CANTO 3
BATTLE BRIDGE PLACE
“WE DO NOT LOOK UP”
We arrive at London’s King’s Cross station…
NOTES:
“AT BATTLE BRIDGE THEY PUT A KING UPON A PLINTH“
Battle Bridge /ˈbat(ə)l brɪdʒ / A crossing of the old River Fleet (now King’s Cross) where legend has it that Boudicca’s army met and defeated the Roman garrison in London before burning it to the ground.
The area has long been associated with urban decay. In 1728 Alexander Pope wrote: “To where Fleet-ditch with disemboguing streams / Rolls the large tribute of dead dogs to Thames / The king of dykes! than whom no sluice of mud / with deeper sable blots the silver flood”.
A sixty foot tall monument to King George IV described as “a ridiculous octagonal structure crowned by an absurd statue” was erected here in 1830. This, and the area’s name being changed from ‘Battle Bridge’ to ‘King’s Cross’, can be regarded as an early attempt to ‘gentrify’ the neighbourhood. Deeply unpopular with locals the monument only stood until 1845.
BODY 115 