London has many old buildings, memorials and institutions, but they are not always in the same place they originally were. The Footprints of London guides choose their favourite things in London that have moved from their original location.

1. St Andrews Church Kingsbury – Rob Smith

There are a few buildings in London that have been partially rebuilt in a new location, but rebuilding a whole church with its interior intact is very unusual. That’s the story of St Andrews Church in Kingsbury. The church was first built in Wells Street in Marylebone in 1847, designed by Samuel Daukes. At that time Marylebone’s population was rising and so a new church made sense, but by 1931 the congregation was not large enough to support St Andrews and the similar sized All Saints nearby. One had to go.

At first demolition looked likely, but St Andrews had a particularly good interior, with work by some of the best Victorian church architects – Pugin, Butterfield, G E Street and William Burges, and some beautiful stained glass. Too good to break up this collection. Fortunately an opportunity arose in London’s North West Suburbs, where a rapidly rising population in Kingsbury had outgrown the ancient St Andrews church that had been there since 1100. It was proposed to carefully take the Marylebone St Andrews apart, numbering every block, and reassemble it on new concrete foundations next to the old St Andrews. The work carried out by Holland & Hannen and Cubitts took two years, and became a tourist attraction in itself. A newsreel about “The Worlds Largest Jigsaw Puzzle” was made when the work was finally finished in 1933.

The two churches sit side by side in Kingsbury. St Andrews has now been in Kingsbury longer than it was in Marylebone. While London’s Victorian churches are perhaps less interesting than the many older churches, St Andrews is worth a visit for its entirely Victorian interior. Moving to Kingsbury saved it from damage in World War Two and modernisation in the 1960s so it’s a good survivor.

Rob will be talking about more of London Borough of Brents Best Buildings on 21st February

2. St Lawrence & Mary Magdalene Drinking Fountain – Jill Finch

The Grade II listed St Lawrence & Mary Magdalene Drinking Fountain (left) looks very much at home opposite St Paul’s Cathedral, but it has a moving story.

Despite the Metropolitan Water Act of 1852 outbreaks cholera remained a reality in London and philanthropic bodies started to provide fountains.

But this one, designed in an elaborate Gothic style by architect John Robinson (who studied with Pugin) was erected jointly by the City parishes of St Lawrence Jewry and St Mary Magdalene in 1866; and it stood outside the Church of St Lawrence Jewry for more than 100 years (right).

St Lawrence holds his grid iron on the north side and St Mary Magdalene, with a skull at her, feet. holds a cross and faces south.

When Guildhall yard was redeveloped in 1970 the fountain was dismantled into 150 pieces languished in a City vault before moving on to an Epping barn.

The decision to put it, like Humpty Dumpty, back together again came in 2010 – as did the decision to relocate it.

It’s a rather lovely piece of City ‘Street Furniture’ with a quirky past. A bronze plaque on the east side of the monument tells the story and you can read more about it here

3. Arsenal Football Club – Jane Parker

The football team we know today as Arsenal FC was first created in 1886, the players being munitions workers from Woolwich Arsenal, in south-east London. At first, the men played on various open grounds in and around the local area until they settled on nearby Plumstead Common. An arson attack by suffragettes in 1913 caused such extensive damage that the club made the decision to cross the Thames to north London, specifically to Highbury where a new stadium was constructed on the lumpy sports fields of St John’s College of Divinity.

In 1925 Herbert Chapman was installed as manager of the club, implementing many innovative changes that would as good as turn him into the patron saint of Arsenal. One of Chapman’s best achievements was the complete rebuild of the 1913 ground and, in 1932, a multi-tiered Art Deco style terrace was constructed on the west side, followed six years later by an even more impressive East Stand in Avenell Road, shown here. It’s a beautifully-designed building redolent of the Hoover factory in Perivale, west London, but here with cannon motifs and Arsenal red paintwork. During this period the name of the area and the local tube station was changed to echo the team name.

In 2006 the club again relocated, this time a stone’s throw away, within the newly-constructed Emirates Stadium in Holloway, N7. The Art Deco terraces at Highbury have subsequently been converted into residential properties overlooking private gardens that replace the football pitch.

An almost parallel story, but in the opposite direction, is that of Millwall FC, founded in 1885, just one year before Arsenal, and made up of workers from a canning and preserves factory on The Isle of Dogs on the north of the Thames. Since 1910 Millwall’s home ground has been near New Cross in south London.

Find out more about Arsenal’s Highbury ground and buildings on Jane’s ‘Art Deco Arsenal to Finsbury Park‘ guided walk, one of many Art Deco routes she offers both online and along the streets.

4. Temple Bar – Marilyn Greene

The grand, architectural gateway that marks the entrance to Paternoster Square, is Temple Bar. However, it only moved to this site in 2004 as the completion of the redevelopment of Paternoster Square.

Temple Bar is the last remaining gateway to the City of London and originally marked the entrance of the City of London from Westminster, where the Strand meets Fleet Street. This version was deigned by Sir Christopher Wren in 1672, replacing a wooden structure which had been damaged in the Great Fire of London.

