28th June 1762

Went to Woolidge & went on Board the Warwick Indiaman. Bout. a Silk Handkerchief 4/-
and See the Warren & all the Cannons morters Bum Shells & Cannon Balls came back through Hanging wood so to Charlton where Horne Fair is kept so to Greenwich Deptford & home spent their 12


Warwick was a Ship of course - belonging to the East India company. Read about such ships here. It would seem that the Warwick was not exactly new when Thomas went aboard on that June Monday. (Now he isn't at work, his trips out are not confined to Sundays as they were at the beginning of this blog). The ship is mentioned in the London Magazine for 1752.

The Warren is the old name for the Royal Arsenal

Hanging Wood - the remains and there is an interesting post abou it in the Greenwich Phantom's blog



The Horn Fair - this fair, suppressed in the 19th century has been revived

3 June 1762

Went to Greenwich See the Chappell & Painted Hall the 4 Elements Fire Air Earth & Water 4 Seasons Spring Sumer Autumn & Winter 4 Quarter of the World Europe Asia Africa & America besides a Great many other Curious Paintings all of them are painted on the top of the Sealing 12d

Well.. that's easy, isn't it? Find a picture of the Old Royal Naval College Chapel. It is still there.
No, it is not easy! This is the chapel in 1779


The original design by Thomas Ripley was replaced and that is the interior you can visit today.

If anyone finds picture of the earlier chapel interior, please let me know, could you?

The Painted Hall is a magnificent place - almost every inch of wall and ceiling covered in paintings by Sir James Thornhill. To select one picture is almost impossible so here is a panoramic view.

However, I did say "almost" so here is where the painter included his own portrait in the mural

6th February 1762

Went to see the Whale that was taken on the Goodwin Sands near dale and brout to Green Land Dock near Deptford
it measured 58 Futt Long it was thourgh their was above 100000 people went to See it
Dined at deptford Mr Hall we Spt 12d


This whale was reported in the London Magazine. The picture above is the illustration which accompanied the article

"dale" is Deal in Kent!

There are further details of the Whale here - the whole text of the London Magazine is available online so you can read the account for yourself. On p105 of the same magazine is an account of how the whale was killed.

There is more about Greenland dock & Whaling here.

24th October 1761

Bought of Robert Dartnell Stationer St Martins Court
2 Quire post paper 2/3
2 Quire foolscap 20d
2 Quire Gilt paper 18d
2 Sticks Wax 10
Book for Acct. 2/3
Almanack 6d

16th October
2 Bottles British Oyle 2/-

British Oil seems to have been mineral oil and taken as a medicine - I can't think that it did anything but make people feel iller!

1st January 1762
Went with Mr Hall aboard an India man lying at Blackwall
Bout. 2 silk Handkerchiefs on board

4th Jan Warr proclaimed against Spain

This is very complicated - the 7 Years War had been going on for ages by this time

20th October 1761

Spt 3d and Went to Covent Garden to See King Henry 5 with Corronation which was very Grand Severall Gentlmn & Ladys all agreed that it was grander than the real one was 2/-

There is no coronation scene in Henry V but it seems they stuck the one from Henry VIII into this production because it looked good! Mrs Bellamy was the Queen. She mentions this role and the fact that Rich produced the play in her memoirs.



I wonder what Thomas spent 3d on? It's unusual for him not to tell us (though I don't imagine he ever imagined that anyone else would read his account book).

9th November 1761

Monday Lord Mayors Show the King & Queen Princesses Wales Duke Cumberland and all the Royal Family went to Dine with the Lord Mayor & Aldermen at Gild Hall & a great number of Quallity went I see the King & Queen & the rest of the Royal Family in a Bellconey at the Quaker's over against Bow Church to see the procession of Lord majoyr & all the Comanys of the City of London the Bellconey was fitted up at the Citys Expence Alderman Fludyer Esq was Lord Mayor. Spent 9 This was a well documented event. There is even an engraving which shows the Balcony where the Royal Family stayed to watch the procession. Here is a, roughly contemporary, picture showing Bow Church on a less crowded day. And I have found a further account of the event.

"Sir Samuel Fludyer, Lord Mayor of London in the year 1761, the year of the marriage of good King George III., appears to have done things with thoroughness. In a contemporary chronicle we find a very sprightly narrative of Sir Samuel's Lord Mayor's show, in which the king and queen, with "the rest of the royal family," participated—their Majesties, indeed, not getting home from the Guildhall ball until two in the morning. Our sight-seer was an early riser. He found the morning foggy, as is common to this day in London about the 9th of November, but soon the fog cleared away, and the day was brilliantly fine—an exception, he notes, to what had already, in his time, become proverbial that the Lord Mayor's day is almost invariably a bad one. He took boat on the Thames, that he might accompany the procession of state barges on their way to Westminster. He reports "the silent highway" as being quite covered with boats and gilded barges. The barge of the Skinners' Company was distinguished by the outlandish dresses of strange-spotted skins and painted hides worn by the rowers. The barge belonging to the Stationers' Company, after having passed through one of the narrow arches of Westminster Bridge, and tacked about to do honour to the Lord Mayor's landing, touched at Lambeth and took on board, from the archbishop's palace, a hamper of claret—the annual tribute of theology to learning. The tipple must have been good, for our chronicler tells us that it was "constantly reserved for the future regalement of the master, wardens, and court of assistants, and not suffered to be shared by the common crew of liverymen." He did not care to witness the familiar ceremony of swearing in the Lord Mayor in Westminster Hall, but made the best of his way to the Temple Stairs, where it was the custom of the Lord Mayor to land on the conclusion of the aquatic portion of the pageant. There he found some of the City companies already landed, and drawn up in order in Temple Lane, between two rows of the train-bands, "who kept excellent discipline." Other of the companies were wiser in their generation; they did not land prematurely to cool their heels in Temple Lane, while the royal procession was passing along the Strand, but remained on board their barges regaling themselves comfortably. The Lord Mayor encountered good Samaritans in the shape of the master and benchers of the Temple, who invited him to come on shore and lunch with them in the Temple Hall.

Every house from Temple Bar to Guildhall was crowded from top to bottom, and many had scaffoldings besides; carpets and rich hangings were hung out on the fronts all the way along; and our friend notes that the citizens were not mercenary, but "generously accommodated their friends and customers gratis, and entertained them in the most elegant manner, so that though their shops were shut, they might be said to have kept open house."

This is taken from Walter Thornbury's Book of Old and New London pub 1887 but still in print! The account goes on to tell us that Thomas's "Quaker" was a Mr Barclay. Samuel Fludyer Wikipedia has a portrait. The elaborate wig he wore for his Lord Mayor's Show is depicted in William Hogarth's Five Orders of Periwigs. It is the fancy one on the far right with all those "wings". Sir Samuel would have travelled in the the same Lord Mayor's State Coach as is used today. It was made in 1757. It is now in the Museum of London, when the Lord Mayor doesn't require it. You can visit it.

7th November 1761

Bout. at Auction 9 Pictures & Don Quicksett 16d

I just love Thomas's spelling of Don Quixote! This, often credited with being the first modern novel, was published in 1605, with the first English translation of the first part appearing only 7 years later.