Hyde Park from Domesday-book to Date

CHAPTER XI

Royal Humane Society’s Receiving House – Boats and bathing – The Dell – Chelsea Water Works reservoir – Walnut-trees – Flower-walk – Military executions – The Magazine, Whip, Four in Hand and Coaching Clubs – Their dress – Satire on coaching – The Park as a military centre – The first review – Fort at Hyde Park Corner – Guard-house – Camp in Hyde Park – Insubordinate troops.

On the north bank of the Serpentine, nearly on the site of the Cheesecake House, is the Receiving House of the Royal Humane Society, built in 1834 (the Duke of Wellington laying the first stone), on the site of a former one, which was erected forty years previously, George III. having given the Society a piece of ground for the purpose. Needless to say, it is a very useful institution, especially during severe frosts, being a convenient place where fractures, contusions and immersions can be properly attended to.

Near the Receiving House, boats can be hired for diversion on the lake, and on the opposite, or southern side, is a very fine bathing place, which is most extensively patronized, both in early morning and late evening, in the summer – nay, all the year round come some bathers, be the weather what it will, regardless of rain or frost. A boat rows up and down to rescue any swimmer who should be suddenly seized with cramp. On the same side, but nearer the eastern end, is the favourite place for sailing miniature vessels, some of them being beautiful models, exquisitely fitted and very costly.

At the eastern end of the Serpentine, its water overflows in a miniature cascade into a very pretty little dell, in which are rabbits disporting themselves, together with pheasants, and in 1890 there was a squirrel. As the public are not allowed to invade this portion, but only to look at it, the small zoological domain increases and multiplies, and the animals become exceedingly tame. In this dell is a monolith, which came from Moorswater, in the parish of Liskeard, Cornwall, where it was quarried on Jan. 3, 1862. One of the excavators employed in the work was accidentally killed, and his death was the cause of the publication of two books, William Sandy, who died by an accident at Moorswater, etc., and The grace of God manifested in the life and death of William Sandy, etc. This monolith, although obviously only placed in the Dell for ornamental purposes, was, by a correspondent in Notes and Queries,40 declared to be a phallic symbol.

Between Stanhope Gate and Grosvenor Gate, close by the flower-walk, may be noticed a circular basin having in its centre a fountain. This, which is shown in Roque’s Map, was a reservoir of the Chelsea Water Works Company, and it stood, as the same map well shows, in a double avenue of walnut-trees. These, ultimately, became very decayed, and about 1811 they were cut down, and their timber made into gun-stocks for the army. The flower-walk is a worthy successor to the avenue, and gives great scope to the gardener’s skill and sense of colour, from early spring, with its hyacinths, daffodils, narcissi and tulips, to late autumn, when the bedding out plants, which have afforded innocent delight to hundreds of thousands, are distributed among the poor, and thus continue their sphere of usefulness by brightening the homes of the recipients.

If the reader will turn to Roque’s Map, he will see, just where the Marble Arch now stands, a “Stone where soldiers are shot.” And it was a place for military executions, and the shooting of two sergeants for desertion, etc., is thus described by Draper in 1751: —

The Gentleman’s Magazine for 1747 gives an account of a military execution here. “Thursday, 26th Nov. A court-martial was held at Whitehall, general Wade president, on the trial of Sergeant Smith, who was lately bought from Scotland, for deserting into the service of the French, and, afterwards, to that of the rebels; and after hearing, and the facts being proved, he was found guilty.

“Friday, Dec. 11. Sergeant Smith was conducted from the Savoy to the Parade in St. James’s Park, and from thence by a party of the Foot-guards, commanded by Col. Dury, attended by the minister of the Savoy, to Hyde Park, where he was hang’d on a gibbet erected for that purpose, and bury’d near it: he seemed not much concerned, and professed himself a protestant. He had been in the service of several princes, and abus’d them all by desertion. Having thus acquir’d divers languages, he was of great service to our officers in Germany, as interpreter, who treated him as a companion, and promoted him to be paymaster sergeant, by which, and other perquisites, he had above £200 per annum; but he could not overcome his propensity to change.”

