Anatomy of a Painting: William Hogarth's March of the Guards to Finchley
The nuggets of London history lurking on canvas.
Welcome to Londonist: Time Machine, the newsletter about London history.
Here’s a simple idea: take an old painting of London, then history-the-living-heck out of it. That’s what I’m going to try in today’s newsletter and, if it works, I’ll make it an occasional series.
My debut painting of choice is by William Hogarth (1697-1764). A life-long Londoner, Hogarth is most famous for his satirical compositions1 such as A Rake’s Progress or Gin Lane. Each presents a vivid, if comedically exaggerated, window onto Georgian society.
One good example is his The March of the Guards to Finchley, painted in 1750. Here it is, in all of its inglorious glory:
All of 18th century life is here. Musicians, soldiers, drunkards, beggars, lusty tricorned officers, boxers, thieves, harlots and smokers. In the thick of it all are the King’s Guard, who will shortly head north to defend the capital against Bonnie Prince Charlie’s Jacobite Rising of 1745.
These soldiers have got themselves into a right old mess. One gutter-stoops from booze, yet still reaches for gin. Another man kisses and fondles a woman, seemingly against her will. Others letch, swipe, scrimshank and stagger, like a bunch of crapulent numbats. I’ve seen more military discipline at an under-fives soft-play party.
This trio are intriguing:
This soldier seems a little more sober than his comrades. He has the urgent attention of two ladies, at least one of whom is pregnant. Given the debauchery elsewhere, we might read this as a love triangle. But art scholars believe it’s Hogarth encapsulating the rebellion in miniature. The left-hand lady’s basket contains flyers that say “God Save the King” (unreadable in this digital version). She’s supportive of George II and the Hanoverians. Meanwhile, the lady on the right has robes reminiscent of a nun, with a crucifix-shaped fold at the back. Catholicism is implied, and therefore the Stuart cause. The scroll she holds is reckoned to be a Jacobite newspaper. The man is torn between two futures, though he’s leaning towards the Hanoverians.
Happily, not all the troops are so compromised. In the background, a column of soldiers holds formation while marching into the distance. Given the painting’s title, we can assume they are on their way to Finchley, to defend against the Jacobites.
Can we identify where the more debauched action in the foreground is taking place? Why, yes we can. All the location clues we need are there in the painting. The most obvious is at the top left, where a hanging sign gives a name, the Tottenham Court Nursery:
Tottenham Court was, quite logically, the manor to which Tottenham Court Road once led. This is an ancient name. It is first written down around the year 1000, and is later recorded in Domesday Book (1086) as Totehele. So far as anyone knows, Tottenham Court has nothing to do with Tottenham in north London. It’s coincidental etymology.
Anyhow, I happen to know a rather nice map from the time of this painting. It’s called the John Rocque map, and I’ve been gradually colouring it in over the past year and a bit. Here’s the excerpt for Tottenham Court.
I reckon that the Hogarth scene is taking place pretty much on the crossroads shown at the centre of the image, about where the ‘C’ of ‘Court’ is placed. The spread of the buildings in Hogarth’s painting vaguely matches the map, looking north from that point.
The ‘Tottenham Court Nursery’, advertised on the sign, was a real place, though neither a nursery for toddlers, nor for botanical cultivation. Rather, it’s Hogarth’s wry reference to a boxing arena, George Taylor’s ‘Great Booth’. Here, young pugilists would study the fistic arts in what might be considered a nursery of sorts. Hogarth was friends with Taylor. He even worked up a design for Taylor’s gravestone, which featured the veteran pummeller triumphant over death. We can see a pair of bare-headed, bare-knuckled combatants, to the lower-right of the sign.
The nursery board is accompanied by another pendent placard — a pub sign. This is labelled “Giles Gardener” and features an image of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. We have yet another real location. This is a reference to the Adam and Eve pub and tea gardens (owned by Gardener), which also occupied the site from around the mid-17th century. It would linger on in various forms until the 1960s.
