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A bridge over hammersmith

Currently closed for 3 years, hammersmith bridge is one of London’s most attractive crossings. There’s been a bridge connecting hammersmith and Barnes for nearly 200 years, and ever since the first one was opened in 1827 there have been complaints about its strength. With hammersmith becoming an important agricultural and industrial part of west London there had been an increasing need to add more river crossings. With this in mind the authorities turned to local engineer William Tierney Clark, who’s best known for the Széchenyi Chain bridge that spans the Danube in Budapest. Even at the start of the work, when the Duke of Sussex blessed the bridge,...

Power bridge

  Tower bridge is one of the most famous bridges in the world, and behind its iconic structure lies an amazing story. In the late 19th century London had grown to a city of 6 million, with a third of them living in the East End. To cross the river was a real problem - it still is - with the building of a foot tunnel by the Tower of London wholly inadequate. To solve the problem a competition was launched to design a bridge that had a clearance of 9 metres, so masted ships could pass beneath it and reach the Pool of London . The winners were Sir Horace Jones (who happened to be on the selection committee) and Sir John Wolfe Barry, son of Sir Charle...

No Dove Lost

Emery Walker House   During the First World War, if you’d been walking across hammersmith bridge at night you might have spotted a shifty looking gentleman surreptitiously throwing bits of metal off the bridge and into the River Thames. This mysterious dumper was a disgruntled bookbinder by the name of Thomas James Cobden-Sanderson, who died 100 years ago this year. As for the metal, they were his collection of Doves Type, a beautifully designed font created with his partner Emery Walker.   In the last years of the 19th century Thomas James Cobden-Sanderson (1840-1922) decided to abandon his life as a barrister and become a bookbinder.  With his wif...

hammersmith Schools for Boys

Renowned actors, sportsmen and musicians have been educated in hammersmith. Earlier this month a group of 30 followed me along the River Thames to learn about some former pupils of Latymer School and St Paul’s School. Latymer Upper School is nearly 400 years old, having been founded in 1624 by Edward Latymer (1557-1627). A prosperous lawyer, he eft part of wealth for the clothing and education of “eight poor boys” from hammersmith. The clothing, which included a doublet, a pair of breeches, a shirt incorporated a red cross on the left sleeve, a pair of woollen stockings and shoes, was to be distributed twice a year on Ascension Day and All Sa...

The Royal Queens of hammersmith

As we celebrate The Queen’s 70 years on the throne I’ve had a look at other royal connections to my nearby borough of hammersmith.  As you emerge from Stamford Brook Underground station, to the left once stood the Queen Charlotte Maternity Hospital, named after the consort of George III, Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (1744-1818). It’s now in East Acton but when it was in W6, in 1945 Helen Mirren was born there. Appropriately she played Queen Charlotte in the film The Madness of King George. Further east, on the site of the present-day Latimer Prep School once stood Rivercourt House. For 4 years, between 1687 and 1691, it was the home of...

Hidden Coade in the City

How many times have you crossed Westminster bridge and gazed up at the large Lion Brewery feline on the southern end of the bridge? Or admired the two Chinese figures above the doorway to Twining’s in the Strand? Both sculptures were the product of a remarkable businesswoman by the name of Eleanor Coade. She was born in 1733 in Devon, the daughter of an unsuccessful wool merchant. In her thirties she headed for London and began to set up her own drapery business. She added the title ‘Mrs’ as a courtesy as it was highly unusual at the time for an unmarried woman to run their own company. Before long Mrs Coade had gone into partnership with a Da...