Ashen Grey : Victorian Age World of Darkness

London by Gaslight

The term “London” most properly applies to the square mile that makes up the City of London itself, however colloquial usage has long since replaced such a meaning and the word is now used to describe the Cities of London and Westminster, and the areas that immediately surround them. With the advent of Mr. Stephenson’s locomotive engine and its rapid deployment in the city by various commercial concerns, areas once considered to be little more than rural parishes now fall under the title of Greater London.

One result of this growth has been the retention of large open areas within the city itself, which is one of the treasures of London. The combination of wide streets, garden squares and parks is characteristic of the centre of the London we know tonight. While the slums of the working people still exist, they do little to distract from the city’s beauty to a right-thinking man. Indeed, to the Kindred, they serve a most useful function in providing for their inescapable needs.

When one steps outside the central area, which one might define by the loop of the new Metropoloitan and District Underground Railway, the nature of the city changes once more. Many of the former parishes have become stops on the railways, and so have become popular residences for the more moneyed members of the middle classes.

One might concieve of the city as two concentric circles. The inner circle houses much of the commerce of the city, as well as the business of governance. There, the upper classes and working classes both reside within walking distance of their places of work, though each lives in markedly different conditions. The outer circle is largely residencial in nature, though some choose to conduct their business farther from the core of the city. This circle also houses many leisure attractions, not least of which is the beautiful Crystal Palace, now in Sydenham.

A walk on London’s roads, however, is not for the weak or easily disturbed. Certainly, ladies should always travel in cabs, for the din of iron-shod hooves and wheels on stone and cobbles is loud enough to offend delicate constitutions and make conversation difficult. The mud and horse dung that cover much of the streets does a little to muffle the sound, but also ensures that a gentleman must have a boot scraper outside his front door, lest visitors’ boots besmirch the carpets of his haven from this world.

While a walk in the dead of night can be a pleasant and sustaining experience, it is better to make use of London’s cabs. Two main carriages can be found for hire. The Hackney carriage is the longest-serving, being a comfortable, if slow moving, service, easily accomodating four people. The cab is horse-drawn and travels of four wheels, quite unlike its more fashionable competitor, the handsom cab. These two-wheeled cabs are seen in increasing numbers and are popular for their speed in traffic-clogged streets. There are also the large, often two-deck, horse-drawn omnibuses, which run up until midnight, for the lower classes. In recent years, a system of trams has also started to appear, again useful for the lower classes, though these too cease running early at night.

North London

North London is a land of contrasts. Rich and poor live within a stone’s throw of each other, vice and culture going hand-in-hand. Hills give way to river lands and forests to the urban jungle. Here, new stands atop old. It is the most venerable part of the city, home to places of power, dark and light, rich and poor.

Hampstead Heath

Hampstead is renowned for its heath, a rolling greensward that encompasses ponds, woods and ancient monuments including, so legend has it, Boudicca’s Grave. Here, too, lies Parliament Hill, the Vale of Heath and Kenwood House, home to the Earls of Mansfield. The heath is beloved of London’s Gangrel, meeting in the 18th century coaching inn called John Straw’s Castle, named for a companion of Wat Tyler.

Spaniard’s Inn

Even older than John Straw’s Castle, this pub attracts young Daeva and Toreador drawn by its illustrious former patrons Byron, Keats, Dickens and Shelley.

Highgate Cemetery

Highgate, with its woods and elegant village life, is best known for its cemetery. Here lie Karl Marx, George Elliot, Michael Farraday, Christina Rossetti and the family of Dickens (Charles lies in Westminster Abbey). Coleridge lies nearby, resting in the vault of St Michael’s Church, while Francis Bacon also died in the “village.” The sylvan cemetery’s architecture ranges from the Classical to the Romantic; its subterranean Egyptian Avenue features massive obelisks and family vaults, while the Lebanon Circle comprises a number of crypts sunk in a circle around an ancient cedar. Highgate has a reputation, a little exaggerated, as one of London’s premier haunted sites, exceeded only by Westminster Palace, Marble Arch (Tyburn as was) and the Tower of London.