Anent this stone, Larwood says, that when Cumberland Gate was built, and the ground prepared for that purpose, this stone was found so deeply imbedded in the earth, that it was thought more convenient to cover than to remove it. The earth was consequently thrown over it, and it now lies buried in its original resting-place.

On the north-west side of the Serpentine, and close by the bridge, which there crosses it, is a magazine for gunpowder, generally known as “The Magazine,” a singularly exposed position for the storage of such destructive material. It now forms the starting place, at the commencement of the season, of the “Four-in-Hand” and “Coaching” Clubs, either of which, if the weather is propitious, is a very pretty sight.

The first of these clubs was started as the “Whip Club,” and in the Morning Post, June 9, 1808, is a description of a “Meet.”

“The Whip Club met on Monday morning in Park Lane, and proceeded from thence to dine at Harrow-on-the-Hill. There were fifteen barouche-landaus, with four horses to each; the drivers were all men of known skill in the science of charioteering. Lord Hawke, Mr. Buxton, and the Hon. Lincoln Stanhope were among the leaders.

“The following was the style of the set out: Yellow bodied carriages, with whip springs and dickey boxes; cattle of a bright bay colour, with plain silver ornaments on the harness, and rosettes to the ears. Costume of the drivers: a light drab colour cloth coat made full, single breast, with three tiers of pockets, the skirts reaching to the ankles: a mother-of-pearl button of the size of a crown piece. Waistcoat blue and yellow stripe, each stripe an inch in depth. Small clothes corded with silk plush, made to button over the calf of the leg, with sixteen strings and rosettes to each knee. The boots very short, and finished with very broad straps, which hung over the tops and down to the ankle. A hat three inches and a half deep in the crown only, and the same depth in the brim exactly. Each wore a large bouquet at the breast, thus resembling the coachmen of our nobility, who, on the natal day of our beloved sovereign, appear, in that respect, so peculiarly distinguished. The party moved along the road at a smart trot; the first whip gave some specimens of superiority at the outset, by ‘cutting a fly off a leader’s ear.’ ”

In the Annual Register, vol. 51, p. 883 (1809), is the following satire “On the Whip Club: —

The Morning Post, April 3rd, 1809, says that the title of the “Whip Club,” had then been changed to the “Four-in-Hand-Club,” and their first meet took place in Cavendish Square on April 28th of that year. The dress of the drivers was altered, and was as follows. A single-breasted blue coat, with a long waist, and brass buttons, on which were engraved the words “Four-in-Hand-Club,” waistcoat of kerseymere, ornamented with stripes alternately of blue and yellow; small clothes of white corduroy, made moderately high, and very long over the knee, buttoning in front over the shin-bone. Boots very short, with long tops, only one outside strap to each, and one at the back; the latter were employed to keep the breeches in their proper longitudinal shape. Hat with a conical crown, and the Allen brim(?); box, or driving coat of white drab cloth, with fifteen capes, two tiers of pockets, and an inside one for the Belcher handkerchief; cravat of white muslin spotted with black. Bouquets of myrtle, pink and yellow geraniums were worn. In May of the same year, the club button had already gone out of fashion, and “Lord Hawke sported yesterday, as buttons, Queen Anne’s shillings; Mr. Ashurst displayed crown pieces.”

Possibly this “Four-in-Hand-Club” was dissolved, for Captain Gronow says42 that amongst his papers he found a list of the original members of the club, which met at Richmond on Saturday, June 2nd, 1838, and passed a series of resolutions, that formed the basis of the regulations which were observed during its existence: and he relates how “In the days of which I speak there were amateur coachmen, who drove with unflinching regularity, and in all weathers, the public stage-coaches, and delighted in the opportunity of assimilating themselves with professional jehus. Some young men then, heirs of large landed proprietors, mounted the box, handled the ribbons, and bowled along the high road; they touched their hats to their passengers, and some among them did not disdain even the tip of a shilling or half-crown, with which it was the custom to remunerate the coachman.

