John Ashton - The Fleet. Its Rivers, Prison, and Marriages

Fagges well.

"Then was there Fagges well, neare vnto Smithfield by the Charterhouse , now lately dammed vp, Tod well , Loders well , and Rad well , all decayed, and so filled vp, that there places are hardly now discerned.

"Somewhat North from Holy well is one other well curbed square with stone, and is called Dame Annis the Cleare , and not farre from it, but somewhat west, is also one other cleare water called Perillous pond 8 8 Afterwards known as "Peerless Pool," an unmeaning cognomen. , because diuerse youthes by swimming therein haue beene drowned; and thus much bee said for Fountaines and Wels.

" Horse poole in Westsmithfield , was sometime a great water, and because the inhabitants in that part of the Citie did there water their Horses, the same was, in olde Recordes, called Horspoole , it is now much decayed, the springs being stopped vp, and the land waters falling into the small bottome, remayning inclosed, with Bricke, is called Smithfield pond .

Poole without Cripplegate.

"By S. Giles Churchyard was a large water, called a Poole . I read in the year 1244 that Anne of Lodburie was drowned therein; this poole is now for the most part stopped vp, but the spring is preserued, and was cooped about with stone by the Executors of Richard Wittington ."

LONDON, for its size, was indeed very well supplied with water, although, of course, it was not laid on to every house, as now, but, with the exception of those houses provided with wells, it had to be fetched from fixed public places, which were fairly numerous. When the waters of the Fleet, and Wallbrook, in the process of time, became contaminated, Henry III., in the 21st year of his reign (1236), granted to the Citizens of London the privilege of conveying the waters of the Tye-bourne through leaden pipes to the City, "for the poore to drinke, and the rich to dresse their meate." And it is only a few years since, that close by what is now called "Sedley Place," Oxford Street, but which used to be the old hunting lodge of bygone Lord Mayors, some of these very pipes were unearthed, a fine cistern being uncovered at the same time.

For public use there were the great Conduit in West Cheape: the Tonne or Tun in Cornhill, fountains at Billingsgate, at Paul's Wharf, and St. Giles', Cripplegate, and conduits at Aldermanbury, the Standard in Fleet Street, Gracechurch Street, Holborn Cross (afterwards Lamb's Conduit), at the Stocks Market (where the Mansion House now stands), Bishopsgate, London Wall, Aldgate, Lothbury – and this without reckoning the supply furnished from the Thames by the enterprising German, or Dutchman, Pieter Moritz, who in 1582 started the famous waterworks close to where Fishmongers' Hall now stands.

The Fleet river (I prefer that title to the other cognomen, "Ditch"), flowing through London, naturally became somewhat befouled, and in Henry the VII.'s time, circa 1502, it was cleansed, so that, as aforesaid, "boats with fish and fewel were rowed to Fleete bridge, and to Oldburne bridge." We also know, as Stow records, that more springs were introduced into the stream from Hampstead, without effect, either as to deepening or purifying the river, which had an evil reputation even in the time of Edward I., as we see in Ryley's "Placita Parliamentaria" (ed. 1661), p. 340 —

" Ad peticionem Com. Lincoln. querentis quod cum cursus aque, que currit apud London sub Ponte de Holeburn , & Ponte de Fleete usque in Thamisiam solebat ita largus & latus esse, ac profundus, quod decem Naves vel duodecim ad predictum Pontem de Fleete cum diversis rebus & mercandisis solebant venire, & quedam illarum Navium sub illo Ponte transire, usque ad predictum Pontem de Holeburn ad predictum cursum mundanmum & simos exinde cariand, nunc ille cursus per fordes & inundaciones Taunatorum & p varias perturbaciones in predicta aqua, factas & maxime per exaltationem Caye & diversionem aque quam ipsi de Novo Templo fecerunt ad Molendina sua extra Castra Baignard , quod Naves predicte minime intrare possunt sicut solebant, & facere debeant &c. unde supplicat quod Maior de London assumptis secum Vice com. & discretionibus Aldermannis cursum pred̄ce aque videat, & quod per visum & sacrm̃ proborum & legalium hominum faciat omnia nocumenta predicte aque que invinerit ammovere & reparare cursum predictum, & ipsum in tali statu manutenere in quo antiquitus esse solebat &c. Ita responsum est, Assignentur Rogerus le Brabazon & Constabularius Turris, London Maior & Vice Com. London, quod ipsi assumptit secum discretionibus Aldermannis London, &c., inquirant per sacramentum &c., qualiter fieri consuevit & qualis cursus. Et necumenta que invenerint ammoveant & manueri faciant in eadem statu quo antiquitus esse solebat. "

Latin for which a modern schoolboy would get soundly rated, or birched, but which tells us that even as far back as Edward I. the Fleet river was a nuisance; and as the endorsement (Patent Roll 35 Edward I.) shows – "De cursu aquæ de Fleta supervivendo et corrigendo," i. e. , that the Fleet river should be looked after and amended. But the Commission issued to perfect this work was discontinued, owing to the death of the king. (Patent Roll 1 Edward II., pars 1. m. dorso.) "De Cursu Aquæ Flete, &c., reducend et impedimenta removend."

And Prynne, in his edition of Cotton's "Records" (ed. 1669, p. 188), asks "whether such a commission and inquiry to make this river navigable to Holborn Bridge or Clerkenwell, would not now be seasonable, and a work worthy to be undertaken for the public benefit, trade, and health of the City and Suburbs, I humbly submit to the wisdom and judgment of those whom it most Concerns."

So that it would appear, although otherwise stated, that the Fleet was not navigable in May, 1669, the date of the publication of Prynne's book.

As a matter of fact it got to be neither more nor less than an open sewer, to which the lines in Coleridge's "Table Talk" would well apply —

The smell of the Fleet river was notorious; so much so, that Farquhar, in his Sir Harry Wildair , act ii., says, "Dicky! Oh! I was just dead of a Consumption, till the sweet smoke of Cheapside , and the dear perfume of Fleet Ditch made me a man again!" In Queen Anne's time, too, it bore an evil reputation: vide The Tatler (No. 238, October 17, 1710) by Steele and Swift. 9 9 Journal to Stella , October 17, 1710 – "This day came out The Tatler , made up wholly of my Shower, and a preface to it. They say it is the best thing I ever writ, and I think so too."