The extremities of London continued to extend. Grosvenor-place, Hyde Park Corner, was reared 1767; Marylebone-garden was leased out to builders 1778; Somers-town was commenced 1786. "Though London increases every day," observes Horace Walpole in 1791, "and Mr. Herschel has just discovered a new square or circus, somewhere by the New-road, in the via lactea, where the cows used to feed; I believe you will think the town cannot hold all its inhabitants, so prodigiously the population is augmented." "There will be one street from London to Brentford, ay, and from London to every village ten miles round; lord Camden has just let ground at Kentish-town for building 1,400 houses; nor do I wonder; London is, I am certain, much fuller than ever I saw it. I have twice this spring been going to stop my coach in Piccadilly, to inquire what was the matter, thinking there was a mob; not at all, it was only passengers."
The Westminster Paving Act, passed in 1762, was the commencement of a new system of improvement in the great thoroughfares. The old signs, posts, water-spouts, and similar nuisances and obstructions, were removed, and a pavement laid down for foot passengers.
But until the introduction of gas, in the present century, the streets continued to be dimly lighted, and the services of the link boy at night to be in general requisition. In 1760, names began to be placed on people's doors, and four years subsequently, the plan of numbering houses originated. Burlington-street was the first place in which this convenient arrangement was made. In Lincoln's-inn-fields it was next followed.
The history of London, during the latter half of the eighteenth century, was emphatically that of an age of public excitements, some of them specially pertaining to the city, while in others the whole country shared. The removal of Mr. Pitt, afterwards Earl of Chatham, from the high ministerial position he had occupied—an event which occurred in 1757—produced very strong ebullitions of feeling in the hearts of his numerous admirers. London largely participated in the popular admiration of that extraordinary man, and expressed a sense of his services by voting him the freedom of the city, which was presented to him in an elegant gold box. The success of the British arms during the next year, in the taking of Louisbourg, led to great rejoicings, illuminations, and the presentation to the king of loyal congratulatory addresses. In the year following, the wants of the army being found very urgent, and men being unwilling to enlist, a subscription was opened at Guildhall to meet the exigency by raising a fund, out of which the amount of premium on enlistment might be augmented. The taking of Quebec, in 1759, again awakened enthusiastic joy; and the record of bonfires, ringing of bells, and kindred demonstrations, are conspicuous in the civic annals for that year. The accession of George III., in 1760, was marked by the full payment to the young sovereign of all those loyal dues, which are tendered by the metropolitan authorities and community when such an important event occurs as the transfer of the sceptre into new hands. But the public excitement in his favor was soon exchanged for feelings equally intense of an opposite character. John Wilkes appeared on the stage of public life in 1754—a man utterly destitute of virtue and principle, but possessed of certain qualities likely to render him popular, especially an abundance of humor, and a wonderful degree of assurance. By attacking Lord Bute, the favorite of the king, but no favorite with the people, he gained applause, and was set down as a patriot. In No. 45 of the "North Briton," a newspaper which he edited, a violent attack on his majesty appeared; indeed, it went so far as to charge him with the utterance of a falsehood in his speech from the throne. The house of Wilkes was searched, and his person seized for this political offence; but sheltering himself under his parliamentary privileges, he obtained his dismissal from custody. Upon an information being filed against him by the attorney-general, he declined to appear, when the House of Commons took the matter in hand, and declared Wilkes's paper to be a false, seditious, and scandalous libel, and ordered it to be burned by the common hangman. The sympathies of many in London being with Wilkes, a riot ensued upon the attempt which the sheriffs made to execute the parliamentary sentence. Wilkes's disgrace was turned into a triumph, and the metropolis rang with the applause of this worthless individual. Unhappily, the proceedings against him had involved unconstitutional acts, which are sure to produce the indignation of a free people, and to transform into a martyr a man who is really criminal. He was next convicted of publishing an indecent poem; but again the improper means adopted to secure his conviction placed him before the people as a ministerial victim, and diverted attention from his flagrant vices. But the reign of this demagogue in London, properly speaking, did not begin till 1768, when he returned to England, after a considerable absence, and offered himself as a candidate for the city. Though exceedingly popular, he failed to obtain his election, but afterwards, with full success, he appealed to the Middlesex constituency. Then came the tug of war between the electors and the House of Commons. The latter invalidated the return, in which the former persisted. Riots were the consequence. One dreadful outbreak took place in St. George's-fields, when the military were ordered to fire, and some were killed or wounded. Three times Wilkes was returned by the people to parliament, and three times the parliament returned him to the people. This violation of popular rights was deeply resented in London, and throughout the country. It also made Wilkes's fortune; £20,000 were raised for him; all kinds of presents were showered on the favorite; and his portrait, in every form of art, was in universal request. In the Common Pleas, he afterwards obtained a verdict against Lord Halifax for false imprisonment and the illegal seizure of papers. He was subsequently elected sheriff, alderman, and mayor of London; and finally, in 1779, sank down into neglect much more comfortably than he deserved, as chamberlain of the city. His history singularly illustrates how illegal proceedings defeat their object, though it be right; and how a rash eagerness in pursuing the ends of justice overturns them.
