Opening of Lincoln's Inn Fields by Sir John Hutton, Chairman of the Council, on Saturday, 23rd February, 1895, at 2.30 p.m.

  • London County Council.
Date:
[1895]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Opening of Lincoln's Inn Fields by Sir John Hutton, Chairman of the Council, on Saturday, 23rd February, 1895, at 2.30 p.m. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    G residue of the said fields unto the Society of Lincoln's Inn- and for the laying of the same into walks for common use and benefit, whereby the great annoyances which formerly have been to the said fields, will be taken away, and passengers there for the future better secured.* We see here for the first time that the fields were legally conveyed to the Society of Lincoln's Inn, who were by the articles stated to be interested in the advantage of the prospect and air of the said field. Under the agreement the benchers of Lincoln's-inn leased to the owners for 900 years the Cup field at a rent of 20s. per annum, but they were never to build on it. The previous history of the ownership is veiy obscure. In 1221 the order of Black Friars wei-e gi-anted a piece of ground without the wall of the City by Oldborne (Holborn) near unto the old Temple, upon which they built a monastery facing Holborn. This monastic building and land in the time of Edward 1. was in the possession of Harry Lacy, Earl of Lincoln, from whom we obtain the name of Lincoln's-inn. He died without issue in 1312. The Society of Lincoln's Inn was founded about 1310, but how the property became theirs is a mystery. These several acts and mandates most certainly did not put an end to the nuisances that existed here. We shall be able to gather from contemporary writings what they were. In very early times the fields had been the scene of several executions. The fourteen conspirators who had plotted to assassinate Queen Elizabeth and set free Mary Queen of Scots were executed here. This attempt was known as the Babing- ton conspiracy, and in September, 1586, having been found guilty, they were all hanged, bowelled, and quartered, in Lincoln's Inn Fields, on a stage or scaffold of timber, strongly made for that purpose, even in the place where they used to meete and to conferre of their traitourous practices.! Nearly a hundred years after, namely in 1683, William, Lord Russell, was executed here on the charge of being concerned in the Rye House Plot. Some have said that the Duke of York moved that he might be executed in Southampton Square before his own house, but that the king rejected that as indecent. So Lincoln's Inn Fields was the place appointed for his execution.J Through these fields in the reign of Charles II. Thomas Sadler, a well-known thief, attended by his confederates, made his mock procession at night, with the mace and purse of the Lord Chancellor Finch, which they had stolen from the chancellor's closet in Great Queen Street, immediately adjoining, and were * Burton, Diary, vol. II., p. 259. t Sfcow's Ann., p. 12:^6.