RAPH G IC PO A L ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING O T S 2013 O N Tuesday, 9 July St Clement Danes C O I Newsletter E Church, The Strand 6pm D Number 76 T N Y Our 113th AGM will be held in St Clement Danes, O May 2013 the Central Church of the Royal Air Force. Standing L opposite the Royal Courts of Justice at the end of the Strand, the church was built by Christopher Wren in 1680-82, burnt down by the Luftwaffe on 10 May 1941 and then abandoned until reconsecrated as the RAF church in October 1958. Former parishioners included Samuel Johnson, David Garrick, James Boswell, Edmund Burke and the poet John Donne. Justice) – more than twenty routes stop here with In accord with its role the church has books of Nos 9 & 15 running heritage Routemaster buses. remembrance on display containing more than 150,000 names; nearly 900 squadron and unit Facilities badges made of slate are set into the floor; and a There is very limited disabled off-street parking at range of RAF colours and squadron standards hang the entrance to the church. Please contact Mike in the church. Members will be able to visit the crypt Wicksteed ([email protected]). with its coffin plates and chain to prevent body The church’s toilet facilities are also limited, so it snatchers from stealing coffins. A range of impressive is strongly recommended that members make a pit seventeenth century plate is also on display. stop before arriving at the church. For anyone Refreshments will be served in the church from caught short there is a disabled toilet in the church about 5.15pm and the meeting will start at 6.00pm. (off the verger’s office) and there’s a pub, The Members are entitled to bring one guest. George, across the road. AGENDA Around St Clement Danes The present junction of Aldwych and the Strand 1. Minutes of the 112th AGM. belongs with the creation of Kingsway in 1905, but 2. Annual Report of the Council for 2012. recent archaeological investigations have shown 3. Accounts for 2012. that the Aldwych area has a most interesting older 4. Hon. Editor’s Report. history. As the name suggests, it was the site of the 5. Election of Council officers and members. Middle Saxon trading port of Lundenwic (the 6. Proposals by Members. discoveries are described in a brand new 7. Any other business. publication by Museum of London Archaeology). Items 1, 2 and 3 can be found in this More recent places of interest nearby include: Newsletter (see pp.18-19) The Royal Courts of Justice (9.00am – 4.30pm, Following the AGM, Robert Thomson will talk entry off the Strand); the Roman Bath, 5 Strand about the index he compiled for this year’s Lane (to arrange a viewing between 11.00am – Publication; Elizabeth Williamson, the Editor of 3.00pm. Email: [email protected] [best] the Victoria County History, will tell us about or phone Mr David Creese on 020 7641 5264); the research her team is doing on the registers Twinings Tea Museum & Shop (opposite the RCJ); of the church, and Blue Badge Guide Peter Fountain Place at Middle Temple (to rest your feet if Anderson will talk about the history of the it’s a sunny day); Sir John Soane’s Museum, 12-13 building. Lincoln’s Inn Fields; and Dr Johnson’s House at 17 Gough Square off Fleet Street. How to get there Middle Temple Hall: Up to 5.30pm if you tell the The church is at the east end of the Strand, porter you’re an LTS member – and there isn’t a between Aldwych and the Royal Courts of Justice. function taking place – you will be able to view the Tube: The nearest underground station is Temple Hall at Middle Temple, built between 1562 and (Circle/District Lines) – Holborn Station 1573 and which remains virtually unchanged to (Piccadilly/Central Lines) is also walkable. this day having survived the Great Fire of London Buses: (alight at Aldwych or at the Royal Courts of and both World Wars. News from the London Metropolitan Archives The Archives of the Cubitt Estates are an important record of the great nineteenth century squares and estates developed by Thomas Cubitt (1788-1855), one of London’s leading master builders. A catalogue of the ten volumes of rentals and leasebooks of the Cubitt estates held by LMA has recently been completed. However, these are not the whole story: at a recent auction 537 further volumes of Cubitt estate records came under the hammer, but LMA was unable to secure them and they were sold for £1,700. Their current whereabouts is unknown. Anyone with further information should contact the LMA. Christ’s Hospital and St Paul’s Cathedral Archives , previously stored at the Guildhall, were