thestreetnames

Today’s tenuous connection takes in a former Bishop of London, a boat race on the Thames, and some pubs.

Swan Walk in Chelsea takes its name from the Swan Tavern. The swan was a common sign for inns, partly because it featured on Henry IV’s coat of arms, and it was especially popular for waterside inns. This Chelsea inn was a common gathering ground for the fashionable set of 17th-century London, of whom Samuel Pepys was one. It was also the finishing stage of the Doggett Coat and Badge boat race, which started at the Old Swan Tavern near London Bridge.

I was put in mind of this race when I was reading the letters (mentioned in an earlier post) from Mandell Creighton, one time Bishop of London, to his nephew. In one, dated 26 March 26 1897, the Bishop writes to the 11-year-old Basil, “We have been having lovely spring weather, and I have been quite cheered up in going about. The crocuses are all out. I went in the train the other day along the river, where the country was all full of orchards, and all the trees were sprouting, and looked lovely in the sun. Everybody here is tremendously excited about the Boat Race. I went to the river to see the crews practise. I go on running about making speeches everywhere. That is rather dull.”

The Bishop was, of course, referring to the annual Oxford and Cambridge boat race (Oxford won it on 3 April 1897 by two and a half lengths) but it did remind me of the Doggett Coat and Badge race.

This race was established in 1715 by Sir Thomas Doggett, actor, comedian, and theatre manager, to commemorate George I’s accession to the throne and it was open to watermen in their first year of freedom. Doggett organised and funded the race (and chose the route) until his death in 1721, and he left instructions in his will for the continuation of the will. The prize was originally cash and a traditional watermen’s orange coat with a silver badge added to the sleeve, displaying the white horse of the House of Hanover and Brunswick, with the word ‘Liberty’.

Once upon a time I worked in a building opposite the Doggett Coat and Badge pub on Southwark bridge; this pub takes its own name from the fact that it lies on the race route. Some offices in the building where I worked had a great view of the Doggett’s beer garden; a fact the sales team learned to their cost after an extended lunch when they kept answering their mobiles and assuring our publisher that they were en route to various meetings. It was quite the entertaining show for those of us who had managed to find an empty office with its own view of the beer garden.