The warmer weather has returned and today was sunny with a temperature around 23°C (73°F). This tempted us to take another of our longer walks.

The Peasant

This is the first of our pubs, The Peasant in St John Street.

This pub apparently takes is name from the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381 but it has only been known by this name since 2001. Originally, it was called the George & Dragon, a fact that you could have guessed from looking at the roundels in the pediments as these show an image of George lancing the poor old Dragon. A pub has existed here from at least 1788 but I imagine that the present building is younger than that, probably Victorian.

Finsbury Bank for Savings

We entered Sekforde Street which is a fairly minor road, and one where you would not expect to find a bank, especially one of this size. Nonetheless, it does have a bank or, rather, had a bank, as it closed long ago. Its upper inscription declares it to be the Finsbury Bank for Savings. The lower inscription tells us that the firm was instituted in 1818 but that the building was erected in 1840. As a further oddity, the building is also known as “18 and a Half Sekforde Street”. Why this is so, I do not know, unless it is because its position follows number 18 and numbers 19 and 20 had already been assigned to other buildings. The onetime bank is now Grade II listed.

For more intriguing details of the bank, see this post on Caroline’s Miscellany.

The name of the street, Sekforde, may strike you as odd as it did me. It is named after Thomas Sekforde, who was one of the Masters of the Court of Requests and
Surveyor of the Court of Wards and Liveries of Queen Elizabeth I. For more about this worthy gentleman, see Wikipedia’s Thomas Sekford.

The Sekforde

Another denizon of this street is our second pub, called The Sekforde. It was originally known as the Sekforde Arms but acquired the shorter name in 2017 after being closed for two years. Sekforde Street was built in 1835-40 and records of the pub’s existence begin from 1839.

St James Clerkenwell

We entered the gounds of the Church of St James Clerkenwell and as it was such a pleasant afternoon, we sat for a while on a bench. What must once have been the churchyard has been turned into a park and there were plenty of people sitting, strolling and even some doing gymnastic exercises. This is a view of the rear of the church.

The district in which the church lies is called Clerkenwell after the well that supplied water to the two monastic establishments. It still exists and can be seen though it is now inside a building. The site of the church was once occupied by the 12th-century convent of St Mary. It became one of the richest religious houses in the land but was closed in 1539 by Henry VIII’s Dissolution of the Monasteries. The church survived and became the local parish church under a new name, that of St James. The current building, replacing that of 1625, was buit in 1792. The steeple was erected in 1849 and the whole building was restored in 1882.

Colourful doorway

We passed along the side of the church where we discovered this unusually colourful doorway. I do not know the significance of the number 66 or of the decoration in general, but it no doubt stands for something.

Church and steeple
Photo by Tigger

I tried to photograph the front of the church but the street is quite narrorw, preventing me from distancing myself enough to include the whole in the frame. Tigger took this panorama of the church. By its nature a panorama introduces some distortion but it at least gives a general impression of the church.

We continued on down into Clerkenwell Green. The name may once has been appropriate, when this was a village, but it has long since been built up. The name endures but no trace of the village green remains.

The Crown Tavern

Here we found today’s third pub, the Crown Tavern. This was established in 1799, presumably when this row of buildings was erected, and rebuilt in its present form in 1815.

We continued on into Britton Street, which has several points of interest, including our fourth and final pub.

The Jerusalem Tavern

It stands at number 55 in that street and looks more ancient than it is. It proudly bears the name of the Jerusalem Tavern. According to Historic England’s Grade II listing, the terrace of houses including the shop front dates from about 1825. I think it was in the mid 1990s that the lease of the shop passed to St Peter’s Brewery when it became a pub under its present name.

That name, I might add, is not unique in the area. Much of the land around here was originally owned by the Knights of St John, also known as the Knights Hospitaller, an order that was first created and had its headquarters in the Kingdom of Jeruslalem, which had been established by the crusades. Hence the use of the Jeruslem name.

Gatehouse, Priory of St John

We now made our way to the heart of St John territory, the old Priory and Hospital of St John itself. Your first sight on arriving is of the gatehouse or grand entrance. Attached to it are priory buildings and a short distance away is the chapel. Both properties are now a museum owned and run by the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem, the modern incarnation of the Knights Hospitallers. The history of the order is too long to retell here, but you will find it set out on the history page of the museum’s website.

A plaque inside the gate tells us that the first gate was built in about 1148 but was burnt down by Wat Tyler in the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381. It was restored following thus incident and rebuilt in 1504 by Prior Thomas Docwra. Following confiscation by Henry VIII in 1559, the property had many owners and served many purposes before being restored to the ownership of the Order in1873.

Window

We spent a while admiring and photographing the building and its details, such as this handsome window and the door shown below.

Door

Feeling a little tired (we still haven’t recovered from the sloth induced by lockdown), we made for home. We passed once more through the grounds of St James Clerkenwell and again rested on a bench.

Concrete bench

We ignored the blandishments of this – rather uncomfortable-looking – concrete bench, and sat on one of the wooden ones.

Having recovered sufficiently, we continued homewards. If you have been following our lockdown rituals, you will expect me to say that we called in at Myddelton’s for our usual coffees. On any other day of the week you would have been right but today is Saturday and we had forgotten that over the weekend, Myddelton’s closes at 3 pm. So, no coffee today 😦

Never mind: that will make tomorrow’s all the more enjoyable!