A bar was first mentioned in 1293 comprising a chain between two wooden posts, but by 1351 there was a gate with a prison above. It is believed that Sir Christopher Wren built the new temple bar with statues of Charles I and Charles II on the western face and of James I and Anne of Denmark (Charles I mother) on the eastern side. The heads of traitors were displayed here between 1684 and 1746 as a warning to anyone entering the City.

During the nineteenth-century, the increase of traffic, meant that the gateway was causing an obstruction and in 1878, it was taken down piece by piece and placed in storage.

Ten years later it was acquired by Lady Meaux and reconstructed by Sir Henry Bruce Meux (brewers) for their country estate in Theobalds Park, Hertfordshire– where it gradually fell into disrepair. There it stayed until as a result of a long campaign to return it to the City by the Temple Bar Trust, it was restored and repositioned at the entrance of the Paternoster Square.

A monument from 1880 to The Temple Bar by Horace Jones marks the spot in Fleet Street where the original Bar was.

You can learn more about its fascinating Story in Marilyn’s virtual Tour Between Two Bars: Strolling along Fleet Street

5. Model Dwellings in Kennington Park – Stephen Benton

Just inside Kennington Park is a building now used as offices but which was built for the Great Exhibition of 1851 as a four flat “model” dwelling by the Society for Improving the Conditions of the Labouring Classes.

Prince Albert had considerable interest in improved housing for the poor and was president of the Society. The Society wanted it built on the Exhibition grounds, but the Exhibition commissioners were unwilling to have an exhibit that addressed such social issues. Following Prince Albert’s intervention, it was agreed that the building could be constructed close to the Exhibition grounds, so it was put up at Knightsbridge Barracks. Afterwards it was dismantled and rebuilt in Kennington Park in 1852.

You can see this on Stephen Benton’s “In Vincent’s Footsteps” tour which is running on 26 February and 26 March. This follows the route which Vincent Van Gogh might have walked home in 1873/74 when he was working in Covent Garden and living in Stockwell. This tour also includes a visit to the house at Stockwell.

6. The Wrought Iron Gates to St John’s Hampstead Parish Church – Marilyn Greene

The wrought Iron gates and railings that front the entrance to Hampstead parish church have an interesting history. They were adapted to surround the site of the original Medieval parish church of St Mary’s Hampstead which had been completely rebuilt by John Sanderson and re dedicated to St John on 8th October 1747 by the Bishop of Llandaff.

In the same year the estate of James Brydges, the First Duke of Chandos (6 January 1673 – 9 August 1744) was sold off. Hampstead Parish’s Church’s gates came from the demolition sale of the estate of the family seat of Cannons held from 1-16 June.

James Brydges estate at Cannons Park had been bought by Sir Thomas Lake in 1604 from the Cannons of St Bartholomew, Smithfield. At the beginning of the 18th Century, Mary Lake married James Brydges who sat in the English and British House of Commons and later the House of Lords. He was subsequently created Earl of Carnarvon and then Duke of Chandos.

Chandos made his fortune as Paymaster general to the to the Duke of Marlborough and his estates included 1,492 acres including 481 acres of Cannons Park. George Frederick Handel was music master to him from 1719-20 and Cannons was considered the height of fashion. However, he lost his wealth in the South Sea Bubble of 1720 leaving his son, the second Duke of Chandos, to sell off the estate.

The house was demolished, and the cabinet maker William Hallet built a house on its foundations. In 1929 North London Collegiate School bought this house and some of its grounds. 45 acres of Cannons Park is now public, cared for by the London Borough of Harrow.

Marilyn’s walks: Constable’s Hampstead, Modernist Hampstead and Lamplit Hampstead pass these historic railings and gates.

Picture Credit: Church railings looking to Church Row, Hampstead by Gebruiker Voyageur Wikimedia Commons

7. The Duke of Wellington Statue, Hyde Park Corner – Richard Watkins

People walking past the equine statue of Wellington at Hyde Park corner today may have little idea of the fuss that was made over the original statue!

Matthew Coates-Wyatt was commissioned to make a large equine statue of Wellington in the 1830s. Made of bronze from French cannon from Waterloo, weighing 40 tonnes, it took three years to complete.

It was unveiled on 28 September 1846, with 29 horses pulling the carriage to Hyde Park Corner and hoisted up on top of the Wellington Arch to massed cheering crowds. The statue was 26 feet long and rose to 90 feet above the ground on the Arch: the largest equine statue in Britain at the time.

The statue was lambasted by the press as being an oversized work of hubris. The horse was said to look nothing like Copenhagen Many considered it dangerous and warned people not to pass under the Arch. Even the Queen thought it an eyesore.

Eventually in 1883, it was pulled down when the Arch was repositioned to allow better traffic access, and moved to Aldershot barracks, then re-erected at Round Hill there where it still stands today.

The statue in Hyde Park Corner today (not on the Arch) is by Edgar Boehm, 1888, and is surrounded by soldiers from English, Scots, Welsh and Irish regiments.

Richard talks about the statue on his walk, “The Peacemakers of Belgravia”.

