It is not often that we London bloggers stumble across something that stops us in our tracks – but it happened yesterday. Twice. The first time was during a delightful tour of the venerable Apothecaries Hall in Blackfriars whose alumni include John Keats, Agatha Christie and Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, the first woman to blast her way – and it needed some blasting – into qualifying as a doctor. The tour itself, organised by London Historians, was memorable. Apothecaries are the largest City livery society (indeed, the only one as the others which dirty their fingers in trade are mere companies) and has a dizzy array of panelled halls and rooms replete with portraits of its illustrious leaders (see, below). Well worth a visit on the few days it is open to the public.

But the Hall is also of interest because it sits on the site of the medieval Blackfriars Monastery where Parliament once sat and where Catherine of Aragon defended herself when Henry VIII divorced her for Anne Boleyn.  William Langland in the ancient poem, Piers Plowman, railed against the loucheness of the monks, but that’s another story. After the dissolution of the monasteries in the 1530s Blackfriars became a posh residential area and the site of two theatres, the first of which used some of the space now occupied by the Apothecaries Hall and the second was Shakespeare’s indoor theatre which was immediately south of what is now the hall.

Hardly anything of the monastery now remains apart from a tiny section of wall  and part of another wall lost inside a nearby office block  which very few people have seen. So, imagine our surprise when we asked our admirable guide, the Beagle, Gary Howe, whether there were any traces of the old monastery  left. At first he seemed to say No but then added that comparatively recently they had found a crypt-like arched room 20 metres long after lifting some carpet tiles and descending down a narrow opening. They didn’t take any photographs so this hidden gem – for once the term is correctly used – still remains hidden. He was kind enough to lift the carpet tiles, tantalisingly,  for us (above, left) which are immediately in front as you walk in the main door and the remains of the monastery would run roughly beneath the front of the building (above, right), where some London Historians are standing).

If that wasn’t enough for one day we took a visitor from New York around the corner through Playhouse Yard and along Ireland Lane to show her the Cockpit Pub on the site of the only property Shakespeare is know for certain to have purchased . But when we got there we bumped into the Chambers director of the building opposite who not only claims that it is the  true site of the gatehouse but points to a new plaque on the wall, approved by the Corporation of London, which has endorsed it. I will need more evidence before I take sides in this Shakespearean turf war – and in any case there is a limit to the number of surprises you can take in a single day.

Medieval stained glass, (above) and dining hall, below)

Left, remains of monastery wall. Right – Cockpit pub, site of Shakespeare’s house

LONDON is often accused of hiding its history but seldom has anything been as well buried as the history of Blackfriars. I walked to work for many years up the deeply uninspiring Farringdon Road without any idea that on the (eastern) side of the street once stood the monastery of the Dominicans or Black Friars from 1276 until the Dissolution in the 1530s when it was divvied up among Henry V111′s cronies. In Henry’s time the former refectory was often used for meetings of Parliament and in  May 1529, the Parliament Chamber – later to become Shakespeare’s indoor theatre – was where the annulment of Henry V111′s first marriage to Catherine of Aragon was debated.

Blackfriars played a seminal role in Shakespeare’s life because when his troupe was forced to leave The Theatre in Shoreditch in 1598, it tried to set up in The Blackfriars precinct only to be thwarted by a group of aristocratic Puritans led by the uber-connected Lady Elizabeth Russell whose single-mindedness makes Mrs Thatcher look like a girl guide. As a fascinating book just published (Chris Laoutaris, Shakespeare and the Countess) argues, it was only because Shakespeare’s troupe – led By Richard Burbage – was thwarted in Blackfriars by Lady Russell and her neighbours that it had to resort to Plan B – to build the Globe over the Thames on Bankside out of timbers recycled from The Theatre. Without Lady Elizabeth’s nimbyism, there may have been no Globe. Anazing thought.

Old wall (left). Playhouse Yard (right). The theatre was near the pillared building at the back

Later on in 1608, after Lady Elizabeth’s death, Shakespeare and his King’s Men were able to occupy, or re-occupy the (much more profitable) Blackfriars site in the Parliament/Refectory hall where they staged Henry V111 (originally called All is True) in the very hall where Henry’s divorce petition against Anne Boleyn had been debated years earlier and using some of the actual words mouthed by Catherine.

Claiming bottles of Chateau Tooting

Everyone knows that making good wine is all about concentrating on the best grape varieties that suit your soil and then honing them to perfection monitored by experts. Which makes Chateau Tooting, which breaks every rule, all the more interesting. People from all over London – and especially from the south – bring grapes grown in their allotments and gardens to a central point once a year from where they are taken to an established vineyard, Bolney, for processing.

