called ‘harling’ (a lime and pebble stucco render). It may be decorated like icing, but to me it is altogether lighter – more like a confection made of whipped cream! It really is a masterpiece and its resurrection is all the more remarkable because by the end of the Twentieth Century the place was in a terribly dilapidated state. Three cheers for English Heritage and the Lottery Fund, who between them raised the majority of the nine million pounds needed to restore the building which kicked off the neo-Gothic movement!
The style is down to the vision and verve of Horace Walpole, who bought what was an eighty-year old villa near the banks of the River Thames, at Twickenham, in 1747. The previous owner was a well-known shopkeeper who sold toys and trinkets by the name of Mrs Chevenix, and Horace Walpole described his purchase as “a little plaything that I got out of Mrs Chevenix’s shop and is the prettiest bauble you ever saw.” Over the next fifty years he transformed it into a Gothic fantasy – into what he whimsically described as “the castle I am building of my ancestors”.
Walpole used it as his summer residence. In those days it was half a day’s ride from the centre of London, eleven miles away. It was not in a particularly fashionable area, but Walpole created a wondrous creation to impress and amuse his friends – and to house his astonishing collection of books, paintings, furniture, coins and historical artifacts.
Horace Walpole was a remarkable man – an effete, an aesthete, a dilettante, a collector and an innovator. He died in 1797 at the age of eighty.
Strawberry Hill house is at 268 Waldegrave Road, Twickenham, TW1 4ST and is administered by the Strawberry Hill Trust. The house has been closed for the winter, with a re-opening date of 3rd March 2013. The trust website is 
The Great staircase
Charles Gregory, Ninth Viscount Fairfax of Emley, was a staunch Catholic, unlike the Denton branch of the family which came from the West of York and who became fiercely Protestant and featured so strongly in the story of the English Civil War. My own ancestry derives from the Denton crowd of Fairfax’s – family members are still christened ‘Fairfax’ despite it being fairly apparent that the union was the ‘wrong side of the blanket’. Proud bastards after all those centuries I hear you say, and why not!