Historic London
Published on
June 5th, 2016
The Francis Frith Collection is home to so many wonderful historic photographs of London. Here we feature just a few of our favourites images of the streets, characters and landmarks of England's vibrant capital city at the turn of the 19th Century.
London, Elephant And Castle 1885. This crowded region south of the river was once the heart of #London cockney life. The Elephant and Castle, a great meeting place of thoroughfares, was termed a ‘ganglion of roads’ by Dickens in ‘Bleak House’.
Children cluster round licking at the cheap ice cream from the hokey pokey stall.They look like ragged street urchins in their rumpled suits and battered boots, and were probably bought their treats in return for posing for the photographer.
This Lambeth river frontage presents a very different face to the more refined Chelsea scene across the river. Here is a clutter of ramshackle warehouses, timber-yards and wharves. The flimsy houses were clearly not designed to face the water, for the windows are few and diminutive.The crumbling facades bring a clear impression of neglect and poverty.
The first elephants here probably arrived by 1851, according to an early drawing. Two are known to have come from Africa in 1867. Soon after this picture was taken, the elephants were given a new home on a site designed by the architect Sir Hugh Casson.
This five-arched granite structure was constructed in 1827 from the designs of John Rennie. Its excessive cost was once the talk of the city. Estimates ran as high as two and a half million pounds. In 1869 it was faced with cubes of Aberdeen granite. In the background is the imposing column of the Monument.
This murky view looks west from the Pool of London towards what was to become one of the mechanical wonders of the late 19th century. Here we see the towers - 'steel skeletons clothed in stone' as described by Sir John Wolfe Barry, the architect - not yet stone clad, and the upper walkway taking shape.
Perhaps you'd like..?
If you liked our "Historic London" Blog Feature, you might like to see and follow this
Francis Frith board over on Pinterest.
This post has the following tags:
Archives,Places,Nostalgia.
You may find more posts of interest within those tags.
Join the thousands who receive our regular doses of warming nostalgia!
Have our latest blog posts and archive news delivered directly to your
inbox.
Absolutely free. Unsubscribe anytime.