Oliver Twist and the Artful Dodger met in Barnet High Street. This final stage of their walk to Fagin’s Lair, taken at night, can still be followed – more or less. ‘Oliver Twist’ was published in 1838, the year after Queen Victoria came to the throne. Whilst writing his novel, Dickens was observing the last days of Georgian London. Victorian London was yet to exist.
Rosebery Avenue
Built by the London County Council in 1889 and named in honour of its Chairman (and future Prime Minister) Lord Rosebery, this late Victorian thoroughfare would clearly not have been trodden by Oliver and the Dodger. Their route south west from St John Street would have been through back alley slums, the likes of which Rosebery Avenue was designed to crush.
However, they would have passed close to the Sadler’s Wells Theatre, founded by Thomas Sadler in 1683, on the site of the old holy well of St John’s Priory. Sadler’s Wells had really been a music house (Joseph Grimaldi performed there often) and then later a music hall, before being rebuilt in 1931 as the ballet and opera venue we know today.
Farringdon Road (Coppice Row)
Farringdon Road, like Rosebery Avenue, was yet to be constructed (mid 1800’s). Like Rosebery Avenue, Farringdon Road also served the dual purpose of being a wide, well built connecting road and an excuse to steam-roll over slums.
Nothing wrong with clearing slums I hear you say. But over 16000 Londoners were displaced in the building of Farringdon Road and in those days nobody bothered to re-house them. Put simply, these citizens just upped and moved into other overcrowded slum districts.
Coppice Row, Chick Lane and Field Lane were three of the more notorious slums – or rookeries – cleared for the construction of Farringdon Road and the Holborn Viaduct scheme. Oliver and the Dodger did pass by one imposing, unwelcome edifice that survived demolition until 1883, the Clerkenwell Workhouse.