In connection with the Wilkes affair, there is a remarkable episode in the municipal history of the metropolis. A most serious misunderstanding took place between the monarch and the corporation. The proceedings of ministers in reference to the Middlesex election, led the civic authorities to present to the king a very strong remonstrance, begging him to dissolve the parliament, and dismiss the ministry. The monarch took time to consider what reply he should make to so formidable an application, and at length informed the corporation that he was always ready to receive the requests and listen to the complaints of his subjects, but it gave him concern to find that any should have been so far misled as to offer a remonstrance, the contents of which he considered disrespectful to himself, injurious to parliament, and irreconcilable with the principles of the constitution. Among the aldermen, there were some who disapproved of the remonstrance, and now strongly protested against it; but Beckford, who then, for the second time, filled the office of lord mayor, and strongly felt with the common council, livery, and popular party, earnestly resisted such opposition, and encouraged the citizens to maintain their stand against what was considered an exercise of arbitrary power on the part of government. The mayor summoned the livery, and delivered a speech just adapted to the assembly. Another remonstrance was drawn up, to be presented to his majesty by the lord mayor and sheriffs. To this the king replied, that he should have been wanting to the public and himself, if he had not expressed his dissatisfaction at their address. Beckford, who must have been a bold and eloquent man, breaking through all the rules of court etiquette, delivered an extempore speech to the sovereign, which he concluded by saying, "Permit me, sire, to observe, that whoever has already dared, or shall hereafter endeavor, by false insinuations and suggestions, to alienate your majesty's affections from your loyal subjects in general, and from the city of London in particular, and to withdraw your confidence in, and regard for, your people, is an enemy to your majesty's person and family, a violator of public peace, and a betrayer of our happy constitution, as it was established at the glorious and necessary revolution." Of course, no reply was given to this impromptu address, but it seemed to have excited no little wonder among the courtiers present on the occasion. On the birth of the princess Elizabeth, a short and loyal address of congratulation, avoiding all controversial topics, was presented by the same chief magistrate; to which his majesty answered, that so long as the citizens of London addressed him with such professions, they might be sure of his protection. The stormy agitation was of brief continuance. The ripples on the stream soon subsided. With this interview the good understanding between the king and the city appears to have been restored, though the bold remonstrance the latter had presented produced no practical effect. The popular lord mayor, who signalized himself especially by his speech in the royal closet, was removed by Divine Providence out of this life before the term of his mayoralty expired. After his decease, the citizens, to mark their esteem for his character, erected a monument to him in Guildhall, and engraved on it the speech which had given him so much celebrity.
The great dispute between the mother country and America, which began as early as 1765, could not fail to excite a deep interest in the capital of the empire. "The sound of that mighty tempest," as it was termed by Burke, was heard with deep concern at first by the London merchants, as threatening to injure their commercial interests; and when the Stamp Act, so odious from its influence in that respect, was repealed soon after it was passed, the whole city beamed with gladness and satisfaction. When, however, America asserted her independence, many in London, as well as in other parts of the country, felt their national pride so much wounded, that they encouraged the war, till finding the conflict with so distant and powerful a colony all in vain, they were willing to hear of peace, though at the expense of losing the chief part of the British territory in the western hemisphere. But in the feelings that the protracted struggle awakened, the metropolis only shared in connection with the provinces; they must, therefore, be passed over with this cursory notice, that we may attend to what particularly constitutes the history of the city.
