Tooley Street, skirting the river eastward from the bridge foot, derived its name from a corruption of St. Olave’s Street. St. Olaf, the Christian King of Norway, came to the assistance of Ethelred II. against the Danes in 1008, and destroyed London Bridge, which was then in their possession. He pulled down the piles of the bridge by means of ropes attached to his ships. This friendly act, together with his reputation as a Christian sovereign, procured him the gratitude of the English nation. No less than four churches in London were dedicated to this saint—those, namely, in Tooley Street, Hart Street, Silver Street, and Old Jewry.
Closely adjoining St. Olave’s Church was the Bridge House, the centre of administration for the bridge and its repairs, and an institution hardly second in importance to any in Southwark. Indeed, the Borough has no other heraldic device than the curious “mark” of the Bridge House, which it has adopted as its heraldic cognisance. The origin of the Bridge House Trust extends back probably to the period of the early wooden bridge which existed before the building of Peter of Colechurch’s stone bridge in 1176. London Bridge, being regarded, and with good reason, as a work of national importance, attracted a long roll of wealthy benefactors. William Rufus and his successors (probably, too, his Norman and Saxon predecessors) made grants of tolls and taxes for its support. Other benefactors included Richard, archbishop of Canterbury (Becket’s successor) in 1174; Cardinal Hugo di Petraleone, papal legate to this country in 1176; Henry Fitzailwin, first Mayor of London; and numerous wealthy citizens and ecclesiastics who, either in their lifetime or by their wills, left valuable property to the Bridge House funds. This was administered in early times by the Bridge Masters or Wardens, two in number, who were appointed by the Mayor, Aldermen, and Commonalty of the City.
This post was one much coveted in early times, and was bestowed upon men of the highest position in the City. The Wardens’ duties were honourable and doubtless profitable, but they entailed great responsibilities. They had in their ward and keeping all the goods of the bridge, whether lands, rents, tenements, or commodities, and possessed large, if not absolute, powers of dealing with the bridge property by sale or otherwise for the profit of the Trust. On the other hand, their responsibility was strictly personal, and unthrifty wardens were removed from office. This was the case in 1351, when the wardens were removed after ten years’ service for showing a deficit of 21l. odd. The unfortunate wardens for the year 1440, Thomas Badby and Richard Lovelas, owed no less than 327l. 9s. 10d., the loss having arisen from many of the houses on the bridge being dilapidated and unlet. The wardens obtained the King’s intercession on their behalf, and the Court of Aldermen compromised the matter by accepting 200 marks in full discharge of the debt.
The wardens kept great state at the Bridge House, which was necessarily an establishment of considerable extent. Behind the Tooley Street frontage the premises extended to the river, where was a wharf for landing stone, timber, and all other necessaries for the repair of the bridge, the houses upon it, and the large property belonging to the estate. Besides the necessary offices, the Bridge House contained state apartments for official meetings, and the sumptuous entertainments already mentioned. In fact, the Bridge House in mediæval times largely resembled and took the place of the Mansion House of modern days. The building itself must have been pleasantly situated; it possessed extensive grounds, which were laid out as a garden with ponds and a fountain. The wardens kept, as we have seen, a “game” of swans, and, moreover, a pack of hounds.
Besides its great service to the citizens of London in establishing their world-wide commerce, the Thames also largely contributed to the health and recreation of the inhabitants of London. Fitzstephen, writing in the twelfth century, thus describes the water sports in his day: “In the Easter holidays they play at a game resembling a naval engagement. A target is firmly fixed to the trunk of a tree, which is fixed in the middle of the river, and in the prow of a boat, driven along by oars and the current, stands a young man, who is to strike the target with his lance. If, in hitting it, he break his lance and keep his position unmoved, he gains his point and attains his desire; but, if his lance be not shivered by the blow, he is tumbled into the river, and his boat passes by, driven along by its own motion. Two boats, however, are placed there, one on each side of the target, and in them a number of young men to take up the striker when he first emerges from the stream, or when—
‘A second time he rises from the wave.’
“On the bridge, and in balconies on the banks of the river, stand the spectators,
‘... well disposed to laugh.’”[3]
Other recreation was afforded by fishing, as the Thames abounded with fish of all kinds, from the noble sturgeon and the salmon to the shoals of smelts and whitebait.
The river presented a gay scene, being the great highway for all classes of society, both for purposes of locomotion and for conveyance of goods. The traffic between the court and city was naturally carried on by wherries from London Bridge or Blackfriars to Westminster. The King and Queen had their royal barges, so had the noblemen whose mansions lined the south side of the Strand, each having stairs for approach from the river. Gower gives a charming picture of his meeting his patron, King Richard II., on the river, when the King summoned him to his barge and asked him to write “some new thinge.” The poet obeyed by presenting the King with his “Confessio Amantis.”