Hello people,
I'm still in Shad Thames SE1 and I've been using my magical adjustable spanner - which allows me to travel through time - to see how the area has changed throughout the years. During my time travels I visited the early 1900's when Shad Thames was a thriving dockyard, filled with traders, sailors and boats bringing in cargo from all over the world. It was the Amazon of it's day, only with longer waiting times and you had to buy in bulk. I watched the busy dockers move barrels of spices, wheat, tea, etc. across the walkways overhead into the huge warehouses where they were stored for sale. Incidentally, when these warehouses first became flats in the 1980's they were named after the goods that were stored in them - Vanilla & Sesame Court was where they kept the vanilla and sesame, Tea Trade Wharf was where they kept the tea, and Butlers Wharf was where they kept the Butlers. It was claimed by many of the first residents that the scents of the spices had infused into the bricks, and they could clearly smell the scent that each building was named after when they first moved in. In case you’re wondering, Butlers wharf smelt of Brute aftershave. Classy.
As I watched this thriving industry, I couldn't
help but wonder if there might be a way I could make a few quid while I
was here too. Strictly speaking it’s against the rules to profit from time
travel in case you accidentally change time and end up in an insane world where Leicester are Premier League Champions, Donald Trump is President of the USA and people only eat, sleep and exercise when their watches tell them too. So if I was going
to do it, I'd have to be really sneaky, this is what I did...
I journeyed back to 2016, and had a look on Wikipedia to see if any famous people had ever lived or worked in Shad Thames. I then had a look on eBay to see whose autographs fetched the most money. After a little research I discovered that Charles Dickens had spent some time there while researching one of his novels. I forget the name of it, but it's the one about a little orphan who has an adventure. I think it's called Annie...
Anyway it turns out that Charles Dickens signed memorabilia is worth an absolute fortune, so I grabbed my copy of 'A Christmas Carol' - longest song ever by the way - plus a few other bits and pieces, gave the old spanner a quick twist, and found myself in 1836 standing by the river Thames waiting for Charles Dickens to show up. However, I hadn't gone to Shad Thames this time - Shad Thames was nothing more than a cobbled street back then. The area I'd come to find the great man, was Jacobs Island just a stones throw away....
I'm still in Shad Thames SE1 and I've been using my magical adjustable spanner - which allows me to travel through time - to see how the area has changed throughout the years. During my time travels I visited the early 1900's when Shad Thames was a thriving dockyard, filled with traders, sailors and boats bringing in cargo from all over the world. It was the Amazon of it's day, only with longer waiting times and you had to buy in bulk. I watched the busy dockers move barrels of spices, wheat, tea, etc. across the walkways overhead into the huge warehouses where they were stored for sale. Incidentally, when these warehouses first became flats in the 1980's they were named after the goods that were stored in them - Vanilla & Sesame Court was where they kept the vanilla and sesame, Tea Trade Wharf was where they kept the tea, and Butlers Wharf was where they kept the Butlers. It was claimed by many of the first residents that the scents of the spices had infused into the bricks, and they could clearly smell the scent that each building was named after when they first moved in. In case you’re wondering, Butlers wharf smelt of Brute aftershave. Classy.
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| Shad Thames - the bridges over head were used by dockers to shift goods between warehouses |
I journeyed back to 2016, and had a look on Wikipedia to see if any famous people had ever lived or worked in Shad Thames. I then had a look on eBay to see whose autographs fetched the most money. After a little research I discovered that Charles Dickens had spent some time there while researching one of his novels. I forget the name of it, but it's the one about a little orphan who has an adventure. I think it's called Annie...
Anyway it turns out that Charles Dickens signed memorabilia is worth an absolute fortune, so I grabbed my copy of 'A Christmas Carol' - longest song ever by the way - plus a few other bits and pieces, gave the old spanner a quick twist, and found myself in 1836 standing by the river Thames waiting for Charles Dickens to show up. However, I hadn't gone to Shad Thames this time - Shad Thames was nothing more than a cobbled street back then. The area I'd come to find the great man, was Jacobs Island just a stones throw away....
