272
WOODEN WATER-PIPES AT CLERKENWELL,
LONDON.
By F. W. READER.
With Plate XI.
OWING to the great interest that the Essex Field Club has
shown in the matter of wooden water-pipes, the accom-
panying illustrations may perhaps be acceptable, as adding to the
large amount of information on the subject already collected in
the pages of the Essex Naturalist, by Mr. T. V. Holmes and
others.1
The original drawings from which these views have been
reproduced are in the collection of the Soane Museum, and
represent the course of the New River mains in the fields at
Clerkenwell about the year 1800.
As topographical records they are extremely interesting,
though in this particular they may hardly be thought to come
within the province of the Essex Field Club. A few remarks
may be admissible.
Both the views are taken from about the same spot, which is on the course
of the Fleet River, at this time an open stream as far as Holborn Hill. The
locality is that traversed by the King's Cross Road, formerly known as the
Bagnigge Wells Road. At the present time the district is dull and squalid,
offering apparently little of interest to the casual visitor. The great changes that
have taken place in recent years might well lead one to suppose that all traces of
its condition a century ago, when it formed a stretch of open meadows intersected
by streams, would long since have been obliterated. However, the valley of the
Fleet, though considerably filled up, is still to be recognised in the rise of the
streets on either side of King's Cross Road, and other landmarks remain, so that
with the aid of old engravings and maps many of the features of these drawings
may still be clearly traced.
The upper view shows the mains crossing the Fleet in the Spa Fields, and
stretching on the left-hand side of the picture to the New River Head by Sadler's
Wells. Here at the present time the New River Head remains, and Sadler's
Wells Theatre still exists, though there is little to tell of its former glories and
triumphs, while the name by which it is still known "Old Sads" seems
singularly appropriate in its now dismal and fallen condition.
The street of houses seen in the distance is Exmouth Street, then occupied by
well-to-do people. The domed building seen over the houses to the right is Spa
Fields Chapel, once famous as Lady Huntingdon's Chapel. This has in quite
recent years disappeared, and the church of the Holy Redeemer has been built on
its site.
The high wall on the right is that of the County Gaol, afterwards
known as the House of Correction or Cold Bath Prison. This has now been
1 Essex Naturalist, Vol. xiii;, pp. 60-75 Ib. 117 and 118, and pp. 229-240.