Souvenir guide to London : visit of surgeons of the United States of America 1910.

Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Souvenir guide to London : visit of surgeons of the United States of America 1910. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    219/680 (page 103)
    1611 by Thomas Sutton^ a wealthy mercbant, for his ‘Hospital’, i.e a school for 40 ‘poor boys’ and a home for 80 ‘poor men’. A curfew, tolled every evening at 8 or 9 o’clock, proclaims the number of the ‘poor brethren’, which owing to depreciation of agricultural rents is now 59. These are not former pupils of the school; the fictitious instance of Thackeray’s Col. Newcome, who was both a pupil and a poor brother, is one which has very rarely been paralleled in the real history of the institution. The school was transferred in 1872 to Godaiming in Surrey, where large and handsome buildings were erected for it (see Baedeker s Great Brltairi). The part of the pro- perty thus vacated was sold to the Merchant Taylors’ Company for their ancient school, now containing 500 boys. The Charterhouse School, which is attended by 500 boys besides 60 on the found- ation, boasts among its former scholars the names of Barrow, Crashaw, Lovelace, Steele, Addison, Blackstone, Wesley, Thomas Day (author of ‘Sandford and Merton’), Grote, Thirlwall, Leech, Havelock, and Thackeray; while among the famous pupils of the Merchant Taylors’ School are Edmund Spenser, James Shirley, and Lord Clive. Visitors are shown over the buildings by the porter any day except Sun. (fee 6d., reduction for a party); but the Great Hall is closed from noon to 3 p.m. Visitors may attend service in the chapel on Sun. at 11 and on weekdays at 9.30 and 6. The ancient buildings date chiefly from the early part of the 16th cent., but have been modified and added to by Lord North, the Duke of Norfolk, and others. The Great Hall is considered one of the finest spe- cimens of a 16th cent, room in London. The Great Staircase and the Great Chamber upstairs are, with the exception of the W. window of the latter, just as the Duke of Norfolk left them three centuries ago. Part of the original Chapel (1371) remains, hut it was altered by the monks about 1500 and greatly enlarged by the Trustees of Thomas Sutton in 1612, when it received its present Jacobean appearance. It is approached by a cloister with memorials of Thackeray, Leech, Havelock, John Hul- lah, etc., and contains a fine alabaster monument of Sutton (1611) and the monuments of the first Lord Ellenborough by Chantrey and of Dr. Raine by Flaxman. The altar-piece is a copy of Francia’s Pieta in the National Gallery (p. 172; No. 180). The initials of Prior Houghton, who was head of the priory at the dissolution, may be seen on the outer wall of the Washhouse Court. The two quadrangles in which the Pensioners and some of the officials reside were built about 1825-40. The Master's Lodge contains several portraits: Sutton, the founder of the institution; Charles II.; George Villiers, second Duke of Buckingham; Duke of Monmouth; Lord Chancellor Shaftesbury; Lord Chancellor Somers; William, Earl of Craven; Archbishop Sheldon; Talbot, Duke of Shrews- bury; and the fine portrait of Dr. Burnet, by Kneller. A little to tbe W. of tbe Charterhouse is St. John's Lane, in which is situated St. John’s Gate (PI. R, 36), an interesting relic of an old priory of the knights of St. John, with lateral turrets, erected in the late-Gothic style in 1504, by Prior Docvjra. On the N. side of the gateway are the arms of the priory and of Docwra ; and on the S. side those of England and of France. The knight s of St. John were suppressed by Henry VIII., restored by Mary, and finally dispersed by Elizabeth. The rooms above the gate were