Saddler's Wells Theatre

The Saddler’s Wells Theatre was once among the most notorious in London but has, in recent years, been “rescued” from disaster by Samuel Phelps and become a respected venue for drama, though still not as well regarded as those in central London.

Clerkenwell Green

Immediately south of Angel (named after the Angel Inn, in Islington) lies Clerkenwell “Green” (in fact a paved square). The rookery here is among the worst slums in the city, made famous by Oliver Twist, and known locally as Little Italy for all the Italian immigrants who have moved into the area.

Lord’s Cricket Ground

On the far side of Regent’s Park, across the canal in St Jame’s Wood, lies Lord’s Cricket Ground, home since 1814 to the Marylebone Cricket Club (affectionately known as the MCC) and undisputed birthplace of the game. Surprisingly for a game that can last five days and that takes place only during the day, Lord’s is popular with a number of Kindred who use a mixture of technical apparatus (mirrors, shutters and the like) to view the games from a secure subterranean chamber.

West London

As a whole, West London is more affluent than other districts, containing many of the homes of the rich and well-to-do.

The core of London is the West End, a series of interlocking “villages” that serve as the brain (Westminster), heart (Soho) and soul (Royal Palaces) of the city — St. Giles would be the bowels. Running parallel to the Thames is the Strand, the principal thoroughfare linking The City to Westminster, as well site of many prestigious residences (including that of the prince) and the newly opened Savoy Hotel.

Royal Albert Hall

Originally to be called the Hall of Arts and Science — Queen Victoria changed its name in memory of her husband — this cylindrical edifice is surprisingly humble for a Victorian building, though its red-velvet interior, used mostly for classical concerts, is breathtaking. Construction was partly funded by selling seats and boxes on a 999-year lease, and numerous Daeva and Ventrue of the city are seat-owners, considering the price a fair investment given their unlife expectancy. As might be expected, the Albert Hall, the adjacent Royal College of Music and the nearby Royal College of Arts are part of the Elysium.

Hyde Park

Hyde Park, directly north of Kensington, is the largest open space in central London, covering 340 acres but completely surrounded by buildings. Once the lands of Westminster Abbey, the park contains a boating and bathing lake (the Serpentine), woodland and gallops. It continues to be the favoured place for duels, though the practice has largely disappeared since the British Army banned duelling in 1844. Speaker’s Corner, in the northeastern reaches of the park opposite Marble Arch, is the favoured haunt of radicals (and no few Carthians) who seek to voice their opinions. It was established by an Act of Parliament in 1872, and anyone with an opinion can express it here, traditionally on a Sunday morning, though obviously Kindred don't hold with this restriction and hold their own gatherings in the small hours without fear of interference (though haranguing is quite likely).

Westminster Abbey

Across the square from Parliament, this impressive edifice was begun in the reign of Edward the Confessor before the Norman invasion. Most of the construction dates from the reign of Henry III in the 13th century, but the building was not fully completed until shortly before the Reformation (with additions made by Nicholas Hawksmoor in 1745). The gothic building, originally a Benedictine Abbey, incorporated a school and cloisters for study and contemplation, though this function was replaced by political machination (the Commons used to meet here after the Reformation). The abbey has remained a major religious structure, as the site of almost every state coronation since William I and the burial place of many kings and queens. Perhaps because of its continual use and place at the heart of English society, Westminster Abbey is a difficult place for a Kindred to enter; even the most strong-willed feel uncomfortable and the majority suffer immense pain, if they are able to cross the threshold at all.

Trafalgar Square

Trafalgar Square stands at the head of Whitehall, established in the 1830s and home to the 165-ft. tall Nelson’s Column. On the north side of the square is the National Gallery and the neighbouring National Portrait Gallery, as well as the Tale Gallery, expected to open next year.

