Finding more Loughborough connections in London

If you visited the blog last week you will have seen the post about connections I found between Loughborough and London when I recently paid a visit to the capital. There were lots and lots of these connections, and this week I’m sharing the people connections I found! 

Most of the people with connections are big people, by which, I don’t mean in size, I really mean that they’re pretty famous!!

I was lucky enough to visit the Charles Dickens Museum, which was in the house in which the family lived before poverty struck. It was fascinating to read the story of his life, his writings, and his friendships. Dickens is known to have visited Loughborough, and stayed in the Bull’s Head Hotel which used to be on High Street. It was around 1855, when he stopped off on his way to Mount St Bernard Abbey, and he wrote about his experience in a weekly journal called ‘All the Year Round’. The actual article, called ‘Out of the world’, was published in the very early days of the journal which Dickens edited – Vol.1 issue 4, to be precise – and Dickens loosely disguised Loughborough by calling it Buffborough!

The Dickens Museum in London

I spotted Phillip Larkin, the poet, in the National Portrait Gallery! Larkin used to be a regular visitor to our lovely town, when his mother, and sister, used to live on York Road. I've written about Mrs Larkin in a number of blogposts: here's an example.

Nelson’s Column was as tall as I remembered it! The man who won the competition to design a monument to commemorate Nelson, was William Railton, an architect who was responsible for the Bavarian Arch, and several lodges on the Garendon Estate, as well as some Leicestershire village churches, like St Paul’s at Woodhouse Eaves. I’ve written extensively about Railton on this blog!

Richard Cobden was a radical politician who was jointly responsible for creating the Anti-Corn Law League, which was about abolishing the laws that taxed imported wheat, making products like bread more expensive for people to buy. In Loughborough we have a school and a road named after Richard Cobden.

Lord Macaulay used to live at Rothley Court, and a few years ago a plaque was unveiled on the building: I was honoured to be invited to attend the unveiling and wrote about it on an earlier post. The first picture below was in the Dickens Museum, as lord Macaulay was a friend of the author, while the second picture was in the National Portrait Gallery.

 

Charles Booth did lots of surveys of the poor in London, and at one time lived at Grace Dieu Manor house, which was a building that had been designed by William Railton for the de Lisle family. Mrs Ada Coltman visited Mr and Mrs Booth at Grace Dieu, and Booth's wife was the daughter of Lord Macaulay. I admit to sometimes confusing Charles with William Booth he started the Salvation Army, and who once lived in Sneinton, Nottingham, and who is celebrated with a statue in London.

Charles Booth

 

William Booth

The Blacksmith’s Arms is currently being refurbished again. This building was built in 1931, and replaced an older building which had once been called the Blackboy. You can read about my theory behind that former name, and its connection to the Burnaby family on an older blogpost. The picture below is simply a man with the surname Burnaby!

 

And so to another famous person – Handel! Not a direct connection to Loughborough really, but he used to stay at Gopsall Hall, where he wrote the Messiah to words by Jennens. I’ve written about this before, so I won’t repeat myself!

Copy of Handel's Messiah

Jennens

And there I must leave connections with London!

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Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

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