Of the CAMDEN HISTORY SOCIETY No 208 Mar 2005 London's
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
No 207 of the CAMDEN HISTORY SOCIETY Jan 2005 Eleanor Farjeon and Family Advance Notice Please put these dates in your new diary: in Hampstead 17 March: London's Maddest Church? An apprecia- Thurs. 20 Jan, 7.30pm tion of the architecture of EB Lamb. Speaker Anthony Rosslyn Hill Unitarian Chapel, Rossyln Hill NW3 Edwards, at St Martin's, Gospel Oak. 21 April: Peter Baynes on John Passmore Edwards. The Farjeons were well-known in Hampstead. Venue not yet fixed. Eleanor's father, Benjamin, was a novelist and she and 19 May: To mark 60 years since the end of the 2nd her brothers and sisters were brought up in Belsize World War, Robin Woolven will be talking about the Park. Eleanor received, according to the DNB, no state of St Pancras in May 1945. Venue not yet fixed. formal education but did have the run of her father's 16 June: Annual General Meeting at Rosslyn Hill Uni- 8,000 volume library. These circumstances led to her tarian Chapel. Speaker Ruth Rowntree on the 'Reli- being, again according to the DNB, out of touch with gious Devills of Hampstead'. reality but in her twenties she shook this off and became a competent writer herself. Though she wrote LOCAL STUDIES - TEMPORARY OPENING a great deal, she is best remembered nowadays for her TIMES books for children. She settled at 20 Perrins Walk off Heath Street in 1920, and remained there until her Holborn Library is being refurbished in January. As a death in 1965. result the Local Studies and Archives Centre will be open only by appointment from 4 January until 29 The talk on this interesting family will be given by January. Normal opening hours will resume on 31 Anne Harvey. January. To make an appointment telephone 7974 6342, or The Making of the Foundling email on [email protected]. Museum AN AWARD FOR SOCIETY PUBLICATION Thurs 17 Feb, 7.30pm Our publication, Victorian Seven Dials, by David Hayes, Education Centre, Foundling Museum, 40 Brunswick was joint runner-up for the LAMAS Local History Square WCl award. He received a certificate, and a cheque which will be shared between David and the designer, Ivor The Foundling Museum together with its Education Kamlish. Centre opened only last year, dedicated to the achieve- ments of the original Foundling Hospital and its suc- BURGH HOUSE CHANGES cessor's work with children. It has, of course, a re- In receipt of lottery funding, the construction and nowned art collection, which originated with the cus- renovation at Burgh House can now take place. From tom in the 18th century of sympathetic artists, such as the 1st of March the ground floor rooms, the first floor Hogarth, Gainsborough and Reynolds, donating can- office and the Hampstead Museum, will be closed for vasses to the institution. In this way the Foundling about ten weeks. During that time, the floor in the became an early art gallery. Music Room will be replaced, and a new accessible entry way into the Room from the courtyard will be Though in a 1930s' building these pictures and other built. mementoes of a laudable institution are displayed in interiors saved from the now demolished Foundling The house will reopen in May, though work will Hospital building in Coram's Fields. continue at the rear of the house. During the building work the Buttery will remain open. Our speaker is Rhian Harris, Director of the Museum. down. Relations with their neighbours in the Square The Scattering have not always been good. The book also deals with 248pp, 245 x 185mm, 83 ills the particularly difficult times in the '70s and '80s By Gerry Harrison when the conflict in Northern Ireland brought suspi- ISBN O 948667 99 0 cion on the whole Irish community and the Centre Published by the London Irish Centre, price £12.95 was often raided by the police. Proauced by Historical Publications. On a visit in 1999 the Irish President, Mary McAleese, "In any case the libraries are better" summed up the huge contribution the Centre has The above is perhaps the most unusual explanation made to the Irish community in London. She called it given by one of the many thousands of young Irish "... a place of belonging, of recognition where you can people who could see no option but to "take the boat" find a friend or get a helping hand, celebrate or get to England in search of a better life after the Second some advice ... it is a credit to its founders and to the World War. The majority of these were from a rural generations who have sustained and developed it." background and were completely unprepared for the cultural shock of London. Jobs, or at least jobs of a There is no doubt that the Irish Centre will continue certain