Piccadilly Circus

Due north of Green Park is Piccadilly, home to many of the city’s gentleman’s clubs, and beyond that is Mayfair, where lie the most sought-after residences. At the eastern end of Piccadilly is Piccadilly Circus, a gaudy mélange of shops and music halls, at the centre of which is a newly erected winged statue. Even further east, the music halls of Leicester Square — notably the Empire and Alhambra — have recently taken over what was a prime residential area. Both the square and Piccadilly are popular rendezvous points and ideal hunting grounds for Kindred.

Soho

One a fashionable area in the 17th and 18th centuries but now shunned, some parts of Soho attempt to cling to respectability while much of the area is home to impoverished immigrants. The “night houses” of Soho are home to prostitutes of both sexes, exploiting the more liberal attitude of the immigrant-dominated area. Drinking and opium dens are also rife in the area, managed by mortal and Kindred crime bosses.

British Museum

Surprisingly not far from the St. Gile’s Rookery (the most rundown part of the city; a maze of slums, home to numerous vagrants, cutthroats and prostitutes), the British Museum is London’s preeminent centre for history and learning. Private evening soirees allow London’s Kindred to enjoy the museum’s exhibits (some of them recall when the artifacts were new!) and mingle with the upper echelons of mortal society. At the heart of the museum complex is the reading room, which houses tens of thousands books and is seen by many Kindred as their library. Others have nurtured the mortal souls who have passed through the reading room, including Karl Marx, Mohanda Gandhi and Thomas Carlyle.

Covent Garden

Turning south from Holborn takes you to Covent Garden, an area of stark contrasts. The covered central piazza houses a fruit and vegetable market, while the surrounding arcades house shops and chambers as well as street entertainers.

Royal Opera House

In the northeast corner of Covent Garden’s piazza stands the Royal Opera House, a mélange of Victorian and preexisting structures that has seen numerous classical performers and shows. Like the Royal Albert Hall, prominent Kindred regularly attend performances at the Opera House, observing each other and the well-to-do kine from their private boxes.

Savoy Hotel

Catering for those of the highest class, the site of the Savoy Hotel, covering three quarters of an acre, is adjacent to the Savoy Theatre. On every floor there is a terraced balcony, supported either by granite columns or pillars. The carriage entrance, on Savoy Hill, brings visitors into a rectangular central courtyard, in the middle of which a fountain plays in a bower of flowers. At two corners, enclosed in towers which form portions of the square, have been provided American elevators, by means of which passengers may conveniently ascend to the top floors. On the first floor is the restaurant, considered as distinct from the hotel for it can be used by anyone alighting from the Strand. It is splendidly mounted in mahogany, carved and inlaid, and the chairs are covered with red leather. French windows open upon the broad balcony, where after dinner the grateful cup of coffee and cigarette may be enjoyed in the open air. Another separate department is the banqueting-hall on the mezzanine floor, below the restaurant, having beneath it the ballroom. In the lower floors of the building are lounge-rooms, bureaus, cloak-rooms, smoke-rooms, and other conveniences which are the outgrowth of modern civilisation. The hotel took five years and vast expense to complete and, when it opened on 6 August 1889, incorporated unheard of features, not least of which was full electric lighting, driven by four electric light engines housed in the depths of the cellars.

The City

The site of the old Roman and medieval towns, The City (also called Square Mile) is London’s financial heart. The old city walls came down (mostly) in 1760, though several fragments remain, and the line can be seen in the street names (such as London Wall near Moorgate) and layout. Even before the Great Fire, this part of London was the merchant quarter, and the 17th century reconstruction bolstered this with magnificent financial edifices.

