Somers Town, London

1837 map, showing St Pancras, Regent's Canal, Clarendon Square, Somers Town, Pentonville, Kings Cross and Euston Square

St Pancras Old Church is believed by many to be one of the oldest Christian sites in England. The churchyard remains consecrated but is managed by Camden Council as a park. It holds many literary associations, from Charles Dickens to Thomas Hardy, as well as memorials to dignitaries, including the remarkable tomb of architect Sir John Soane.

Somers Town was named after Charles Cocks, 1st Baron Somers (1725–1806).[1][4] The area was originally granted by William III to John Somers (1651–1716), Lord Chancellor and Baron Somers of Evesham.[5]

18th and 19th centuries

Clarendon Square, with The Polygon on left and St Aloysius Chapel on right (1850 engraving by Joseph Swain from an earlier sketch)

In the mid 1750s the New Road was established to bypass the congestion of London; Somers Town lay immediately north of this east-west toll road. In 1784, the first housing was built at the Polygon amid fields, brick works and market gardens on the northern fringes of London. Mary Wollstonecraft, writer, philosopher and feminist, lived there with her husband William Godwin, and died there in 1797 after giving birth to the future Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein. The area appears to have appealed to middle-class people fleeing the French Revolution.

The site of the Polygon is now occupied by a block of council flats called Oakshott Court, which features a commemorative plaque for Wollstonecraft. The Polygon deteriorated socially as the surrounding land was subsequently sold off in smaller lots for cheaper housing, especially after the start of construction in the 1830s of the railway lines into Euston, St Pancras and King's Cross. In this period the area housed a large transient population of labourers and the population density of the area soared. By the late 19th century most of the houses were in multiple occupation, and overcrowding was severe with whole families sometimes living in one room, as confirmed by the social surveys of Charles Booth and Irene Barclay. Dickens lived in the Polygon briefly as a child.

When St Luke's Church, near King's Cross, was demolished to make way for the construction of the Midland Railway's St Pancras station and its Midland Grand Hotel, the estimated twelve thousand inhabitants of Somers Town at that time were deprived of that place of worship, as the church building was re-erected in Kentish Town. In 1868 the lace merchant and philanthropist George Moore funded a new church, known as Christ Church, and an associated school in Chalton Street with an entrance in Ossulston Street. The school accommodated about six hundred children. Christ Church and the adjacent school were destroyed in a World War II bombing raid and no trace remains today, the site being occupied by a children's play area and sports court. St Mary Eversholt Street is today the parish church.[6]

In 1830 the first on-duty fatality for the newly founded Metropolitan Police occurred when PC Joseph Grantham was kicked to death while trying to break up a street fight in Smiths Place, Somers Town.[7]

Charles Dickens knew the area well. The Polygon, where he once lived, appears in Chapter 52 of The Pickwick Papers (1836), when Mr Pickwick's solicitor's clerk, arriving at Gray's Inn just before ten o'clock, says he heard the clocks strike half past nine as he walked through Somers Town: "It went the half hour as I came through The Polygon." The building makes its appearance again in Bleak House (1852), when it served as the home of Harold Skimpole.[17] In David Copperfield (1850), Johnson (now Cranleigh) Street was the thoroughfare near the Royal Veterinary College, Camden Town, where the Micawbers lived, when Traddles, David Copperfield's friend and schoolfellow, was their lodger.[18] In A Tale of Two Cities (1859) Roger Cly, the Old Bailey informant, was buried in Old St Pancras Churchyard. The funeral over, later that night Jerry Cruncher and his companions went "fishing" (body snatching), trying unsuccessfully to 'resurrect' Cly.[19] Robert Blincoe (1792–1860), on whose lifestory Oliver Twist (1838) may be based, was a child inmate at the St Pancras Workhouse. A central character in Dickens’ Our Mutual Friend (1865) is Nicodemus Boffin, nicknamed 'The Golden Dustman' because of the wealth he inherited from his old employer John Harmon, who had made his fortune as a dust contractor at Somers Town.[20]

A number of significant films have been set in Somers Town: the 1955 Ealing comedy The Ladykillers with Alec Guinness and Peter Sellers; Neil Jordan's Mona Lisa of 1986, featuring Bob Hoskins; Mike Leigh's 1988 film High Hopes; Anthony Minghella's 2006 romantic drama Breaking and Entering starring Jude Law and Juliette Binoche; and in 2008 Shane Meadows's Somers Town, which was filmed almost entirely in and around Phoenix Court, a low-rise council property in Purchese Street.[21]

There are two secondary schools in the area, the Roman Catholic co-educational Maria Fidelis Convent School FCJ in Phoenix Road, and the state Regent High School in Charrington Street. Regent High School was established in 1877 and has gone through several name changes, more recently as Sir William Collins Secondary School, then as South Camden Community School. Somers Town Community Sports Centre was built on part of the school playground. The building is leased to a charitable trust that is jointly managed by the school and UCL (UCL is based a few hundred metres to the south of Euston Road and is a major employer of local residents). It is used for 17% of available hours by UCLU's sports teams for training and home matches and for recreational sport by UCL students. As part of Building Schools for the Future plans to expand the school, it is probable that the sports centre will be reintegrated back into the school campus.

