Smithfield, properly known as West Smithfield,Brewers Dictionary of London Phrase and Fable, Russ Willey, Chambers 2009 is a district located in Central London, part of Farringdon Without, the most westerly ward of the City of London, England.
Smithfield is home to a number of City institutions, such as St Bartholomew's Hospital and livery halls, including those of the Butchers' and Haberdashers' Companies. The area is best known for the Smithfield meat market, which dates from the 10th century, has been in continuous operation since medieval times, and is now London's only remaining wholesale market. Smithfield's principal street is called West Smithfield.Renamed in 1889 to avoid confusion with the Smithfield in Tower Hamlets, nowadays called East Smithfield. Each summer, from the 12th century to the 19th century the area hosted Bartholomew Fair, and the area also contains the City's oldest surviving church building, St Bartholomew-the-Great, dating from 1123 (most City churches were destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666).
The area is located just beyond the New Gate and formerly its prison which held condemned prisoners. In former centuries, especially prior to the establishment of Tyburn, the area bore witness to many executions of heretics and political rebels, as well as Scottish knight Sir William Wallace, and Wat Tyler, leader of the Peasants' Revolt, among many other religious reformers and dissenters (later on, public executions were generally moved out to Tyburn, until being moved back to the prison).
The present Smithfield Market, a Grade II listed-covered market building, was designed by Victorian architect Sir Horace Jones in the second half of the 19th century, and is the dominant architectural feature of the area. Some of its original market premises fell into disuse in the late 20th century and faced the prospect of demolition. The Corporation of London's public enquiry in 2012 drew widespread support for an urban regeneration plan intent upon preserving Smithfield's historical identity.
Smithfield area
In the Middle Ages, it was a broad grassy area known as Smooth Field, located beyond London Wall and stretching to the eastern bank of the River Fleet. Given its ease of access to grazing and water, Smithfield established itself as London's livestock market, remaining so for almost 1,000 years. Many local toponyms are associated with the livestock trade: while some street names (such as "Cow Cross Street" and "Cock Lane") remain in use, many more (such as "Chick Lane", "Duck Lane", "Cow Lane", "Pheasant Court", "Goose Alley") have disappeared from the map after the major redevelopment of the area in the Victorian era.
Religious history
In 1123, the area near Aldersgate was granted by King Henry I for the foundation of St Bartholomew's Priory at the request of Prior Rahere, in thanks for his being nursed back to good health. The Priory exercised its right to enclose land between the vicinity of the boundary with Aldersgate Without (to the east), Long Lane (to the north) and modern-day Newgate Street (to the south), erecting its main western gate which opened onto Smithfield, and a postern on Long Lane. By facing the open space of Smithfield and by having 'its back to' the buildings lining Aldersgate Street, the Priory site has left a continuing legacy of limited connectivity between the Smithfield area and Aldersgate Street.
The Priory thereafter held the manorial rights to hold weekly fairs, which initially took place in its outer court on the site of present-day Cloth Fair, leading to "Fair Gate".The parish: Bounds, gates and watchmen, The Records of St. Bartholomew's Priory [and] St. Bartholomew the Great, West Smithfield: volume 2 (1921), pp. 199–212. Retrieved 10 April 2009
An additional annual celebration, the Bartholomew Fair, was established in 1133 by the Augustinian canons. Over time, this became one of London's pre-eminent summer fairs, opening each year on 24 August. A trading event for cloth and other goods as well as being a pleasure forum, the four-day festival drew crowds from all strata of English society.
In 1855, however, the City authorities closed Bartholomew Fair as they considered it to have degenerated into a magnet for debauchery and public disorder.
In 1348, Walter de Manny rented of land at Spital Croft, north of Long Lane, from the Master and Brethren of St Bartholomew's Hospital, for a graveyard and plague pit for victims of the Black Death. A chapel and hermitage were constructed, renamed New Church Haw; but in 1371, this land was granted for the foundation of the Charterhouse, originally a Carthusian monastery.Religious Houses: House of Carthusian monks, A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 1: Physique, Archaeology, Domesday, Ecclesiastical Organization, The Jews, Religious Houses, Education of Working Classes to 1870, Private Education from Sixteenth Century (1969), pp. 159–169. accessed: 10 April 2009
Nearby and to the north of this demesne, the Knights Hospitaller established a Commandery at Clerkenwell, dedicated to St John in the mid-12th century. In 1194 they received a Charter from King Richard I granting the Order formal privileges. Later Augustinian canonesses established the Priory of St Mary, north of the Knights of St John property.Religious Houses: Houses of Augustinian canonesses, A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 1: Physique, Archaeology, Domesday, Ecclesiastical Organization, The Jews, Religious Houses, Education of Working Classes to 1870, Private Education from Sixteenth Century (1969), pp. 170–182. Retrieved 10 April 2009.
