Monday Miscellanea

This Week In London’s History

Monday – 19th November 1558: Queen Elizabeth I travels to Highgate on her accession to the throne. She is met by the bishops and escorted through London.

Tuesday – 20th November 1992: Fire sweeps through Windsor Castle, causing £40 million worth of damage to over 100 rooms. Wednesday – 21st November 1695: The great composer Henry Purcell dies at his home in Westminster. The cause of his death in unclear, with theories ranging from tuberculosis to chocolate poisoning. Thursday – 22nd November 1995: Serial killer Rosemary West, wife of Fred West, is sentenced to life imprisonment at the Old Bailey. Friday – 23rd November 1984: A fire at Oxford Circus tube station traps almost 1000 people in smoke-filled tunnels for three hours.

Random London Fact Of The Week

In the early 19th century, London was rapidly running out of burial spaces. Parish churchyards had become so overcrowded that the health of nearby residents or workers had been affected, and additional land for burial was hard to come by. A solution was needed – ideally one that would provide burial capacity for the foreseeable future.

One of the first proposals was ingenious, ambitious and somewhat surreal. An architect named Thomas Willson proposed a ‘Pyramid Cemetery for the Metropolis’ – a huge pyramid that would be constructed on top of Primrose Hill, with enough space for the internment of five million bodies. Steam-powered lifts would provide access to the 94 floors of the proposed monolith, which would be “compact, ornamental and hygienic”.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the proposed scheme was not taken up, and an altogether more traditional solution was implemented with the construction of Kensal Green Cemetery.

London’s Weather This Week

Overall, the forecasters are indicating that this week’s weather will be quite miserable, with liberal amounts of rain and some plummeting temperatures later on. However, there might be a bit of sunshine between the showers, if we’re lucky.