St. John's College, Cambridge

by Robert Forsyth Scott

Entering the gate the Hall and Kitchen face us, and preserve much of their original appearance. But right and left the changes have been great. The old Chapel was swept away in 1869—its foundations are marked out by cement; at this time the Hall was lengthened, and a second oriel window added. The range of buildings on the south was raised and faced with stone about 1775, when the craze for Italianising buildings was fashionable; it was then intended to treat the rest of the Court in like manner, but fortunately the scheme was not carried out.

If we walk along the south side of the Court we may notice on the underside of the lintel of G staircase the words, "Stag, Nov. 15, 1777." It seems that on that date a stag, pursued by the hunt, took refuge in the College, and on this staircase; the members of the College had just finished dinner when the stag and his pursuers entered. On the next staircase, F, there is a passage leading to the lane with the Kitchen Offices, this passage is sometimes known as "The Staincoat"; the passage leading from the Screens into the Kitchen is still sometimes called "The Staincoat," or "The Stankard." These curious names really mean the same thing. It appears that in times past a pole was kept, probably for carrying casks of beer, but on which the undergraduates seem also to have hoisted those of their number, or even servants, who had offended against the rules and customs of the College; this pole was called the Stang, and the place or passage in which it was kept the Stangate Hole, with the above variations or corruptions.

Reserving the Chapel for the present we pass through the Screens, the entrance to the Hall being on the right, to the Kitchen on the left. We enter the Second Court. This beautiful and stately Court was built between 1599 and 1600 (the date 1599 may be seen on the top of one of the water-pipes on the north side), the cost being in great part provided by Mary, Countess of Shrewsbury, a daughter of Sir William Cavendish by the celebrated Bess of Hardwick, and wife of Gilbert, seventh Earl of Shrewsbury. The original drawings for the Court, and the contract for its construction, almost unique documents of their kind, are preserved in the Library. The whole of the first floor on the north side was at first used as a gallery for the Master's Lodge; it is now used as a Combination Room. Over the arch of the gate on the western side of the Court is a statue of the Countess, with her shield (showing the arms of Talbot and Cavendish impaled); these were presented to the College by her nephew, William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle.

View from the Screens

A pleasing view of the Court is got by standing in the south-west corner and looking towards the Chapel Tower, with an afternoon sun the colouring and grouping of the buildings is very effective.

Passing through the arch we enter the Third Court; this was built at various times during the seventeenth century. On the north we have the Library, the cost of which was chiefly provided by John Williams, a Fellow of the College, successively Dean of Westminster, Bishop of Lincoln, and Archbishop of York; he was also Lord Keeper of the Great Seal to James I. As originally built the Library occupied the upper floor only, the ground-floor being fitted up as rooms for the accommodation of the Fellows and scholars, on a special foundation of Bishop Williams, but this lower part is now all absorbed into the Library. The southern and western sides of the Court were built between 1669 and 1674, some part of the cost being provided from College funds, the rest by donations from members of the College. On the last or southern pier of the arcade, on the west side of the Court, there are the two inscriptions: "Flood, Oct. 27, 1762," "Flood, Feb. 10, 1795," recording what must have been highly inconvenient events at the time.

The central arch on the western side of the Court has some prominence, and was probably intended from the first as the approach to a bridge. Towards the end of the seventeenth century Sir Christopher Wren was consulted on the subject, and a letter from him to the then Master, Dr. Gower, has been preserved. Sir Christopher's proposal was a curious one: he suggested that the course of the river Cam should be diverted and carried in a straight line from the point where it bends near the Library of Trinity College. A new channel was to be dug, and a bridge built over this; the water was then to be sent down the new channel, and the old one filled up. He pointed out that this would give "a parterre to the river, a better access to the walks, and a more beautiful disposal of the whole ground." This scheme was, however, not carried out, but a stone bridge was built outside the range of the buildings on the site of an old wooden bridge, which then gave access to the grounds. This is the bridge which still exists; it was built, apparently from Wren's designs, under the superintendence of his pupil, Nicholas Hawksmoor. More than a century now passed before further building operations were undertaken. In 1825 the College employed Mr. Thomas Rickman and his partner, Mr. H. Hutchinson, to prepare designs for a new Court, with from 100 to 120 sets of rooms. This work was started in 1827, and completed in 1831. The covered bridge connecting the old and new parts of the College was designed by Mr. Hutchinson; it is popularly known as the "Bridge of Sighs." The style of this Court is Perpendicular Gothic. The site was unsuited for building operations, consisting mostly of washed and peaty soil; it had been known for generations as "the fishponds close." The modern concrete foundations were then unknown, and the plan adopted was to remove the peaty soil and to lay timber on the underlying gravel. On this an enormous mass of brickwork, forming vaulted cellars, was placed; this rises above the river level, and the rooms are perfectly dry. The total cost of the building was £78,000, most of which was provided by borrowing. The repayment, extending over a number of years, involved considerable self-denial on the Fellows of the College, their incomes being materially reduced for many years. Crossing the covered bridge and passing down the cloisters of the New Court, we enter the grounds by the centre gate; these extend right and left, being bounded on the east by the Cam, and separated from the grounds of Trinity by a ditch.

From the old, or Wren's, bridge over the Cam two parallel walks extend along the front of the Court; according to tradition the broader and higher was reserved for members of the College, the lower for College servants. At one time an avenue of trees extended from the bridge to the back gate, but the ravages of time have removed all but a few trees.

At the western end of the walk we have on the left the (private) Fellows' garden, known as "The Wilderness," an old-world pleasance, left as nearly as may be in a state of nature. Towards the end of the eighteenth century the College employed the celebrated Mr. Lancelot ("capability") Brown to lay out the grounds and Wilderness. The plantation in the latter was arranged so as to form a cathedral, with nave, aisles, and transept, but here also old age and storms have brought down many of the trees. On the right, opposite to the Wilderness, there is an orchard, the subject of much legend. One popular story is that this orchard formed the subject of a bequest to "St. John's College," and that the testator, being an Oxford man, was held by the Courts to have intended to benefit the College in his own University. As a matter of prosaic fact, the orchard originally belonged to Merton College, Oxford, being part of the original gift of their founder, Walter de Merton, and it was acquired by St. John's College by exchange in the early years of the nineteenth century.