The National Gallery

The National Gallery occupies the whole north side of Trafalgar Square, and stands on the site of the King’s Mews. It is divided between the national collection of paintings of the old masters (the western half) and the Royal Academy (occupying the eastern half), which exhibitions of modern works are held from May to July. The Gallery was founded by a vote of Parliament, April 2nd, 1824, and the present building erected between 1832 and 1838. Cheap catalogues of the pictures, from a penny to a shilling, may be had both within and without the Gallery. The gallery is open to the public on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Saturdays during November, December and January, from 10am until dusk, through February, March and April, from 10am until 5pm, and throughout May, June, July, August and September, from 10am until 6pm. The gallery is open to students on Thursdays and Fridays during the above-mentioned months from 10am till 5pm. In the month of October the gallery is closed.

St. Paul’s Cathedral

Although the best known, St. Paul’s Cathedral is only one of dozens of churches in the Square Mile. The sanctity of the site means that few Kindred can enter the cathedral or its precincts without pain, the the aura of holiness is less fierce than Westminster. Some of the London Kindred whisper that this strength of faith in St. Paul’s — and the key placement of other churches, notably those of Nicholas Hawksmoor, around the capital— is part of some wider conspiracy by a secret mortal faction to hamper the activity of the city’s Kindred.

Houses of Parliament

Westminster centres on the Houses of Parliament (also referred to as the Palace of Westminster since it incorporates the last relics of the old Royal Palace). Parliament has sat here since 1622, but the present building is mostly less than a century old. A major fire in 1834 gutted all by Westminster Hall and the Jewel Tower, and the building wasn’t completed until 1860. Sine the days of Oliver Cromwell, Parliament has been the domain of the Invictus. The Prime Minister’s residence since 1732 has been Downing Street, up Whitehall toward Trafalgar Square. The prince discourages any interference with the workings this residence.

New Scotland Yard

Another part of Invitcus domain and the headquarters of the Metropolitan Police, the Yard moved to Westminster from Great Scotland Yard in 1890.

Newgate Gaol

London’s infamous jail replaced Tyburn as the city’s principal place of execution. For eighty-five years, such executions were held in public, but after 1868 they were moved into the security of the prison’s grounds. The building was the focus of the Carthian-sponsored Gordon Rioters in the late 18th century, and it remains a target of that covenant’s enmity.

Royal Courts of Justice

The eastern extension of the Strand toward The City is the heart of the legal system in London, Britain and the empire. Completed in 1882, the Royal Courts of Justice on Fleet Street (also renowned for its newspaper offices) are the nation’s principal courts, ad the surrounding buildings are geared to supporting them. The so-called Inns of Court, a combination of legal school and chambers for lawyers and barristers, stand north and south of the court. Middle and Inner Temple lie situated south of the Strand toward the Thames, and Lincoln’s Inn and Gray’s Inn to the north around High Holborn. The first two trace their origins to the Knight’s Templar, who had premises on the site, though most of the buildings in the four Inns of Court are of Elizabethan or more recent origin. Unbeknownst to the mortal legal practitioners, a series of tunnels weave their way under the buildings, avoiding the subterranean Fleet River to provide Kindred (mostly Invictus) interested in the legal proceedings with access to the premises and practitioners.

London Bridge

This noble structure is a work of great magnitude and skill. On each side a large dry arch is thrown over the streets running east and west; a plan well adapted to so busy a part of the City, as it obviates the destruction which formerly occurred from two constant channels of industry crossing each other. The materials of which the bridge is constructed are Scottish, Peterhead, and Derbyshire granite; it consists of five elliptical arches, and the central arch (150 ft. span) is generally considered the finest ever executed, for the strength and beauty of its construction. The piers have massive plinths and Gothic-pointed cut- waters. The arches are surmounted with a bold projecting block cornice (corresponding with the line of roadway), covered with a plain blocking-course, by way of parapet, which gives the whole a simple and grand appearance. The approaches to the bridge, on both sides of the river, have a noble appearance. That on the south side is called Wellington Street; on the east of which is Duke Street leading to Tooley Street, and the entrance to the Brighton and South-Eastern Railway termini. On the north side, King William Street forms part of the grand connecting-line with Islington, by Prince's Street; the line being continued by Moorgate Street to the City Road, and from thence to Islington.

