3-011-375 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Great Fire in the City: ruins of Haberdashers' Hall, [City of London], 1864. 'In a conflagration of a calamitous extent...one of the oldest of our civic halls - that of the Haberdashers' Company - has been almost reduced to roofless walls and blackened rafters...The ancient hall of the Haberdashers, with many of the company's records and property of much value, were destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666...In the year after the Fire, 1667, the rebuilding of the hall was commenced by Wren...The banqueting-room was lofty and spacious, and had a screen and music-gallery...The arms of distinguished members were emblazoned on the hall windows, six of which, on the south side, had been completed this year, but are destroyed; and the front of the gallery is described as decorated with some of [Grinling] Gibbons's carving. The pictures, we are glad to hear, are saved: they are interesting memorials, though not of artistic merit. We regret that so many of the City halls closely adjoin warehouses, or are in part let for business, and are thus more liable to be destroyed by fire. In times when the halls had their gardens this dread was not felt'. From "Illustrated London News", 1864.