Most of them – including myself – don’t even know what varieties they have been growing or even whether they are wine grapes or desert ones. It is a surefire recipe for vinicultural disaster mitigated by hopes that imbibers will make allowances for the circumstances of its birth.
Which makes it all the more amazing that at last night’s premiere tasting of Chateau Tooting 2013 at Le Gothique by Wandsworth Common it was found to be – well, not bad at all. In fact, rather good.
None of us could pretend to be unbiased observers but everyone seemed genuinely to like it even though, unsurprisingly in view of its provenance it didn’t taste like any wine we were used to. One member from Heathcote&Ross who obtained a distinction in the tasting section of a wine course he took, immediately sensed aromas of greenapple and limey citrus and found it summery and fresh awarding it 7.5 out of 10.
Richard and Paul, who organised it all commented: “The wine looks and tastes great which is fruity and dry with a slight oak hint to it”.
This year they produced 660 bottles of crowd-sourced wine, a bit down in the 1,000 produced two years ago attributed to the fact that they took a year off and started late in 2013. In theory the experiment could be extended by getting some participants to grow the same varieties, but that would take away the spontaneity of the exercise and its uniqueness. If you are growing grapes in your garden or allotment or know someone who is you can join or follow the community at Urban Wine on Facebook. I hope to write sooner about the success of the 2013 urban vintage across the whole if London where vineyards are sprouitng up in unexpected places. It hasnot yet reached the success of the microbreweries but it is on the way,

You can get occasional updates for this blog by putting your email address in the box on the right of the screen – or follow me on @vickeegan for regular stuff or @BritishWino for the exploding English and Welsh wine scene.

Towards Trafalgar Square – with the British Council in between
Augustus J C Hare was not a fan of Trafalgar Square. Writing in 1896 he found a “dreary expanse of granite” with the “miserable buildings” of the National Gallery flanked by a “hideous hotel and a frightful club”. Nelson’s Column was “a very poor work, which, however, does not signify much as it can only be properly seen from the top of the Duke of York’s column which no one ascends”.
Almost 120 years later, it still remains true that no one is allowed to ascend the Duke of York’s column. But reading Augustus Hare aroused a long held curiosity which promoted me to seek permission to climb it. And today it happened. Accompanied by two very helpful people from the Royal Parks I climbed the 168 odd Aberdeen Granite steps, torch in hand, dodging pigeon droppings and the odd egg on the way before being hit by a mesmerising, panoramic view of London I’d never seen before. I looked immediately at Nelson’s Column only to find that what would have been Augustus J C Hare’s untrammelled view of Trafalgar Square and St Martin-in-the-Fields was partially obscured by that Johnny-come-lately, the British Council HQ. However, with a little imagination, one can remove the barrier and see what Hare intended us to see. This apart, the platform reveals an unfolding panorama rarely seen from the west of the Capital even though clouds obscured the Surrey hills which can be seen on a fine day (like yesterday?).

Towards St James Park

I love the brazen majesty of the Duke’s column and always pause to admire when I pass by (Reality Check – it rates 1,678 of 1,788 Attractions in London on Trip Advisor) but it is something of a mystery why the Duke (1674 – 1728) was accorded such a personal monument. He was appointed Commander in Chief of the Army by his doting father, George 111, but failures on the field of battle in France and Holland made him widely regarded as unfit to command an army in the field. He was a notorious philanderer and gambler with the dubious honour of being satirised in the famous nursery rhyme:

“Oh, the grand old Duke of York, he had 10,000 men:

He marched them up to the top of the hill,

And he marched them down again.”

When he died he left debts of £401,169 – tens of millions at today’s prices – leaving some to suppose that he was put on top of a column to dodge his creditors. However, he did leave a lasting legacy for which the nation was grateful by reducing corruption in the granting of army commissions (though this didn’t stop his mistress earning a bob or two that way)  and established a military college that became Sandhurst. The column – built from Aberdeen granite and, appropriately, York stone -was paid for by soldiers in the army donating a day’s pay worth £25,000  (by conscription rather than subscription, one presumes) for its construction from 1830 to 1833.

The public used to be able to climb to the top from 12pm to 4pm, from May to Sept for 6d until a spate of suicides led to its closure in the late 18th century. On a clear day you can see for miles. Thst didn’t happen today but the vista is firmly imprinted in my mind – except for the interfering British Council.

Sign up for occasional updates in the box on the right. Follow me on Twitter @vickeegan

The view towards Regent Street and he Post Office Tower