Southwark History

SOUTHWARK, comprises the parishes of St. Saviour, St. Thomas, St. Olave, and Christ Church, it is an ancient parliamentary borough, forming one of the great divisions of the metropolis, locally in the E. division of Brixton hundred, and Lambeth union, county Surrey. It is situated on the south-eastern bank of the Thames, opposite the City of London, to which it is joined by the London, Southwark, and Blackfriars bridges, and the Thames tunnel.

The Greenwich, Brighton, South-Eastern, Croydon, and Crystal Palace railways have their central termini at Tooley-street, adjoining London-bridge.

It was called in Saxon times Suthwerc, from an ancient earthwork or fort, erected for the defence of the ferry here across the river. It was fired by William the Norman in 1066 on his approach to London. In 1327 it was granted by Edward III. to the City, of which it became in 1551 a portion, under the name of the Borough of Southwark, or Bridge-without, being presided over by one of the senior aldermen.

As one of the metropolitan boroughs, it possesses an independent franchise, and has returned two members to parliament since the reign of Edward I. The high bailiff is the returning officer. It was occupied by the malcontents, under Wat Tyler, in the reign of Richard If., and again in 1554 by the insurgents under Wyatt; on the former of these occasions the rioters destroyed the stews of Southwark, then belonging to the Lord Mayor, Sir William Walworth, which act, Mr. Cunningham suggests, may explain the unusual loyalty displayed by the Lord Mayor in stabbing the insurgent leader in cold blood with his own hand.

On the passing of the Reform Act in 1832 the bounds of the borough were extended, so as to include, besides the old borough, with the liberties of the Mint and manor of Suffolk, the parishes of Rotherhithe, Bermondsey, and Christ-Church, with the Clink liberty of the parish of St. Saviour.

The whole area of the old borough, extending about 1¾ mile from E. to W., and about one mile from N. to S., is crowded with streets, houses, and public buildings, but a considerable portion of the recently added parishes are occupied by wharves, docks, yards, and other conveniences for shipping, and extensive manufactories reaching nearly 4 miles along the S. bank of the river.

In form the new borough nearly resembles a parallelogram, being bounded on the S. by Lambeth, and on the other three sides by the Thames, that part of the river called Lambeth Reach separating it from Westminster on the W., and the other part called Limehouse Reach separating it from the Isle of Dogs on the E. The principal streets are the Borough High-street, leading southwards, and Tooley-street, running eastward from London-bridge, Bridge-street, running southward from Southwark-bridge, and Great Surrey-street, near the western limits of the borough, running southwards from Blackfriars-bridge to the Obelisk in St. George's-fields, where the main streets from the several bridges, known as the Borough-road, Blackfriars-road, Waterloo-road, Westminster. road, London-road, Lambeth-road, and New Kent-road meet, the exact distances being marked on the Obelisk.

Amongst the most conspicuous edifices may be mentioned the church of St. Saviour, or St. Mary-Overy, one of the largest parish churches in England, standing at the foot of London-bridge; the townhall of Southwark, a modern structure with Ionic pilasters, situated on St. Margaret's-hill; the Union-hall, in Union-street, occupied as a police-office; the New Surrey Theatre, in the Blackfriars-road; Guy's Hospital, founded in 1721, in St. Thomas's-street; the Magdalen Hospital, built in 1769; the Albert Institution, in Gravellane, near Blackfriars-road, erected on the site of a once notorious haunt for thieves, by the Rev. Joseph Brown in 1869, as a school, model-lodging house, and reading-room, with baths and washhouses, and beds for single men; the Queen's Prison, at the bottom of the Borough-road, established in lieu of the old Queen's Bench, Fleet, and Marshalsea prisons for debtors and bankrupts, and for persons committed for contempt of court; the New Bridewell, near Bethlem Hospital; and Barclay, Perkins, and Co.'s brewery, the largest, probably, in the world, a fuller account of which will be found under the article [London] to which also the reader must refer for ecclesiastical and other returns.

[Description(s) from The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland (1868)
Transcribed by Colin Hinson ©2003] These pages are intended for personal use only, so please respect the conditions of use.