Cattle troughs

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philanthrophy, water

London’s very first public drinking fountain dates to 1859 and is set into the railings of St Sepulchre-without-Newgate on Holborn Viaduct, corner Giltspur Street. It was placed there by The Metropolitan Drinking Fountain Association and paid for by one of the founders, Samuel Gurney, to provide free and clean water to the people of London in the hope that it would encourage them to drink less (or preferably no) alcohol.⁽¹⁾

St. Sepulchre, notice the water cups

But hygiene was also an issue. Drinking water available to the poor, if available at all, was frequently contaminated and held largely responsible for the cholera outbreaks of 1848-49 and 1853-54. It was no wonder that the people turned to alcohol. The cholera outbreaks and the understanding that the water supply was to blame, actually exacerbated the situation, because many wells and pumps were shut down for fear of contamination. The water supply in the city was in the hands of a few private companies who completely failed to provide an adequate supply. Legislation was sluggish, but the Water Act of 1852 forced the New River Company to cover its reservoirs and to filter its water and in 1856, the Southwark Company was forced to move its inlet away from the sewage outfall. But it was a slow process and better water quality did not immediately mean better access to it. Victorian philanthropy, the call for temperance, and the practical accomplishments of the founders came together and the Drinking Fountain Association was set up and quickly produced results. The Association held its inaugural meeting on 10 April 1859 and a resolution was passed that set out the aim:

St. Dunstan Fleet Street

“That, where the erection of free drinking fountains, yielding pure cold water, would confer a boon on all classes, and especially the poor, an Association be formed for erecting and promoting the erection of such fountains in the Metropolis, to be styled “The Metropolitan Free Drinking Fountain Association”, and that contributions be received for the purposes of the Association. That no fountain be erected or promoted by the Association which shall not be so constructed as to ensure by filters, or other suitable means, the perfect purity and coldness of the water; and that it is desirable the water-rates should be paid by local bodies, the Association only erecting or contributing to the erection, and maintaining the mechanical appliances, of the fountains”.

First drinking fountain from Illustrated London News, 30 April 1859

But is was soon realised that humans were not the only creatures suffering from the lack of (clean) water and quickly drinking troughs for dogs were attached to the fountains. But for horses and cattle the situation remained precarious. Pubs usually provided troughs, but the understanding was that the owner of the horse bought himself a drink when watering his horse or pay some money for the water. One pub trough was inscribed “All that water their horses here Must pay a penny or have some beer”. Local vestries sometimes objected to the erection of cattle troughs, often because they feared to become financially responsible for them, sometime just on the grounds that it would be an obstruction to traffic, but the Association steadily ground down the resistance and troughs sprang up all over the place. In 1867, the name of the association was changed to include their work for animal welfare and they became The Metropolitan Drinking Fountain and Cattle Trough Association.

West Smithfield

West Smithfield detail

By 1870, 140 fountains and 153 troughs had been erected and in 1879 (see illustration from Burke’s Peerage below) the numbers had already reached 575 and 597 respectively. The alternative the fountains provided to beer and stronger spirits greatly appealed to the Temperance Movement, and they became keen supporters of the Fountain Association. Many fountains were set up opposite pubs. The Evangelical Movement was also in favour of fountains, but they preferred them in churchyard in the hope that people would associate the water supply with the support of the church. The extension of the objective of the Association into animal welfare, provided them with a powerful ally, the RSPCA.

From Burke’s Peerage via Wikipedia

The Association began as a philanthropic organisation, depending solely on the money and connections of the founders and donations from private individuals, but from the 1870s onwards, the Association became more and more an established institution attracting legacies and larger donations. Unfortunately, more of these donations were received for special or memorial fountains, often of a highly ornate, Victorian gothic, design. These were more expensive to maintain and the donor of the fountain would usually only pay for the build and not for the maintenance or water supply. The Association developed a standard plain fountain which can still be seen in many London parks, but more elaborate models were built for donors willing to fork out the extra money. At the headquarters of the Association in Victoria Street, a book of designs could be consulted. An example of a privately paid for fountain, is the one on Commercial Road which was erected in 1886 by Harriet Barrett in memory of her brothers.
It unfortunately lost its animal trough sometime between 1886 and now (see here). From the end of the 19th century, more and more local authorities took over the maintenance and water provision for the fountains and troughs in their area, freeing up the Association’s money to finance more watering places.
The Association stopped building troughs in 1936 as the motorcar had taken over from the horse. While fountains are often noticed, the troughs are not, probably because they are not at head height, and these days, no longer contain water but flowers.

corner Farringdon Road / Farringdon Lane

The Association may no longer build troughs, but they, now as The Drinking Fountain Association, still build fountains, for instance in schools and in other countries where the provision of clean water is still an issue.

(1) Information on the history of the Association from their website drinkingfountains.org and from Howard Malchow, “Free Water: the Public Drinking Fountain Movement and Victorian London” in London Journal, vol. 4 (1978), pp. 181-203.

** More photo’s of troughs and fountains at Faded London and for troughs only London Cattle Troughs.

** A map of current fountains at Find-A-Fountain.

Let there be light: Link-boys

Never seed nuffin, cause I’m werry hard o’hearing

Nowadays, we take it for granted that the streetlights are lit as soon as it gets dark, but that has not always been the case. Wealthy Romans had a slave, a ‘laternarius’ who was responsible for lighting the lamp(s) on the outside of their villas, but anyone walking from A to B had to bring an oil lamp (or a slave with an oil lamp) to light his way. This remained the situation until well into the Victorian Age, although the slaves were by then replaced by servants or people with a light hired on the spot.