transferred in February to the LMA at 40 Northampton Road, Clerkenwell. In future all consultation of these archives will take place at LMA. For further information contact the LMA by email at [email protected] or telephone 020 7332 3820. Members should note that the LMA Newsletter is an excellent way of keeping up to date with the The statue of Dr Johnson outside St Clement Danes, the gift of the sculptor Percy Fitzgerald, was erected by the Rev. Septimus LMA’s exhibitions, activities and acquisitions. Pennington in 1910, whose forbear had been a curate in Johnson’s time A future for Britain’s postal heritage . In 2016, l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l provided funds can be secured this year, a new Notes and News postal museum will open at Mount Pleasant, giving access to every British stamp issued since 1840 This year’s publication, No.174, which will be ready and more than 70,000 artefacts. The museum will for collection at the AGM, is The A-Z of Charles II’s be the cultural hub of a Royal Mail masterplan of London, 1682, London Actually Survey’d by William 680 homes, offices and retail space, and an Morgan , a valuable record of the rebuilt City international destination for the study of postal emerging after the Great Fire. Work is already in communications, telling how postal services hand on next year’s exciting publication: transformed world history over 400 years. provisional title ‘Les Singularitez de Londres’ . It is a description of London in a manuscript at the Miscellanea. It is always good to learn that the Vatican, never before published in full, which dates Newsletter inspires readers to seek out and share from 1577, and so precedes Stow’s famous Survey. new sources of information. Michael Major, a recent Note from the Treasurer. HMRC, formerly known member, draws attention to the interactive map as the Inland Revenue, requires me to point out to called ‘Bomb Sight’ which was devised by a all members who Gift Aid their payments to the team from the University of Portsmouth using Society that you must pay enough income tax data from the National Archives. See and/or capital gains tax in any tax year to cover all www.bombsight.org/#15/51.5050/-0.0900 and the the tax on all your payments made under the Gift BBC History reference at www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk- Aid scheme in that year which the various charities england-london-20637222 will reclaim for that tax year. If this ceases to be the Another tip from our member Derek Morris, the case, or if you have any question, please contact historian of East London, who reminds us that an me. increasing number of land tax and insurance This requirement to all charities has been made records for London in the eighteenth century are because the model Gift Aid Declaration supplied by now available online. Derek makes good use of the Inland Revenue and which you signed when these in his recent article, ‘The Shadwell Waterfront joining the Gift Aid scheme only referred to paying in the Eighteenth Century’, by Derek Morris and enough tax to cover your donation to this society Kenneth Cozens, The Mariner’s Mirror , 99, issue I, and not to all your gift aided charitable payments. 2013, pp.86-91. The article can currently be If you do not yet gift aid your subscription accessed on line at www.tandfonline.com/eprint/ payments you can download a Gift Aid declaration XXKHs4qKJbpii5bdrQAJ/full, and under the open from the How to Join section of the website or access rules applied by Taylor and Francis, the obtain one from me. publishers, up to 50 free reprints of the article are – Roger Cline available. page 2 And here is another website reference sent in by Patrick Frazer: www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ newstopics/howaboutthat/9885753/Worlds- largest-panoramic-images-captures-London-at-its- best.html – which will lead you to an amazing panoramic view of London. If you want to experience your own panoramic view you can visit the Mayor’s room on the seventeenth floor of Westminster City Hall, Victoria Street on 26 June 2013, where the well-known historian of medieval art, Dr Nicola Coldstream FSA, is giving a talk to the Westminster History Society on Imagery and Cult at the shrine of St Edward the Confessor. 7pm. Tickets £10, including a glass of wine. Available in advance or at the event – information from Judith Warner – [email protected] The WHS is a supporters’ group of the Victoria County History , and the profits from their activities go toward the VCH’s current research on Westminster.