Guildhall

Built in 1673 after the Great Fire, the Guildhall is the centre of mortal and Kindred power in The City; the City of London Corporation has controlled affairs for over eight hundred years. Indeed, The City has its own police force independent of the Met, which is a constant source of friction, both among the mortals and between the Kindred who claim domain over the police.

East London

To the east of The City lie the slums of the East End, notably Whitechapel and Spitalfields, but also Shadwell (renowned, perhaps unfairly, for its opium dens). Living conditions are atrocious, with prostitution and petty crime abundant. Immigrants dominate the area, particularly the Irish fleeing the potato famine of 1845-49 and Jews escaping the Eastern European pogroms of the last two decades. It was here, with the exception of Catherine Eddowes (whose body was found at Mitre Square in City jurisdiction) that Jack the Ripper hunted. This den of villainy is prime hunting ground for the Kindred too.

Whitechapel

Prostitution is rife in this area. Estimates vary, from twelve hundred prostitutes counted by the Metropolitan Police in 1888, to “one in sixteen” women practicing this lowest of trades (the Lancet, 1857), a clear demonstration that the “upright values” of the modern Victorian age is a sham. That prostitution is illegal matters little; demands for the woman’s services cannot be denied, and many East End women fall back on so-called “thrupenny trade” when money is short.

Ten Bells

To avoid arrest for on-street solicitation, many of Whitechapel’s prostitutes walk a circuit around the church of St. Botolph at Algate before heading off with their clients. The Ten Bells pub on Commercial Street and the nearby Britannia (better known as the Ringers after its proprietors) are also focal points for the trade.

London Hospital

Opened is 1740, the London Hospital on Whitechapel Road tends to the needs of the local community, including several wards and kitchens dedicated to those of the Jewish faith. The hospital has gained a certain notoriety in recent years as the home of Joseph Carey Merrick (1862-1890), also known as John Merrick — or less sympathetically, the Elephant Man. Brought to the hospital by Frederick Treves in 1886, Merrick has drawn many of the city’s physicians to the East End.

Limehouse

The heart of Oriental London, there are mysterious looking shops in Limehouse with little or nothing in the windows, and which have curtains to shut off the street. Now and again a Chinaman or other Asiatic will push the handle and disappear. It is an opium-smoking room. Enter and you will see a counter, a pair of small scales, a few cigars, some tobacco, and other et ceteras. The shop has a back parlor with a dingy yellow curtain. It is furnished with a settee, chairs, and a spacious divan, or wooden structure with one or two mattresses and half-a-dozen hard pillows or bolsters. It is there that the Ya’pian Kan — the prepared opium — is smoked, and the majoon, made of hellebore, hemp and opium, is chewed, eaten and smoked. The Oriental lodging-houses and homes of Limehouse and Poplar are nearly all of them private. The residents stay three or four days, sometimes a week or a fortnight, and longer as the money lasts. In the majority of cases each race and taste has its own home. The Mohammedan Lascars and the Hindus eat apart from each other, though their food may only be rice. But the Lascars outnumber all the other sailors. When ashore for any length of time they prefer a nearly empty room with just a bed and a mattress. They carry with them their own bedding and their prayer rugs. They often sleep two or three on one bed, and one room may accommodate a half-dozen or more. There are any number of these lodging-houses, yet anybody not thoroughly acquainted with the locality would be at a loss to find one, for they look half deserted, and there is nothing to show that rooms are to let within. Usually the lodging-house is a disused shop; its shutters are up and barred, and it admits only a faint glimmer of light through a small aperture high up near the ceiling. The street door is unlocked, but shut to so that it need only be pushed open. The Orientals glide in and out silently, and the shut-up shop, round which are beds and divans, is a delightful retreat from the Oriental point of view; the half darkness being grateful to the eyes and restful to the nerves induces that delightful sensation called Keyf. Although most of the houses are generally well conducted, it occasionally happens that an Arab or Malay will cause a terrible disturbance. These gentry occasionally get intoxicated through the bhang and the hashish that they chew and eat amid which makes them raving mad.