By the end of the 14th century, these religious houses were regarded by City traders as interlopers – occupying what had previously been public open space near one of the City gates. On numerous occasions vandals damaged the Charterhouse, eventually demolishing its buildings. By 1405, a stout wall was built to protect the property and maintain the privacy of the Order, particularly its church where men and women alike came to worship.
The religious houses were dissolved in the Reformation, and their lands broken up. The Priory Church of St John remains, as does St John's Gate. John Houghton (later canonized by Pope Paul VI as St John Houghton), The prior of Charterhouse went to Thomas Cromwell, accompanied by two other local priors, seeking an oath of supremacy that would be acceptable to their communities. Instead they were imprisoned in the Tower of London, and on 4 May 1535, they were taken to Tyburn and hanged – becoming the first Catholic martyrs of the Reformation. On 29 May, the remaining twenty monks and eighteen lay brothers were forced to swear the oath of allegiance to King Henry VIII; the ten who refused were taken to Newgate Prison and left to starve.The Carthusian Martyrs of London Barry Bossa accessed 9 May 2009
With the monks expelled, Charterhouse was requisitioned and remained as a private dwelling until its reestablishment by Thomas Sutton in 1611 as a charitable foundation; it was the basis of the school named Charterhouse and almshouses known as Sutton's Hospital in Charterhouse on its former site. The school was relocated to Godalming in 1872. Until 1899 Charterhouse was extra-parochial; that year it became a civil parish incorporated in the Metropolitan Borough of Finsbury. Some of the property was damaged during The Blitz, but it remains largely intact. Part of the site is now occupied by Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry.
From its inception, the Priory of St Bartholomew treated the sick. After the Reformation it was left with neither income nor monastic occupants but, following a petition by the City Corporation, Henry VIII refounded it in December 1546, as the "House of the Poore in West Smithfield in the suburbs of the City of London of Henry VIII's Foundation". Letters Patent were presented to the City, granting property and income to the new foundation the following month. King Henry VIII's sergeant-surgeon, Thomas Vicary, was appointed as the hospital's first superintendent.St Bartholomew's Hospital, Old and New London: Volume 2 (1878), pp. 359–363 accessed: 9 April 2009 The King Henry VIII Gate, which opens onto West Smithfield, was completed in 1702 and remains the hospital's main entrance.
The Priory's principal church, St Bartholomew-the-Great, was reconfigured after the dissolution of the monasteries, losing almost all of its nave. Reformed as an Anglican parish church, its parish boundaries were limited to the site of the ancient priory and a small tract of land between the church and Long Lane. The parish of St Bartholomew the Great was designated as a Liberty, responsible for the upkeep and security of its fabric and the land within its boundaries. With the advent of street lighting, mains water, and sewerage during the Victorian era, maintenance of such an ancient parish with so few parishioners became increasingly uneconomical after the Industrial Revolution. In 1910, it agreed to be incorporated by the Corporation of London which guaranteed financial support and security. Great St Barts' present parish boundary includes just 10 feet (3.048 m) of Smithfield – possibly delineating a former right of way.
After the Reformation, a separate parish likewise dedicated to St Bartholomew was granted in favour of St Bartholomew's Hospital; named St Bartholomew-the-Less, it remained under the hospital's patronage, unique in the Church of England, until 1948, when the hospital was nationalized in the National Health Service.St Bartholomew the Less parish (AIM25) accessed 9 April 2009 The church benefice has since been joined again with its ancient partner, the Priory Church of St Bartholomew the Great.
Following the diminished influence of the ancient Priory, predecessor of the two parishes of St Bartholomew, disputes began to arise over rights to tithes and taxes payable by lay residents who claimed allegiance with the nearby and anciently associated parish of St Botolph Aldersgate – an unintended consequence and legacy of King Henry VIII's religious reforms.
Smithfield and its market, situated mostly in the parish of St Sepulchre, was founded in 1137, and was endowed by Prior Rahere, who also founded St Barts. The ancient parish of St Sepulchre extended north to Turnmill Street, to St Paul's Cathedral and Ludgate Hill in the south, and along the east bank of the Fleet (now the route of Farringdon Street). St Sepulchre's Tower contains the twelve "bells of Old Bailey", referred to in the nursery rhyme "Oranges and Lemons". Traditionally, the Great Bell was rung to announce the execution of a prisoner at Newgate.
Civil history