There are also three primary schools: Edith Neville (state), St Aloysius (state-aided Catholic) and St Mary and St Pancras (state-aided Church of England). The latter has been built beneath Somerset Court, four floors of university student accommodation units.

• Camden Town to the north
• Euston to the west
• King's Cross to the east
• St Pancras to the south-east
• Bloomsbury to the south

The nearest London Underground stations are Mornington Crescent, Euston and King's Cross St Pancras. National Rail services operate from the nearby London King's Cross, London St Pancras and London Euston stations. St Pancras International is the terminus for Eurostar services and was the London terminus for the Javelin fast train service to London Olympic Park.[22]

• John Arnott (1799–1868), Chartist leader and poet, lived at 8 Middlesex St, 11 Middlesex Place and 1 Equity Buildings (now Walker House, Phoenix St), died in St Pancras Workhouse[23]
• Sir James Bacon (1798–1895), judge and privy councilor, born at 10 The Polygon
• Andrés Bello, (1781–1865), Venezuelan poet, lawmaker, philosopher, and educator lived at 39 Clarendon Square, later at 9 Egremont Place[24]
• Natalie Bennett, former Green Party of England and Wales leader[25]
• Maria Caterina Brignole (1737–1813), Dowager Princess of Monaco, Princess of Condé, fled the French Revolution, buried in St Aloysius[26][27]
• Nell Campbell, actress and singer, lived at 50 Charrington Street while appearing in The Rocky Horror Show
• Guy-Toussaint-Julien Carron (1760–1821), French priest who fled the French Revolution and established the chapel of St Aloysius and other institutions in the area, lived at 1 The Polygon[26]
• Charlie Charles (1945–1990), drummer for The Blockheads, lived in Charrington Street[9]
• Joe Cole, England footballer
• Louis Joseph de Bourbon (1736–1818), Prince of Condé, counter-revolutionary leader who fled France[26]
• Jean François de La Marche, Bishop of St. Pol de Léon (1729–1806), priest who fled the French Revolution, buried in St Pancras churchyard[26]
• Samuel De Wilde (1751–1832), portrait painter and etcher, lived in Clarendon Square[1]
• Charles Dickens (1812–1870), lived at 29 Johnson (now Cranleigh) Street for four years,[28] then moved in November 1828 to 17 The Polygon
• Arthur Richard Dillon (1721–1806), Archbishop of Narbonne, who fled the French Revolution, buried in St Pancras churchyard[26]
• Francis Aidan Gasquet (1846–1929), Cardinal, Librarian of the Vatican, scholar, was born at 26 Euston Place
• Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin (Mary Shelley) (1797–1851), most famous for her novel Frankenstein, was born at 29 The Polygon
• William Godwin (1756–1836), Enlightenment philosopher, lived at 25 Chalton Street (from 1793), at 17 Evesham Buildings (in Chalton St, from 1797) and at 29 The Polygon (1797-1807)[29]
• John Gale Jones (1769–1838), English radical orator, lived at 10 Brill Terrace (now Coopers Lane) and 32 Middlesex Street[30][31]
• George Lance (1802–1864), painter, lived in Phoenix St[26]
• Ethel Le Neve (1883–1967), the mistress of Dr Crippen, lived at 17 Goldington Buildings[32]
• Dan Leno (1860–1904), leading music hall comedian and musical theatre actor during the late Victorian era, born at 6 Eve Place[33]
• Doris Lessing (1919–2013), novelist, winner of the 2007 Nobel prize for literature, lived at 60 Charringon Street (street renumbered in late 1970s). In Walking in the Shade she writes of buying her first house in Somers Town[34][35]
• Samuel Mitan (1786–1843), engraver, lived and died at 8 The Polygon [36]
• William Nutter (1759–1802), engraver and draughtsman [37]
• Sidney Richard Percy (1821–1886), one of the most prolific and popular landscape painters of the Victorian era, lived at 11 Johnson (now Cranleigh) Street in 1842
• Antonio Puigblanch (1773–1840), author of The Inquisition Unmasked, London, 1816, lived and died at 51 Johnson (now Cranleigh) Street[38]
• Mary Ann Sainsbury (1849–1927), businesswoman, wife of Sainsbury's supermarket chain founder John James Sainsbury. Born at 4 Little Charles Street (now St Joans House, Phoenix St); her family's shop was at 87 Chalton Street from 1863. In 1882 it became part of the Sainsbury chain.[39]
• Edward Scriven (1775–1841), pre-eminent engraver of his generation, lived and died at 46 Clarendon Square[1][40]
• Benjamin Smith (1754–1833), engraver, lived and worked first at 21 Judd Place‚ then at 65 Ossulston Street[41]
• Fred Titmus (1932–2011), cricketer, lived at 13 Bridgeway Street
• James Tibbits Willmore (1800–1863), engraver, lived at 23 The Polygon[42]
• Harriette Wilson (1786–1845), prominent Regency era courtesan, lived in Duke's Row (now Duke's Road)[43]
• John Wolcot (1738–1819), as "Peter Pindar", the most prolific and successful burlesque poet of the late 18th century, lived and died in Latham Place (now part of Churchway) [44]
• Mary Wollstonecraft (1759–1797), writer and philosopher, died at 29 The Polygon
• William Wordsworth (1770–1850), major Romantic poet, Poet Laureate, lived at 15 Chalton Street in 1795[45]