Isle of Dogs

The promontory that lies in the majestic southward sweep of the Thames, known as the Isle of Dogs, has long been left to nature. Somewhat marshy and swampy in character, it earned its name as an island at the turn of the century when a canal was driven along the top of it. However, demand for further docks in London has led to the northern end of the island becoming home to the vast East and West India Docks in 1870. Now the whole place is become little more than a mass of shipyards, warehouse and docks.

London Docks

As well as legitimate business, this area is a den for activities of the most notorious kind. The working people here are of a distressingly troublesome mood, and their disruptive actions and strikes have had some negative impact on a number of industrial and mercantile ventures.

Hackney Marshes

The broad Hackney Marshes, flanking the River Lea, block the eastward expansion of the city, through the locals claim the remains of buildings can be found in the now-flooded land. The marches serve as a refuge for those fleeing the law, Kindred and kine alike.

South London

Long derided by many of those who dwell north of the Thames as being inferior to the other shore, this is however the very place where Shakespeare first performed his notable plays, and it is home to some of the greatest scientific ideas of the age, not least the Meridian Line at Greenwich.

Bethlehem Royal Hospital

The infamous mental hospital, more commonly referred to as Bedlam, has existed since the 13th century, but has stood in Lambeth only since 1815. For many years it housed both the criminally insane and those who were merely mad. Since the criminals departed for Broadmoor in the West Country in 1864, it has catered only to those whose minds are damaged in legal ways, as it were. The place is renowned for the terrible noise its inhabitants make on occasion.

Borough Market

By Waterloo Station and Blackfriars Goods Yard, the Borough Market is one of the busiest in the city, and the remaining public houses in the area still do good trade.

Queen’s House

Greenwich Palace, built in 1426, and the nearby Queen’s House, built in 1635, have long been popular locations for celebrations, banqueting and balls for the aristocracy. Indeed, at least three mortal monarchs of the realm were born here: Henry VIII, Mary and Elizabeth. Of course, the prominent Kindred of the city, especially the Invictus, have never been averse to taking advantage of its attractions when the mortal dignitaries had moved elsewhere. Though the palace itself is long gone, Queen’s House remains a favourite with mortal aristocracy, and the Invictus have housed their prime domain here. Mortals once used the expansive Greenwich Park (deep within which, atop a hill, stands the Royal Observatory) for hunting, and now the Invictus maintain that tradition, after their own fashion.

Clapham Common

South of Battersea, Clapham houses more influential people than anywhere but the centre of the city itself; its residents have included the poet Shelley, the architect of the Houses of Parliament and the founder of the Thunderer: the Times newspaper. The town, which has become part of London as the houses have sprung up along the railway route, is based around Clapham Common, a body of ground best known for its famous trees. Around it are clustered a number of expensive villas that house the wealthy of the city.

Holy Trinity Church

Over recent centuries Clapham has been the home of a major Christian revival, which has led to the construction of the Holy Trinity Church on Clapham Common, the undisputed bastion and foundation of Lancea Sanctum domain.

Crystal Palace

Until 1854, Sydenham was a small rural town, divided into the fashionable Upper Sydenham, where the wealthy lived, and mean Lower Sydenham, home of the labouring classes. Following the Great Exhibition of 1851 in Hyde Park, its centrepiece, a vast palace of iron and glass, was taken down and re-erected in Sydenham at the cost of £1,500,00. There, it was enlarged and divided into courts to form the centre of an amusement and leisure park for the city. It is used as a theatre, menagerie and exhibition hall, and, on occasions as decreed by the prince, Elysium. The surrounding two hundred acres is known as Crystal Palace Park, and houses gardens, boating lakes, a zoo and the largest maze in London.