The Guildhall.
King Henry V., in 1415—the year of his famous victory at Agincourt—granted the City free passage for four boats by water, and as many carts by land, to bring lime, ragstone, and freestone for the work at Guildhall. Private citizens also came forward with contributions. The executors of Sir Richard Whittington, in 1422-3, gave two sums of £60 and £15 for paving the hall with Purbeck stone, and glazed some of the windows, placing in each the arms of Whittington. The rest of the windows in the hall and many of those in its various courts were glazed by various aldermen. So much of this ancient glass as survived the iconoclasm of the Commonwealth period was swept away by the Great Fire. The two handsome louvres which formed such conspicuous objects on the roof of the building were given by Alderman Sir William Hariot during his mayoralty in 1481. The mayor's chamber, council chamber, and several rooms above were built in 1425-6. An important part of the building was still wanting, for the mayors could not keep their feasts at the Guildhall until the time of Sir John Shaa. Under his leadership, and by the help of the Fellowships of the City, wealthy widows, and other well-disposed persons, the kitchens and other necessary offices were completed for use at his mayoralty feast in 1501. Since that year these famous banquets, which had till then been held in Merchant Taylors' Hall, or Grocers' Hall, have regularly taken place at the Guildhall.
On Tuesday, 4th September, 1666, in the course of the Great Fire, the Guildhall was ablaze, and its oak roof entirely destroyed. Vincent describes its appearance in his little book, God's Terrible Voice to the City:
"That night the sight of Guildhall was a fearfull spectacle, which stood the whole body of it for several hours together, after the fire had taken it without flames (I suppose because the timber was such solid oake) in a bright shining coale as if it had been a palace of gold or a great building of burnished brass."
After the Fire the original open roof was not rebuilt, but the walls were raised an additional storey, the ceiling covering this being flat and square panelled; eight circular windows on each side were added. This poor substitute for a roof was built, as Elmes states, "in haste and for immediate use, and evidently a temporary covering." It lasted, nevertheless, nearly two hundred years, until in 1861 the plans for a new open roof corresponding with the original design of the Guildhall were approved by the Corporation. The dimensions of this magnificent building are 152 feet in length, 49 feet 6 inches in width, and 89 feet in height, from the pavement to the ridge of the roof.
In the angles at the west end of the hall, on lofty pedestals, are the celebrated figures of the giants Gog and Magog. They have been believed by some to be Gogmagog and Corinæus, two mystical personages who were said to have fought together in some of those imaginary conflicts between the Trojans and the early inhabitants of Britain, which are recorded by monkish chroniclers of the Middle Ages. These figures were made by Captain Richard Saunders, a noted carver in King Street, Cheapside, and were put up about the year 1708. They took the place of two old wicker-work giants, which it had formerly been the custom to carry in procession at the mayoralty pageants.
The basement of the Guildhall consists of two crypts, which extend beneath the full length of the hall above. The eastern crypt is entirely vaulted and divided into three aisles by two rows of clustered columns of Purbeck marble, the intersections of the vaulting being covered with a most curious series of carved bosses representing flowers, heads, and shields. This crypt, which, fortunately, escaped the Great Fire, is the finest and most extensive undercroft remaining in London, and for excellence of design and sound preservation may be considered a unique example of its kind. For many years it was neglected and choked with rubbish, which covered its floors to the depth of several feet. In 1851 it was restored to its original condition, and was used as a supper-room for H.M. Queen Victoria and the Prince Consort on the 9th July, when the Corporation entertained the leading persons associated with the Great Exhibition held in that year. On that occasion it was fitted up as a baronial hall, the valuable plate lent by the City Companies being displayed upon an oak sideboard. Around each of the columns stood men clad in armour brought from the Tower of London, each holding a torch of gas for lighting the crypt. A charming feature of the decoration was the treatment of the passage in the western crypt—this was filled with trees and flowers of various kinds, and hundreds of singing birds were let free, thus giving the appearance of a forest glade in summer-time. There is no evidence that this crypt was appropriated to any special use in former times, but to-day it serves the useful, if unromantic, purpose of a kitchen for preparing the mayoralty banquet on the historic ninth of November.
The western crypt, which is separated from that just described by a massive wall of contemporary date, has a roof of arched brickwork dating, probably, from the period of the Great Fire. It is doubtful whether it ever formed an open chamber, and it is now, with the exception of its central passage, entirely devoted to cellarage. In one of its deeply-recessed windows were discovered, in 1902, together with some mediæval stone coffin-lids, some portions of the famous Cheapside cross, which was pulled down by order of the Long Parliament in 1643. These fragments, which were removed to the Guildhall Museum, bear the sculptured arms and badges of King Edward I. and his consort Queen Eleanor. The cross was taken down at the request of the Corporation, and, doubtless, by their officials, the mutilated fragments being removed to Guildhall, where these two pieces evidently lay for over 250 years.
On the south side of the Guildhall, and providing an entrance to it from Guildhall Yard, is a large Gothic porch, or archway. This last addition to the hall, erected in 1425, was one of its most beautiful features, and has been preserved, practically uninjured, to the present day. The porch consists of two bays of groined vaulting, the walls having deeply-recessed moulded and traceried panelling, and being provided with a convenient seat throughout their length on either side. The front of the porch was materially altered in the reign either of Elizabeth or James I., so that we cannot form a complete idea of its magnificent appearance. It was ornamented with seven finely sculptured statues, representing at the top our Saviour, a little below Law and Learning, and lower still, flanking the doorway on either side, Discipline, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance. The statue of our Saviour disappeared at an early date, but the other six figures may still be in existence, for they were presented by the Corporation, in 1794, to Banks the sculptor, at whose death, in 1809, they were purchased for £100 by Henry Bankes, M.P. for Corfe Castle. The present front of the Guildhall, of which the east wing was removed in 1873, was built by George Dance, the City Architect, in 1789.