This is a list of the etymology of Somers Town streets.

• Aldenham Road – Richard Platt, 16th century brewer and local landowner, who gave part of the land for the endowment of Aldenham School, Hertfordshire[46]^:65[47]^:19–20
• Bridgeway Street – by connection with the Barons Ossulston peerage; formerly Bridgewater Street[48][47]^:244
• Charrington Street – as this land was formerly owned by the Worshipful Company of Brewers, and named for the Charrington Brewery[46]^:65[47]^:81
• Chenies Place – after local landowners the dukes of Bedford, also titled Barons Russell, of Chenies[47]^:83
• Churchway – as this formed part of old pathway to St Pancras Old Church[47]^:86
• Clarendon Grove – by connection with the Barons Ossulston peerage[47]^:244
• Cranleigh Street – by connection with the Barons Ossulston peerage; formerly Johnson Street[48][47]^:244
• Crowndale Road – as this land was formerly owned by Dukes of Bedford, who also owned land in Crowndale, Devon[46]^:87[47]^:42
• Doric Way – after the doric Euston Arch, built in 1837, demolished in 1961[46]^:99
• Drummond Crescent – part of the Duke of Grafton's FitzRoy Estate, named after Lady Caroline Drummond, great grand-daughter of Charles FitzRoy, 2nd Duke of Grafton[49][47]^:133
• Euston Road – developed in 1756 by the 2nd Duke of Grafton on land belonging to the FitzRoy Estate, named after Euston Hall, the Graftons' family home[49][46]^:113[47]^:126
• Eversholt Street – after the Dukes of Bedford, whose seat was at Woburn Abbey near Eversholt, Bedfordshire[46]^:113
• Goldington Crescent and Goldington Street – formerly part of the Duke of Bedford's Figs Mead Estate (later Bedford New Town), who also owned land in Goldington, Bedfordshire[3][46]^:87[47]^:145
• Grafton Place – originally part of the Duke of Grafton's FitzRoy Estate[46]^:139[47]^:147
• Medburn Street – Richard Platt, 16th century brewer and local landowner, who gave part of his land at Medburn Farm, Hertfordshire for the endowment of Aldenham School[46]^:210[47]^:20
• Midland Road – after the adjacent railway line, built by the Midland Railway Company; part was formerly Skinner Street, on the Skinners' Company's Estate[46]^:212[47]^:219–220
• Oakley Square – as this land was formerly owned by Dukes of Bedford, who also owned land in Oakley, Bedfordshire[46]^:231[47]^:237
• Ossulston Street – named in 1807 in memory of the Saxon-era hundred of Ossulston, thought to be named after a stone boundary marker at Tyburn (now Marble Arch) erected by one Oswulf/Oswald[46]^:237[47]^:243–244
• Pancras Road – after the adjacent St Pancras Old Church, named for the Roman-era Christian martyr Pancras of Rome[46]^:239[47]^:246
• Phoenix Road – thought to be after a former tavern of this name; formerly Phoenix Street[48][47]^:255
• Platt Street – after Richard Platt, 16th century brewer, who donated this land to the Worshipful Company of Brewers, who built this street in 1848-53[46]^:248–249[47]^:258
• Polygon Road – after the Polygon, a 17th century housing development here instigated by Jacob Leroux and Job Hoare[46]^:251[48][47]^:259
• Purchese Street – after Frederick Purchese, local resident, vestryman, county council member and Mayor of St Pancras[46]^:257[47]^:266
• Werrington Street – after Werrington, Cornwall, where local landowners the dukes of Bedford held land;[46]^:337 formerly Clarendon Street[48]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Somers Town, London.

• An inside view
• Somers Town Community Association
• Somers Town slum clearance
• The Francis Crick Institute
• UCL