kind such as in construction work or hotels, adapting to the needs of the Irish in London for many may have been available but finding a roof over one's years to come and this book does full justice to what head was a real problem. It was not uncommon to see has been and continues to be a remarkable organisation. the sign No Blacks, No Irish in lodging house windows. To the people arriving at Euston at 5 o'clock in the Aidan Flood morning the volunteers from the Legion of Mary handing out cards printed with the details of the Irish Centre in Camden Town would have seemed a god- VERSIONS OF BELSIZE HOUSE send. Roy Allen writes: It's a bit late in the day but, looking again at Newsletters This year sees the 50th anniversary of the London Irish 131 and 132,Irealisethattheopeningparagraphof132 Centre, one of the very few organisations to take a lead does not make sense in the absence of a paragraph in alleviating the desperate physical and indeed spir- which went missing at the end of 131. itual needs of these emigrants. The provision of hostel places and collating a register of lodging houses be- The missing paragraph is as follows: 'When was the came a central aim of the organisation. The impor- house built? In the census of May 1811 there were only tance of finding jobs for the emigrants led to the setting six people here but much of Everett's establishment up of an employment agency and the provision of bars might have been at his town house in Russell Square. and halls for cultural events provided a focal point for The following winter, in a general review of rateable people to meet and counter the isolation so often felt values, Belsize House stands out with an increase of by emigrant communities. 22%, soon raised to 28½%. It looks as if the date is 1811-12.' Gerry Harrison has made extensive use of surviving archives and conducted more than fifty first-hand interviews with many of the personalities involved. SUBSCRIPTIONS DUE The result is a compelling and highly readable account The annual subscription of £10 is due on 1 March; if of the struggles to bring the Irish Centre into existence you do not pay by standing order or if you have not and the challenges it continues to meet up to the already paid in advance, please send your cheque present day. to the membership secretary, Roger Cline, at Flat 13, 13 Tavistock Place, WClH 9SH immediately. If The London Irish Centre at 52 Camden Square was you are not sure whether you have paid by standing formally opened by the Archbishop of Armagh on 27 order, please check your next bank statement and September 1955. Whilst this book traces the history of rectify any omission then. the organisation, it is perhaps even more the story of a group of individuals who had and continue to have a vision. Alongside the concerted efforts of various THE GOAD PLANS Catholic priests such as the first Director of the Centre, Father Tom McNamara, can be placed the many pro- The Goad Plans are very detailed plans of commer- fessional workers and volunteers who have given so cial premises made for insurance purposes. A much over the years. number of Camden areas for the 1880s are shown on some of them. These have now been put onto micro- Although this book celebrates these and the many fiche and are available at the Local Studies and thousands of people helped by the Centre it is not just Archives Centre in Holborn. an eulogy. It is a warts and all story of human beings. Mistakes were undoubtedly made. Sometimes people were dealing with matters beyond their capabilities. At times crippling debts threatened to bring the Centre Committed to stone Saving the York & Albany Many writers would like to see some of their immortal Enclosed with this Newsletter is an application to join words engraved in stone. I had certainly not antici- that invaluable organisation, the Camden Civic Society. pated that this would occur in my own case, and The Society has for some time led the campaign to save indeed the surface only resembles stone, but some- from irreparable alteration the long-empty York & thing of the sort has happened. The engraving is also Albany pub at the end of Parkway by Gloucester Gate. in a most unlikely location, on the sidewallofNando's restaurant in Kentish Town Road, where Anglers Lane joins it. The inscription, shown below, is taken This handsome building was designed by Nash in from my book on Kentish Town and concerns itself 1824, but despite it being a rare survivor of his com- with the reminiscence of an old resident who used to mercial buildings, it has inexplicably been allowed to see young people swimming in the river Fleet where lie empty for 20 years by its owners the Crown Estate it went past Anglers Lane.