“Many persons liked travelling to Brighton in ‘The Age,’ which was tooled along by Sir Vincent Cotton, whilst others preferred Charley Tyrrwhit. On the Holyhead, Oxford, and the Bath and Bristol roads, Lord Harborough, Lord Clonmel, Sir Thomas Mostyn, Sir Charles Bamfylde, Sir Felix Agar, Sir Henry Parnell, Sir Bellingham Graham, Mr. Clutterbuck, Sir John Lade, and other members of the Four-in-Hand-Club, were seen, either driving the coach, or sitting cheek-by-jowl with the coachman, talking about horses and matters relating to ‘life upon the road.’ One of the members of the Four-in-Hand-Club, Mr. Akers, was so determined to be looked upon as a regular coachman, that he had his front teeth so filed, that a division between them might enable him to expel his spittle in the true fashion of some of the most knowing stage-coach drivers.”

In the Park, and close by the path which leads from Grosvenor Gate to the Magazine, are some small barracks for the use of the guards of the Magazine – but Hyde Park has been for more than two centuries the Campus Martius of London, and the first review recorded as having been held there was by Lord Hunsdon, the then Ranger, when as Stow says in his Annales, on the 28th of March, 1569, “The Pensioners well appointed in armour on horsebacke, mustered before the Queen’s Maiestie in Hide Park beside Westminster.”

In The Bow-man’s Glory, 1682, is “A Brief Relation of the several appearances of Archers, since His Majesties Restauration. – On March the 21st Anno Domini, 1661. Four hundred archers, with their bows and arrows, made a splendid and glorious show in Hide Park, with flying colours, and cross-bows to guard them. Sir Gilbert Talbot, Baronet, was their Colonel, Sir Edward Hungerford, Knight of the Bath, their Lieutenant-Colonel; Mr. Donne was their Major. Great was the appearance both of the nobility, gentry and commonalty: several of the archers shot near twenty score yards within the compass of a hat with their cross-bows; and many of them, to the amazement of the spectators, hit the mark; there were, likewise, three showers of whistling arrows. So great was the delight, and so pleasing the exercise, that three Regiments of Foot laid down their arms to come and see it.”

In the early days of the Commonwealth, London was fortified by the Parliament, and so urgent were they on this matter that we read in A Perfect Diurnall of the Passages in Parliament, April 24th to May 1st, 1643, “An order was made by the common Councell of London, that the Ministers in the severall Parishes of the Citie should stir up the Parishioners in their severall churches the next day to send such of their servants and children as are fit to labour, with spades, shovells and other necessary tooles to helpe and assist the raising of the out-workes for the defence of the Citie, which is very needeful to be finished with all expedition, in regard two great Armies are now on foote near the Citie, and that they would begin the work by Wednesday next.”

Nay, the very women helped in this work, as Butler tells us in Hudibras (part ii. cant. 2.): —

In a very fine copy of Hudibras (ed. 1793), with voluminous notes by T. R. Nash, he thus elucidates the line “Rais’d Rampiers with their own soft hands.” “When London was expected to be attacked, and in several sieges during the civil war, the women, and even the ladies of rank and fortune, not only encouraged the men, but worked with their own hands. Lady Middlesex, Lady Foster, Lady Anne Waller, and Mrs. Dunch, have been particularly celebrated for their activity.” The probability is that he took the names of these ladies from a not very scarce satirical tract printed in 1647, called The Parliament of Ladies, or Divers remarkable passages of Ladies in Spring Gardens; in Parliament Assembled, etc., which was never meant to be taken seriously. They are mentioned in the following resolution: —