A second pub sign can be seen to the extreme right of the image. No name is given, but the distinctive royal profile accompanied by the letters CR identify it with Charles II. This might be the pub known as the King’s Head, which also survived at this crossroads (albeit rebuilt) into the 20th century. Note that the sign board is in shadow. Charles II belonged to the Stuart dynasty, which Bonnie Prince Charlie was seeking to restore. The muted light suggests his cause will soon be snuffed out. (That’s my reading, anyway.)
The building behind the Charles II sign is also based on a real location. This is the brothel of Jane Douglas (c.1698-1761), commonly known as Mother Douglas. There she is, bottom right, praying for all her worth for the safe return of the troops — not so much for their own sakes, but because the soldiery formed a large chunk of her client base. The remaining windows are filled with her girls, all beckoning to the men below. Note the cats on the roof. Cattery was a slang term for brothel.
In reality, Douglas’s house of pleasure was a well-known landmark of Covent Garden, a mile south-east of our location. Hogarth was a regular visitor, in search of subjects for his paintings and illustrations (that was his excuse, anyway). His transposition of the brothel to Tottenham Court adds to the melee of sin unfolding before us.
Indeed, the whole painting is contrived (in a good way). The muster on Finchley Common really did take place in December 1745, but there is no record of any revelry at Tottenham Court. All newspaper reports speak of an orderly and swift assemblage. It was some gathering, too. One account speaks of 14,000 men who, in mid-December, were joined by some serious firepower:
“Yesterday, a Train of Artillery; consisting of 33 Field Pieces, with 48 cover'd Waggons, 20 Chests of Arms, and 240 Matrosses, set out from the Tower, for the Camp that is to be formed on Finchley Common under the Care of Capt. John Speedwell, an old Officer, who served both in K. William's and Q. Anne's Wars.” - The Gloucester Journal, 17 December 1745
As it happened, Bonnie Prince Charlie’s incursion never got anywhere near the capital. The limits of his southern advance were in Derbyshire, and he retreated back north in late December 1745. A few months later, his forces were wiped out at Culloden.
Hogarth wanted to dedicate his new painting to King George II. An anecdotal press account from 1773 relates how that went:
George had a point, albeit poorly articulated. Hogarth had depicted His Majesty’s armed forces, some carrying the King’s monogram, in humiliating and degrading circumstances… and then asked the King for endorsement. He was not amused. Hogarth ended up dedicating the painting to the King of Prussia instead.
You can view the original in London. It was acquired long ago by the Foundling Hospital in Bloomsbury, which won a lottery set up by Hogarth. Today, the Foundling Museum keeps it on display.
You can also visit the scene of the painting, though I wouldn’t recommend it. If the location looked riotous in Hogarth’s time, then today it is cacophonous. This is where Euston Road cuts across (and under) Tottenham Court Road. It is one of the busiest junctions in central London, just outside Warren Street tube station. I’ll finish with the modern aspect, which I’ve grabbed off Street View because I’m too chicken to actually stand there and take a photo.
Thanks for reading. As ever, please do leave a comment below — perhaps you have a suggestion for another London painting or drawing that deserves an historical probing. Or email me anytime on matt@londonist.com
Advance notice: I’m going to do something utterly outrageous next week and take a few days off for a family holiday. So there will be no newsletter on Wednesday or Friday next week. It’s the first break I’ve had from the newsletter in over two years, so I hope you’ll excuse my absence.
His talents ranged much wider, however. Hogarth was a prominent portraitist, composed the epic murals at St Bart’s great hall, wrote books, was a noted engraver, and even designed the entrance tokens for Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens.
Forgive me if already covered but I commend Hogarth’s mural Jesus at the pool of Bethesda, on the staircase to the Great Hall at St Bartholomew’s hospital in West Smithfield. The painting is famous for the depiction of a variety of disease common at the time, said to be drawn from patients at the hospital.
Your simple idea has worked. I am fascinated with the Georgian period. Hogarth's recording of London life & your narrative are just wonderful.
I like the boy Piper in the bottom lefthand corner.