Happy History Hour: Top 5 London Pubs
Beer Street and Gin Lane, William Hogarth
“Write what you know” is what writers—established or otherwise—hear from those in the know and from those who don’t know much at all. Meanwhile, visitors to places I have either lived in or been to, regularly ask me, “What bars would you recommend?” Penning my advice on this particular topic is, needless to say, writing what I know, but occupying the go-to pub whisperer position can be a tricky bar stool on which to balance. There is much to consider: day versus night; hunger versus thirst; playlist versus jukebox; conversational opportunities versus drowning one’s sorrows; polished decor versus rough around the edges, and so on. For me personally, a bar with a backstory has a much stronger pull than a beverage menu. Based on this Stories from the City blog being an extension of Purefinder New York, the following recommendations will focus less on barfly anecdotes or a quest for real ale than on historical context summaries of the vicinity of five pubs. Thus, Stories from the City will occasionally provide my personal pub recommendations from around the world with a historical bent. We shall begin, on this occasion, with the Big Smoke, the Great Wen, i.e. London.
On a side note, ahead of the top 5, approaching historic London pubs presents a challenge, as in finding one that esteemed novelist, social reformer, insomniac, and devout walker Charles Dickens didn’t visit in the 19th century—or going back further—noted diarist, member of parliament, naval administrator, and cheese rescuer Samuel Pepys didn’t visit in the 17th century.
Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese
1. Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese is situated in Fleet Street. The River Fleet, which gave the street its name, is the largest subterranean river in London. Incorporated into the sewer system in the 19th century, the Fleet's wastewater flow is audible through grates and gutters outside specific London pubs. Fleet Street sits inside the “City of London,” as in the square mile origins of the city. A busy financial district on weekdays, the area is often deserted on weekends. Therefore, a quiet pint can easily be obtained. The ancient streets and alleyways of the old city, some of them still hemmed in by plastered walls that survived the Great Fire of 1666, harbor some of the oldest drinking establishments in England's capital. As regards The Olde Cheshire Cheese, the original pub dates back to 1538. The current pub was rebuilt shortly after the Great Fire. Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese is not, however, the site from which Samuel Pepys, mentioned above, rescued his cheese (Pepys’ variety was, in fact, parmesan), although we can assume he at least stuck his head around the door like many of his contemporaries. The ghosts of other notable wordsmith patrons—Mark Twain, Alfred Tennyson, Arthur Conan Doyle, P.G. Wodehouse, and, of course, Charles Dickens—continue to toast their respective eras in the imagination of literary tourism. If walls could talk, they would undoubtedly relay the lunchtime gossip of age-old Fleet Street newspaper reporters. Held in higher regard by some patrons, is Polly, the infamous dead parrot behind the bar.
Gordon’s Wine Bar
2. Gordon’s Wine Bar, unchallenged in its claim to be the oldest wine bar in London, is bordered by Covent Garden, the West End, Charing Cross, and Embankment. It resides on Villiers Street, where Samuel Pepys—not unexpectedly—had a residence, and where Rudyard Kipling once lived. Established in 1890, selected offerings from Gordon’s menu—wine, port, cheese, and meat—may be the historic enablers of gout, but for over a century, this underground cave-like hideaway has been more synonymous with secret rendezvous and candlelit office affairs. Additionally, the low ceilings and dark cavernous spaces have become accustomed to the frequent headbanging accidents from the tall and/or inebriated. Curiously, the two generations of the Gordon family who currently own Gordon’s Wine Bar are not related to the three generations of the Gordon family who previously owned it.
The Prospect of Whitby
3. The Prospect of Whitby, in Wapping, is one of many historic pubs along the Thames. The past creeps in heading east: Execution Dock, Captains Kidd and Cook, the Ratcliff Highway Murders, Chinese opium dens, press gangs, crime, and slop—and along the shoreline—dagger hilts, bluish shards of plate, and hollow lime-green pieces from ancient clay pipes. Various incarnations of the Prospect of Whitby—including the Devil’s Tavern—have served last orders to pirates, smugglers, locals, tourists, and mudlarks since the 1500s. The current architecture dates back in a piecemeal fashion to the 16th, 18th, and 19th centuries. Like so many British drinking establishments, the present-day bar belongs to the pub and brewing company Greene King (founded in 1799), nicknamed “Greedy King” by those who resent their monopoly-like takeover. Nonetheless, The Prospect of Whitby, with its wooden beamed ceiling and spaces to suit dark moods, has retained its outlaw undercurrents. On the shore outside the pub, a hangman’s noose pays homage to the pirate executions that took place in the vicinity, including that of the legendary Captain Kidd. Inevitably, Pepys and Dickens, separated by two centuries, were patrons.
Sir Ian McKellen (left) at The Grapes
4. The Grapes, in Limehouse, is another fermenting Thames-side tavern; more precisely, an 18th-century pub built on the site of a 16th-century pub. The indoor aesthetic, faithful to the classic London boozer, fits the working-class demographic it was built for. Narrow Street, on which The Grapes is located, is also where painter Francis Bacon’s home and studio were raided in a 1968 drug bust. Dickens (yes, him again), a frequent visitor to Limehouse, described a thinly veiled version of The Grapes in Our Mutual Friend, his last completed novel: “A tavern of dropsical appearance… long settled down into a state of hale infirmity.” The Grapes’ rickety stilts and staircase riverside exterior suit Dickens’ description but the ramshackle appearance is part of its charm. When actor Ian McKellen, co-owner of The Grapes, isn’t busy with theater and film stardom, he can be found partaking in the Monday night pub quiz, despite being fired as the quizmaster by his business partner.
The Mayflower
5. The Mayflower, a popular hub for British carbs, is in Rotherhithe in the borough of Southwark on the south bank of the Thames, across from The Grapes and the Prospect of Whitby. Rotherhithe is where the HMS Hussar, the Royal Navy frigate that was destroyed in New York’s notorious Hell Gate waters in 1780, and the world’s first tunnel under a navigable river were constructed. Incidentally, French-British engineer Marc Isambard Brunel’s tunneling shield, which aided the connection of Rotherhithe and Wapping via the Thames Tunnel, was reportedly inspired by a worm. The origin story of the Plymouth Colony, the first English colony in New England, had a brush with the area, hence the pub’s name. Sixty-five passengers boarded the Mayflower ship in Rotherhithe ahead of its journey to the New World. Elsewhere, the Mayflower’s oldest pub on the River Thames claim is site-specific as opposed to architecturally accurate. Be that as it may, since the 16th century, the various buildings and monikers have lent themselves to The Mayflower’s jumble of nautical-themed curios, framed portraits, and taxidermy. Having found no direct reference to Pepys’ or Dickens’ pub patronage, one can only assume that they were both barred.
