Holborn and Bloomsbury | Page 2

p. 28. This street runs roughly
north and south throughout the district selected, and dividing it east and
west is the great highway, which begins as New Oxford Street,
becomes High Holborn, and continues as Holborn and Holborn
Viaduct.
The tradition that Holborn is so named after a brook--the Old
Bourne--which rose on the hill, and flowed in an easterly direction into
the Fleet River, cannot be sustained by any evidence or any indications
of the bed of a former stream. Stow speaks positively as to the
existence of this stream, which, he says, had in his time long been
stopped up. Now, the old streams of London have left traces either in

the lanes which once formed their bed, as Marylebone Lane and
Gardener's Lane, Westminster, or their courses, having been accurately
known, have been handed on from one generation to another. We may
therefore dismiss the supposed stream of the "Old Bourne" as not
proven. On the other hand, there have been found many springs and
wells in various parts of Holborn, as under Furnival's Inn, which may
have seemed to Stow proof enough of the tradition. The name of
Holborn is probably derived from the bourne or brook in the
"Hollow"--i.e., the Fleet River, across which this great roadway ran.
The way is marked in Aggas's map of the sixteenth century as a country
road between fields, though, strangely enough, it is recorded that it was
paved in 1417, a very ancient date. Malcolm in 1803 calls it "an
irregular long street, narrow and inconvenient, at the north end of Fleet
Market, but winding from Shoe Lane up the hill westward."
Holborn Bars stood a little to the west of Brooke Street, and close by
was Middle Row, an island of houses opposite the end of Gray's Inn
Road, which formed a great impediment to the traffic. The Bars were
the entrance to the City, and here a toll of a penny or twopence was
exacted from non-freemen who entered the City with carts or coaches.
The George and Blue Boar stood on the south side of Holborn, opposite
Red Lion Street, and it is said that it was here that Charles I.'s letter
disclosing his intention to destroy Cromwell and Ireton was intercepted
by the latter; but this is very doubtful.
On Holborn Hill was the Black Swan Inn, which has been described as
one of the most ancient and magnificent places for the reception of
travellers in London, and which Dr. Stukeley, with fervent imagination,
declared dated from the Conquest. Another ancient inn in Holborn was
called the Rose. It was from here that the poet Taylor started to join
Charles I. in the Isle of Wight, of which journey he says,
"We took one coach, two coachmen, and four horses, And merrily from
London made our courses; We wheeled the top of the heavy hill called
Holborn, Up which hath been full many a sinful soul borne,"
which is quoted merely to show that there is a possible rhyme to

Holborn.
Pennant says also there was a hospital for the poor in Holborn, and a
cell of the House of Clugny in France, but does not indicate their
whereabouts. Before the building of the Viaduct in 1869 (see p. 54),
there was a steep and toilsome descent up and down the valley of the
Fleet. This was sometimes called "the Heavy Hill," as in the verse
already quoted, and in consequence of the melancholy processions
which frequently passed from Newgate bound Tyburn-wards, "riding in
a cart up the Heavy Hill" became a euphemism for being hanged. From
Farringdon Street to Fetter Lane was Holborn Hill, and Holborn proper
extended from Fetter Lane to Brooke Street.
In James II.'s reign Oates and Dangerfield suffered the punishment of
being whipped at the cart's tail all the way along Holborn.
There were Bridewell Bridge, Fleet Bridge, Fleet Lane Bridge, and
Holborn Bridge across the Fleet River. Holborn Bridge was the most
northerly of the four. It was a bridge of stone, serving for passengers
from the west to the City by way of Newgate. The whole thoroughfare
of Oxford Street and Holborn is the result of the diversion of the north
highway into the City from the route by Westminster Marshes.
The antiquities of Holborn and its streets north and south are not
connected with the trade or with the municipal history of London. On
the other hand, the associations of this group of streets are full of
interest. If we take the south side of the street, we find ourselves
walking past Shoe Lane, St. Andrew's Church, Thavies' Inn, Fetter
Lane, Staple Inn, Barnard's Inn, Chancery Lane, Great and Little
Turnstiles, Little Queen Street, Drury Lane, and St. Giles's. On the
north side we pass Field Lane, Ely