8. Brentford FC – Alan Fortune

From the back streets near Griffin Park to the glitz of Kew Bridge

On the hot, tension-filled afternoon of 29 May at Wembley Stadium, the chant of “We’re just a bus stop in Hounslow” rang around the arena as the Bees (Brentford FC), a small club in south west London, defeated Swansea City 2-0 to complete their remarkable eleven year rise from the fourth tier of English football to its pinnacle, the Premier League – the most popular league the world over. Less successful neighbours, Queens Park Rangers, had taunted Brentford fans with the bus stop jibe for several years, usually as a response to being heavily defeated.

So Brentford reached the Premier League for the first time since the league’s foundation in 1992, and the top tier of English football for the first time in 74 years! And just one year after leaving their old home.

From the old place…

The football club was founded in 1889 by members of the town’s rowing club who wanted to pursue a winter sport, and moved in 1905 to Griffin Park, a stadium located in the town’s terraced back streets, and unique in English football for having four pubs immediately outside, one located at each corner of the stadium.

To a new home (a club on the rise)…

The current owner, Matthew Benham, bought the club in 2012 from the fans’ trust which had rescued the financially troubled club a year or so before. Since then Brentford, stuck in the lower leagues of English football for most of its existence, has gone from strength to strength.

In 2020 the club left Griffin Park after 115 years for the newly built state-of-the-art Brentford Community Stadium at Kew Bridge, deep in the heartland of Barbour-jacketed rugby fans. Clever planning allowed it to be erected in the middle of a triangle of railway lines beside Kew Bridge station.

The increased capacity and better facilities now allow the club to attract more fans and to hire out the stadium for concerts and other events. For example, London Irish Rugby Club hire the stadium for all their home games.

The new stadium is at the heart of plans to regenerate the surrounding area, including new homes and commercial opportunities. Indeed, the rise of the football club matches the ongoing rapid regeneration of the town of Brentford itself. Having a Premier League football club is certainly raising the profile of the area. The first game of the Premier League season saw the Bees start with a bang. An excited, raucous crowd in a full stadium witnessed the 2-0 defeat of north London ‘giants’, Arsenal.

‘Discovering Brentford: Aits, Bees, Butts and Griffins’ is a new walk devised by Alan Fortune (a Brentford FC season ticket holder) and Elaine Wein. Alan will lead the walk for Footprints for the first time in the spring of 2022.

9. St George’s Hospital archway – Stephen Benton

Rather hidden away on the perimeter road of the modern day St George’s Hospital in Tooting is a stone archway.

This archway stood by the original St George’s Hospital at Hyde Park Corner and was moved to Tooting in about 1980 as a reminder of the old hospital. It is topped with a replica of a bust of the renowned 18th Century surgeon John Hunter – the original of which can be found inside the medical school where it sits opposite a display telling the history of the hospital.

You can see this on Stephen Benton’s walk “From Bec to Broadway – untold tales of Tooting” which runs on 11 February at 11am.

10. Obelisk to Robert Wraithman – Rob Smith

All our examples have been in more than one location but spare a thought to the Obelisk to Robert Wraithman which is just about to move to its fourth location in London. While it might be one of London’s least remembered memorials, Wraithman was an interesting person, who played a role in the long road to democracy in Britain.

Robert Wraithman was born in 1764 the son of an iron worker in Wrexham who wanted his son to move into trade in London. He became an apprentice in a drapers shop, and by the age of 22 had his own shop in Fleet Street.

Like many Londoners, Wraithman felt hardship during the Napoleonic War’s – the high taxes levied to pay for the war hit hard but they also meant customers did not have spare spending money for luxury goods that many London craftsmen produced. Wraithman started to speak out against the war at public meetings.

He became involved in politics and in 1800 he published a pamphlet demanding an end to the war, parliamentary reform and a more equal society. These were dangerous views at the time. The government had banned any publications that were seen as critical of the King or the Government and public meetings calling for democracy were forbidden.

In 1818 Wraithman was elected MP for the City of London, despite being dismissed as a common tradesman by some of the land owning MPs in Parliament. He also became Lord Mayor of London. While never being the most radical politician he was part of the growing campaign for electoral reform in the early nineteenth century.

When he died in 1933 an appeal was made to build a monument outside his shop in Fleet Street near Ludgate Circus. The new memorial stood there until 1951 when it was found to be in the way of traffic going towards Blackfriars Bridge so it was relocated in Bartholemew Close. Sometime around then a plaque was added with the words “The friend of liberty in evil times”.

That site was redeveloped in 1971 and there were plans to send it to Wraithman’s home town of Wrexham, but instead it was located in the centre of Salisbury Square just south of Fleet Street.

The buildings here are now being demolished, and so the obelisk is on the move again, though not too far – in a new garden that will feature when Salisbury Square is rebuilt over the next few years. Interestingly a portrait of Wraithman was sealed in a bottle and hidden in the base of the obelisk when it was first built. It will be interesting to see if it is still there when the obelisk is moved in 2022.

You can hear more about people who campaigned for peace and reform during the Napoleonic War in Rob’s talk “Radical Islington” on 7th February

Share this page:

Facebook

Twitter

Pinterest

Whatsapp

Reddit

Email