Literary Southwark – London’s last remaining galleried coaching inn

August 19, 2019 Comments Off

Daniella King tells us about her walk Literary Southwark: Poets, Writers and Two Famous Diarists which features in our Literary Festival in October.

It has often been said that a good walk should always end in an historical old inn.

I’m pleased to say that my walk Literary Southwark: Poets, Writers and Two Famous Diarists ticks all the boxes here as we end the walk at The George on Borough High Street.

The George was not the most famous of Southwark’s ancient Inns; that claim to fame rests with pubs such as the Tabard and the White Hart.

However, The George is the last surviving coaching inn in London and was one of several inns that lined Borough High Street in medieval times when pilgrims set off from Southwark to travel down to Canterbury to see the shrine of St Thomas Becket.

We don’t know for sure when The George was first built, but we do know that there was an Inn on this site from the 16th century with its current name. Prior to this there was an earlier pub called the Syrcot close to the site, which probably derives from the word “surcoat” which was a type of medieval tunic.

The George was later rebuilt after a fire in 1676 and whereas many of the other coaching inns had been demolished by the end of the 19th century, the George survives until this day.

At one point in the Victoria era, the Inn was owned by the Great Northern Railway who pulled down two of its wings to build warehouses. By 1937, the railway company gifted the building to the National Trust and with a Grade I listing we hope its future is secure.

The George has been referred to as “Shakespeare’s Local” – so did the Bard really know the Inn? In his play King John, he does refer to the pub and, due to its proximity to the Globe Theatre, it seems very likely that it was one of the many Inns that Shakespeare did frequent in Bankside during the time he both worked and lived here.

It also has a link with another literary giant, namely former local resident Charles Dickens, who refers to the Inn in Little Dorrit, while in The Pickwick Papers he also refers to the “rambling, queer old inns” down Borough High Street.

Apart from finishing at the George Inn, on my walk you will hear about the development of theatres in the Tudor and Jacobean period in this area as we look at the lives of writers such as Kit Marlow and Ben Johnson.

We will visit the hospital where John Keats worked and also hear the story of Geoffrey Chaucer and his Canterbury Tales, as well as Samuel Johnson and his famous dictionary.

And not forgetting Bridget and her Diary as well as JK Rowling and her famous wizard!

The walk is part of Footprints of London’s Literary Festival. To book – please click here