There does not seem any reason to doubt the identity of The Swan of the time of Elizabeth with Le Swan on le Hop,[[537]] demised by the Hospital of St. Giles to John de Polton in 1360–61. It was then described as standing south on land of the said Hospital and north on the king’s highway. This description certainly does not warrant the statement of Parton that the inn must “have been situate somewhat eastward from Drury Lane end, and on the south side of Holborn.”[[538]]

Immediately to the west of The Swan came The Greyhound. Unfortunately no description of the inn or the property connected with it has come down from Elizabethan times. In 1679, however, Thomas Short, son and heir of Dudley Short, sold the whole to John Pery, and the indenture[[539]] embodying the transaction gave a description of the property as it then existed. It included two houses in the main thoroughfare, both extending southward to Greyhound Court and one of them being “commonly called ... or knowne by the name or signe of The Crowne.” It would seem therefore that The Greyhound had by now been renamed The Crown, although the court still retained the old name. By 1704 the court had also been renamed Crown Court.[[540]] Included in the sale was a quantity of land in the rear, with buildings, garden ground and other ground, including the house in Greyhound Court where Thomas Short had himself lived. The details given, though full, are not sufficient to enable a plan to be drawn of the property. It certainly included the eastern portion of the site of St. Giles’s Workhouse,[[541]] and did not extend as far south as Short’s Gardens, as it is said to be bounded in that direction by a “peice of ground commonly called the mulberry garden, late in the possession of Robert Clifton.”

To the west of The Greyhound, were a number of houses, which in 1567 were sold[[542]] by Lord and Lady Mountjoy to Henry Ampthill.[[543]] They are described as in eleven occupations, adjoining The Greyhound on the east, the highway on the north, and a close (probably Greyhound Close) on the south. The western boundary, unfortunately, is not given. The property was subsequently split up, about half coming into the hands of a family named Hawkins,[[544]] and this in 1726 certainly included property on either side of Lamb Alley,[[545]] probably as far as the site of the present No. 45, Broad Street. How much further the Ampthill property extended is not known.

In 1631 Ann Barber, widow, and her son Thomas, sold[[546]] to Henry Lambe a tenement and two acres of land, the said two acres being garden ground and adjoining on the west “a parcell of ground called Masslings,” on the south “a parcell of ground in the occupation of one Master Smith,” on the east a “parcell of ground in the occupation of Mistris Margarett Hamlyn,” and on the north certain tenements and garden plots in the occupation of Robert Johnson and others. In 1654 John Lambe sold the property to Henry Stratton, who in the following year parted with it to Thomas Blythe.[[547]] In the indenture accompanying the latter sale, the two acres are stated to be “a garden or ground late in the occupation of Samuel Bennet,” and the remainder of the property is described as 10 messuages late in the tenure of Edmund Lawrence, 4 small messuages also late in Lawrence’s occupation, a chamber commonly called the Gate House, a messuage called The Bowl, and a messuage called The Black Lamb. The property had formerly belonged to William Barber,[[548]] Ann’s husband. There is nothing to show how he became possessed of it, but it is possible that the property is identical with the “one messuage, one garden and two acres of land with appurtenances” sold by John Vavasour in 1590 to Thomas Young.[[549]]

The eastern limits of the property above described may be fixed within a little, as it is known that a portion of it was utilised in the 18th century for the building of the original workhouse, and is described in a deed quoted by Parton[[550]] as bounded on the east by the backs of houses in Crown Court. It may be regarded therefore as including the site of the central portion of the present workhouse. The “parcel of ground in the occupation of one Master Smith” described as the southern boundary, and referred to in a deed of 1680[[551]] as the garden and grounds of William Short, is obviously the strip of ground on the north side of Short’s Gardens, leased by Short to Edward Smith.[[552]] The western boundary, “Masslings,” has been strangely misconstrued. Parton read it as “Noselings,”[[553]] which he regarded as a corruption of “Newlands,”[[554]] and located the ground on the east side of Neal Street. Blott copied the error and, in a highly imaginative paragraph, connected it with Noseley, in Leicestershire.[[555]] As a matter of fact, there is not the slightest doubt that “Masslings”[[556]] is “Marshlands,” between which the form “Marshlins” appearing in a deed of 1615[[557]] is evidently a connecting link.

The boundary between Marshland and The Bowl property is shown on Plate 39.

By 1680[[558]] a considerable portion of The Bowl property had been built on and Bowl Yard had been formed. In the first instance, the latter led by a narrow passage into Short’s Gardens, but afterwards the entrance was widened, and the southern part of the thoroughfare was named New Belton Street, Belton Street proper being distinguished as Old Belton Street. About 1846 both were widened on the east side to form Endell Street, and the still remaining portion of Bowl Yard at the northern end was swept away. Bowl Yard obviously derived its name from The Bowl inn, which, together with The Black Lamb, is mentioned in the deed of 1655, above referred to. The sign had no doubt reference to the custom mentioned by Stow[[559]] that criminals on their way to execution at Tyburn were, at St. Giles’s Hospital, presented with a great bowl of ale “thereof to drinke at theyr pleasure, as to be theyr last refreshing in this life.” The inn itself probably fronted Broad Street, and the brewhouse attached to it was situated behind, on the west side of Bowl Yard.

Plate 38 shows the west front of The Bowl Brewery in 1846, and the houses at the northern end of Belton Street.

In the Council’s collection are:—

[[560]] The Bowl Brewery in 1846 (photograph).