This plunges us at once amidst scenes of excitement, much more serious and shocking than any others that have lately come under review. In 1779, the Protestant Association was formed, in consequence of some of the Roman Catholic disabilities being removed. The society met at Coachmakers' Hall, Noble-street, Foster-lane, under the presidency of lord George Gordon, whose general eccentricity bordered upon madness, and whose professed abhorrence of Popery sank into fanaticism. The association, in May, 1780, determined to petition for a repeal of the Act just passed, and it was resolved that the whole body should attend in St. George's-fields, on the second of June, to accompany lord George with the petition to the House of Commons. His lordship enforced this motion with vehement earnestness, and said that if less than 20,000 of his fellow-citizens attended him, he would not present the document. At the time and place appointed, an immense multitude assembled, computed at 50,000 or 60,000, wearing blue ribbons in their hats, marshaled under standards displaying the words "No Popery." In three divisions they marched six abreast, over Londonbridge, towards Westminster, being reinforced at Charing Cross by great numbers on horseback and in carriages. The then narrow avenues to the houses of parliament were thronged by these crowds, and such members of the legislature as they disliked were treated with insult, as they made their way through the dense concourse. The petition was presented; but when that business was finished for which the populace had been invited by the foolish nobleman, he found it impossible to disperse them. Harangues, so potent in convening the host, were utterly powerless when employed for their separation. Nor did the magistracy attempt a timely interference; but the mob was left to its own wild will, and like a swollen torrent, which bursts its banks, it poured over the city with destructive havoc. The chapels of the Bavarian and Sardinian embassy were pulled down that night. On the next day, Saturday, they committed no violence; but on Sunday they assailed a popish chapel and some houses in Moorfields, within sight of the military, who stood by unable to do anything, because they had no commands from the chief magistrate, who alone could authorize them to act. All that was done was to take a few of the rioters into custody, while the rest were left without any attempt at their dispersion. Utterly unnerved, the lord mayor virtually surrendered the city at this momentous crisis into the hands of the mob. Encouraged by the impunity with which they were left to pursue their own course, they attacked on the next day the house of Sir George Sackville, in Leicester-square, because he had moved the Catholic Relief Bill. On Tuesday, waxing bolder than ever, they besieged the old prison of Newgate, where a few of their associates were confined. Breaking the roof, and tearing away the rafters, they descended into the building by ladders, and rescued the prisoners. Two eye-witnesses, the poet Crabbe and Dr. Johnson, have left their impressions of this extraordinary scene: "I stood and saw," says the former of these writers, "about twelve women and eight men ascend from their confinement to the open air, and conducted through the streets in their chains. Three of them were to be hanged on Friday. You have no conception of the frenzy of the multitude. Newgate was at this time open to all; anyone might get in, and what was never the case before, anyone might get out."
"On Wednesday," says Dr. Johnson, "I walked with Dr. Scott, (lord Stowell,) to look at Newgate, and found it in ruins, with the fire yet glowing. As I went by, the Protestants were plundering the sessions-house at the Old Bailey. There were not, I believe, a hundred, but they did their work at leisure, in full security, without sentinels, without trepidation, as men lawfully employed in full day." Besides Newgate, lord Mansfield's house in Bloomsbury-square was pulled down, and his valuable library burned. The Fleet, King's Bench, the Marshalsea, Wood-street Compter, and Clerkenwell Bridewell, were all opened, and such a jail delivery effected as the citizens had never witnessed before. A stop was put to business on the Wednesday; shops were closed; pieces of blue, the symbol of Protestant truth and zeal, were required to be hung out of the windows, and "No Popery" chalked on the doors. Before night, even the Bank was assailed, but not without a dreadful and destructive repulse from the military who garrisoned it, and were ordered to act. It is stated that the king, alarmed at the danger of his capital, and indignant at the inaction of the magistrates, took upon himself to command the services of the military for putting down the riot. While thirty fires were blazing in the streets, and the inhabitants passed a sleepless night, full of anguish, a large body of soldiers was engaged in the terrible, though necessary work of suppressing the riot by force. This was accomplished at the expense of not less than five hundred lives. By Friday, quietude was restored. Lord George Gordon was apprehended, but was acquitted upon trial, his conduct not coming within the limits of the statute of treason. Sixty of the deluded creatures, who at first were excited by his mischievous agitation however, had to pay the extreme penalty of the law. A happy contrast to this brutal kind of excitement has been recently (1850-51) displayed in the calm, deep, and, for the most part, intelligent resistance made to a far different measure—the papal aggression, in the creation of territorial bishoprics; one really calculated to excite far greater opposition. The years 1780 and 1850, stand out at the extremes of a period which has witnessed, in London and elsewhere, a change in public thought and habit of the most gratifying kind; and to what can this be so fairly ascribed, under the providence and blessing of God, as to the increase of instruction, especially religious instruction, through the medium of Sabbath and other schools, together with the distribution of the Bible and tracts, as well as other meliorating agencies operating on society?
Eight years after the anti-popery riots, another excitement, of a different kind, rolled its waves over the public mind in London; not, indeed, confined to the metropolis, but concentrating its force there, as the scene of the occurrence which produced it. This was the trial of Warren Hastings, for his alleged mal-administration of Indian affairs. But the great length to which it was extended wearied out the public patience, and ere the forensic business came to its close the court was forsaken, and the numerous London circles, at first thrown into a storm of feeling by the occurrence, resumed their former quietude, and almost forgot the whole matter.
The same year that Hastings' trial commenced, the public sympathy and sorrow were aroused in London, and throughout the nation, by the melancholy mental illness of George III., but the next year his sudden recovery created universal joy, which was demonstrated in the metropolis, after the usual fashion.