GIHS regularly receives copies of The Local Historian published by the Journal of the British Association for Local History. As ever there is little about London and its industries, however an article in the August 2008 edition on parish boundary markers has caught my eye. The article mentions parish outings which used to take place to ‘beat the bounds’ and some of the antics mentioned reminded me of an article in an old Greenwich Antiquarians Transactions (Vol. IX No 4 1982) where there is a description of beating the Greenwich boundaries in 1844 - which includes, for the industrial bits of Greenwich, a description of the civic procession Vicar, churchwardens, local school kids etc etc – who started off down Church Street to Garden Stairs, thence through Brewhouse Lane, the Gallery, Wood Wharf (having a waterman passing up the centre of the river at the same time). Through Mr. Tuckwell’s premises, through Mr. Martyr’s yard, passing over planks to the river wall at the back of the Gasworks, thence on to the edge of the wharfing, over barges and planks into Mr. Burford’s premises. Thence through Mr.Walton’s to the centre of Creek Bridge where three cheers are given for the Queen and the parish of Greenwich. …….. then on across planks and boats to Deptford Bridge where the Hundredth psalm was sung. At the Waterworks a man swam the river to the marker post in Shepherd’s garden. Having continued through the Silk Mill.. . and so on. They stopped for lunch at The Sun in the Sands on Blackheath and after that entered the Countess of Buckingham’s brew house passing out of her laundry window into a large oak tree where the parish treasurer had the honour to be bumped against a stone – and so on right round the parish until they got back to the River at Lombard’s Wall at Charlton, where they continued by boat. The whole thing took eight hours.
Does anyone know of any parish markers in the Borough? Is this something we should be looking out for?
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