London Visits pre lockdown, Piggeries, Potteries, Dovecotes and Equidae … part 5 …

We move west from Arundel Gardens (built 1862/63) … where from the title you can hold your nose as the stench assails you … probably until the late 1800s …

Ladbroke Grove in 2006 - full of
Carnival goers ...

To the west is Ladbroke Grove a (new) north-south main route established by the Ladbroke Estate over forty years: 1820s – 1860s after the infamous Hippodrome failed … further west from ancient Porto Bello, which wandered through rough pasture land.

 

1823 plan for the development
of the Ladbroke Estate - an
early plan:  it consists of a large central
circus with radiating streets and garden
squares (or paddocks).  {Interesting
naming ... circus and paddocks - perhaps
the plan gave Whyte the idea for
the opportunity to build
the Hippodrome}

This was the depository for all peoples at the lower end of the scale of life … those ‘dossing down’ as they attempted to make a living in the ‘hum-drum’ developments spreading out from the Hyde Park area … tradesmen of all sorts … handymen, carpenters, woodworkers, builders, labourers, etc …

… then to add to the mix there were the locals trying to make a living with their piggeries, dovecotes, chickens … set up near the brickworks on the heavy clay soils of the Hippodrome – useless for horses, but wonderful for bricks.

Brick lining for the sewers in the late 1800s

The horse-racing had established stabling, places for carts … for the horses as well as the developing trades needed for the Great Exhibition, Hyde Park, in 1851 and subsequent building expansion as it spread westwards.

In the booklet ‘Arundel and Ladbroke Garden’ the houses were described as of great architectural merit … built using bricks from that heavy clay found in quantity just to the west of Ladbroke Grove, and no doubt by the local navvies desperate for work on the new housing.

Great Western Railway (broad gauge  -
Metropolitan Class) 1850s .... very early:
(the tube now is narrow gauge) 

It was at this time that the railways were being built, later the tube (Underground) lines were being added, and the sewage system … 

River Thames and marked in black are the planned
sewers for London.

... Bazalgette’s sewer system … a necessity in 1858 when cholera became rife in England.

The 'Silent Highwayman' on the
effluent filled River Thames in the 1800s

All effluent was left to trickle away into streams and tributaries before reaching the main river of London ‘The Thames’.  

One even went under Buckingham Palace kitchens … before common sense and realisation kicked in.  Foul … by the way it was only 160 years ago …

Beehive Kiln - all that remains of the
brick kilns of the 1800s

The bricks were a major and integral part of London’s development in the 1800s … houses, sewer tunnels, railway and tube works – bridges, tunnels, embankments – all used brick linings …

The Piggeries, Chickens, Doves and Pigeons would have been a large food source … vegetables and fruits would have been brought in along the lanes – Porto Bello, and similar … sheep, geese and cows out from the rural fields …

Vegetable stall at Borough Market
in south London ...

Not much remains to remind us of these times … but my tired legs took me westwards – it would have been kinder if I could have walked straight over … 

... but no – I found myself in the morass of recovered footpaths – I too zigged and zagged along … once again getting lost.

I ended up asking – I have a smart phone, but don’t much like using it! – I did eventually find my way through.

Making Skep Beehive shaped
baskets in England

I didn’t go looking for ‘the extremely rare Beehive kiln: so-called because of its domed roof, similar in appearance to the beekeeper’s straw skeps used to catch swarms of bees and also the inside appearance being like a honeycomb’.     (see above)

Today Pottery Lane is in an area of one of London’s most fashionable and expensive neighbourhoods … but in the mid-19^th century it lay at the heart of the wretched and notorious slum known as the “Potteries and Piggeries”.

As with most modern cities … the residents of today tread on the land that dirty and dissolute vagabonds used to exist on … ever hoping for a better life.

George Orwell lodged in Portobello
Road in 1927

So much change in such a short time … it was interesting to, in my mind, realise that to the west of where I used to live (Arundel Gardens) is probably more refined now than life in that northern part of the Ladbroke Estate.

Having found my way over … we now come across an area and its squatter residents trying to establish an Independent Republic in 1977 … well that I didn’t know …

Portobello Road curving away

… with, of course, some other fascinating snippets of London life – it’s now quite upmarket … and we will get to the art gallery after we’ve explored the squats …

The Programme for the
Summer Olympics 1908

Beyond the next north-south main route lay another development … set up in the early 1900s … White City – an exhibition area for the Franco-British Exhibition 1908 and the 1908 Summer Olympics: 

... our first Olympic Games to be held in Britain (again, a note … Rome was selected as the host city – but Mount Vesuvius erupted in April 1906 devastating Naples … funds for the Games were diverted to the reconstruction of Naples – Britain came to the rescue).

An illustration from the frontispiece of
Orley's Farm - illustrated by
John Everitt Millais (1861)

So our dissolute and vagrant opportunists had plenty of choices to make a living, joining forces with the early building entrepreneurs of the 1900s.

Life is interesting … I’m so glad ‘I sweated my poor feet and humbled my hips’ to get over there … I’ve stumbled on rather a lot …

Pastoral countryside ...
to the urban areas of London

Well I’m stopping now … interesting snippets coming up as well as some stunning art work …

HorsmansWest London – a family’s archive of builders covering the changing of the guard in the Ladbroke Estate area … views of Portobello in its early days ... 

Hilary Melton-Butcher

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