Westminster
8 Lord North Street
These images were photographed in May 2023 by
David Gaylard, to whom our thanks. This relatively short street of
Georgian terraced houses runs south to Smith Square, in London SW1. At
various times home to 'very important people' given its proximity to
The Houses of Parliament, Lord North Street features official lettering
on the brick walls of a residential house drawing attention to a public
air raid shelter in the vaults (basement/cellar) which is accessed via the 'area' steps beside the front
door. The area is the small open space between the front wall and the
pavement, giving access to the sub-basement level of the house, usually
having a window and a door, presumably intended for servants and
tradesmen. This let some light into the kitchen and others areas.
'PUBLIC SHELTERS
IN VAULTS
UNDER PAVEMENTS
IN THIS STREET'
'S SHELTER'
The 'S SHELTER' arrowed sign can also be seen at no. 10
and is probably related to the larger direction sign on no. 8. Across the road, see between numbers 16/17 (larger sign with
horizontal arrow) and the 'S' sign directing people to the vaults below
no. 15. Similar signs are reputed to be extant in the area.
Courtesy David Gaylard
The key information here is that the shelters weren't
within the bowels of the house, but in vaults extending beneath the
pavements, built when the street was developed in 1722 as storage and
cellarage for wine. Does
this indicate that the vaults were interconnecting, or was each
house connected to a separate cellar? Moreover, perhaps the cellar was
a prestigious feature, so that not all houses had one. There doesn't
appear to be any reference to this in the Grade II* Listing text (https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1222312).
The signwriter
followed the brick courses to create a black rectangular background;
when dry, the white lettering and angled arrows were painted. While not
of top quality, one can imagine that the job had to be carried out at
some speed during wartime. The preservation of these signs is due to
the lack of brick cleaning since the war on most of the houses in the
street.
These bomb shelter signs date from the blitz (intensive
German bombing) during World War II. The street
was originally North Street (leading north from Smith Square). However
in 1936 Brendan Bracken, a resident and close confidant of Winston
Churchill, had it renamed Lord North Street as it sounded grander, and
so it was renamed after the British Prime Minister from 1770 to 1782.
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