'Every repulsive lineament of
poverty, every loathsome indication of filth, rot, and garbage; all these
ornament the banks of Jacobs Island.'
These are the words Charles Dickens used to describe the horror that was Jacobs Island. It's the place he chose to be the home of Bill Sikes in his story Oliver Twist, and it's where Sikes - while on the run from the mob - eventually seals his own fate. Dickens' description of the living conditions on Jacobs Island caused a lot of controversy when it was published. Many where horrified, some simply refused to believe that the place he described was anything other than a work of fiction. Sir Peter Laurie - the former Mayor of London - said publicly that the location was a work of imagination, and that no place by that name, or like it, had ever existed, but existed it had. Jacobs Island had gotten its name by being surrounded by ditches which - according to a social researcher of the time - were 'Harbouring masses of rotting weed, animal carcasses and dead fish' these ditches were the local inhabitants only source of fresh water.
These are the words Charles Dickens used to describe the horror that was Jacobs Island. It's the place he chose to be the home of Bill Sikes in his story Oliver Twist, and it's where Sikes - while on the run from the mob - eventually seals his own fate. Dickens' description of the living conditions on Jacobs Island caused a lot of controversy when it was published. Many where horrified, some simply refused to believe that the place he described was anything other than a work of fiction. Sir Peter Laurie - the former Mayor of London - said publicly that the location was a work of imagination, and that no place by that name, or like it, had ever existed, but existed it had. Jacobs Island had gotten its name by being surrounded by ditches which - according to a social researcher of the time - were 'Harbouring masses of rotting weed, animal carcasses and dead fish' these ditches were the local inhabitants only source of fresh water.
I looked around at the
hardships the people of Jacobs Island had to endure, and I made a promise to myself that when I got
back to 2016, I’d do more to help those a less fortunate then myself. When I awoke from my thoughts I
looked across the ditch to see a well dressed man with a shabby beard, carrying a cane, walking through the heavy London fog with his note book in his hand, writing as he
walked. The man was of course, Charles Dickens.
During the hour we were together, I got the impression that Charles was a man with a lot on his plate. He was constantly sighing and saying things like, "I've actually got quite a lot to do today...." and, "I really must get back to my work soon..." to which I would nod my head sympathetically before handing him another copy of 'Great Expectations' the audio book narrated by Hugh Laurie to sign.
As I said, after about an hour he muttered something about not having all day to stand around, and made to go. He clearly hadn't realised that I still had a few more things left for him to sign.
To my surprise he spun around and practically shouted at me, "What do you want now?!"
I was a little taken aback. He'd seemed so friendly an hour ago. I can't think what I might have done to annoy him? I held up the 'A Tale of two cities' DVD staring Gwyneth Paltrow and very politely said, "Please sir, I want some more."
A look of fury flashed across his face, "What!?" He cried "More!?"
After that he totally lost the plot, and chased me around Jacobs Island trying to hit me with his walking cane. Fortunately I was able to escape just in time by twisting my magical spanner. Unfortunately I left all my signed memorabilia back in 1836. Oh well easy come, easy go, I guess it's true what they say - you should never meet your heroes. What a primadonna!
I'm still going to make good on my promise to help out people less fortunate then myself by sponsoring my friends Damo and Gav Wynne. They're going to run the London Marathon dressed as Smurfs to raise money for helper dogs for children and young people who are blind or partially sighted. If you'd like to donate money for this great cause, or if you just think that two unfit blokes dressed as Smurfs running the London marathon is funny, I've put their just giving link on the my Facebook page.
I'll be back somewhere new next time, see you later people!
That spanner sounds fantastic. An evolution of the flux capacitor?
ReplyDeleteHello Rosemary, sorry for the late reply. My magical adjustable spanner pre-dates the flux capacitor by thousands of years! Some of the worlds leading archaeologists believe it was used to fit the indoor pluming in the pyramids in Egypt! Whether or not the spanner helped inspire director and writer Robert Zemeckis to come up with his classic movie trilogy, I'm afraid only the great man himself can answer that.
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