“Lanthorne and a whole candell light, hange out your lights heare” ©British Museum

At various times, efforts were made by the authorities to force householders to light a lamp on the outside of their building, but they cast at best a gloomy shadow on the house itself and anyone walking in the street was in grave danger of treading into something unpleasant, or of meeting with undesirable characters hiding in dark corners. With the invention of gas lighting and the ever growing appearance of public lanterns and lampposts, there was no longer a need for individual house lanterns. But, until these public lights had covered the whole of the city, Londoners were obliged to arrange for lighting if they wanted to go out at night. If you were rich enough, you could have one or two liveried servants running in front of your own carriage with a light. Many houses had so-called ‘torch-extinguishers‘ or ‘torch-snuffers’ on their gates.

A pair of torchères in the form of footmen holding a torch, probably Austrian 1730-50. Courtauld Institute

But, if you were less endowed with carriages or servants, you could hire the services of a link-boy. He would light your way with a link, a torch made of the dried pith of a rush plant dipped in fat or grease. These link-boys were usually poor urchins who tried to earn a bit of money. They had a bad reputation for luring the unwary traveller to a dark corner where he would fall into the hands of thieves with dire consequences.⁽¹⁾

Let constant Vigilance thy Footsteps guide;
And wary Circumspection guard thy side;
Then shalt thou walk unharm’d the dang’rous Night,
Nor need th’officious Link-Boy’s smoaky Light.⁽²⁾

We find other authors also referring to link-boys, for instance Samuel Pepys, who regularly mentions them in his Diary, as on 4 February, 1660, “So with a linkboy to Scott’s” and on 22 June that same year, “and so by link home about 11 o’clock”. Dickens has a link-boy figuring in The Pickwick Papers: “Yes, there is”, interposed the link-boy, “I have been a ringing at it ever so long”. And W.M. Thackeray inThe luck of Barry Lyndon has them lighting the way in Dublin, “and so we rode on slowly towards Dublin, into which city we made our entrance at nightfall. The rattle and splendour of the coaches, the flare of the linkboys, the number and magnificence of the houses, struck me with the greatest wonder”.

Illustration from The Pickwick Papers

A newspaper of 1840 refers to the declining need for link-boys/men and the strive amongst them for the best patches to pick up a customer in the report on a court case at Marlborough Magistrate Court⁽³⁾. The journalist refers to linkmen as “useful nuisances on dark nights, once indispensable appendages to aristocracy” which are becoming a thing of the past because of gas lighting and an increased police force. One of these linkmen, whose name we incidentally never learn, brought a complaint about a policeman to the court, because he had allegedly been shoved and pushed out of the way for no reason. He was given the opportunity to state his case and the journalist tried to transcribe his statement phonetically:

“Arter I’d verk’d off the nobility and gentry at the Collerseum, I jest thought out of nateral curiosity as I’d jest look in, in my vay home to Vestminster, at the Hannever-skvare rooms, vere there jest happened to be a hevening consort, and ven I got there the company vast jest haccidental a coming out. Vhile I vornt a thinking of not nithin and doing nithin not to nobody votsomdever, up come this here pleseman and treads slap bang on my toes. Hullo, ses I, good luck to yer, mind vot yer arter, and vith that he stomps on em again. Do you call sitch proper usage for a man, ses I. Cut yer lucky, ses he, or I’m blest if I don’t stomp on yer head next. Vith that he shoves and shoves me off the curb, till I werry nearly went heel over tip slap into the kindle.”

Thomas Rowlandson ©Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection

The policeman said in his defense that “he had been ordered to keep the passage to the rooms clear for the company, and in particular not to allow the linkmen and cabdrivers to muster in their usual numbers”. As his witnesses he called James O’Leary (nickname Paddy Carey), the unofficial head of the regular linkmen of the area, the “St. Giles’s illuminati“, and Jack Greathead, another linkman “second only in reputation” to Paddy. Jack produced a large brass badge and said that he was the “principal linkman to her Majesty’s Royal Hopera-house and Hanover-skvare Rooms”. When asked what he knew of the alleged assault, Jack said that “that er waggerbun” had been encroaching on their patch and it served him right if he got into trouble with the policeman, “He arn’t von of us. He aint got no badge, and he never know’d how to handle a link”. He goes on to fulminate against the linkman and the magistrate has to repeat that he just wants to know what Jack has seen of the assault to which he replied “Never seed nuffin, cause I’m werry hard o’hearing” after which pronouncement he immediately returns to his complaint about the linkmen who should not have been there. Since the regulars were obviously not willing to testify against the policemen, but were far more interested in getting their own back on the interloper, and the complainant was unable to prove the assault, the case was dismissed. The paper reports the linkman’s reaction to the dismissal, “Oh, werry well. The police does jest as they likes vith us now, but they’ll find the boot’s on t’other leg werry soon”.

linkboy from tywkiwbi.blogspot

(1) More on the history of rushlights here
(2) John Gay, Trivia, 1716, book III, lines 111-114.
(3) The Morning Post, 14 May 1840.