My last stop on the way home from the Soviet Union in July 1973 was London, England. I had been invited to stay with friends who were living there, in a house near Gatwick Airport to the south of London. I didn’t take many pictures during my short stay, and I have only a few to offer here.
Of course I could not visit London without seeing the Tower of London, first built by William the Conqueror in 1068 and expanded during the following centuries. It has served as a royal residence and grand palace, armory, treasury, prison and public records office; it has also housed the Royal Mint and the Crown Jewels of England.
Near the Tower of London stands the Tower Bridge. It is much newer than the Tower itself, having been built in the 19th century (1886-1894), but it is equally well-known as a landmark. It is often confused with London Bridge, but that is another bridge in a different location. That bridge, the one commemorated by the nursery rhyme, has a longer and rather interesting history, dating from Roman times. Originally it was built of wood, but under King John (who is also commemorated by a nursery rhyme, Humpty-Dumpty), a stone bridge was completed (1209). That bridge, known as Old London Bridge, lasted until the 19th century. Hundreds of houses were built upon it, and at the south end was a gatehouse where the heads of convicted “traitors” were impaled on pikes – figures such as William Wallace, Thomas More, and Thomas Cromwell.
In 1831 the Old London Bridge was replaced by the New London Bridge, which didn’t last as long. By the 1920’s it was found that the bridge was sinking by an inch every eight years, and in 1967 construction on a new one was begun; it was completed in 1973. The old New London Bridge was sold to an American businessman, Robert McCulloch. It was dismantled and shipped in pieces to Long Beach, California, whence it was trucked to Lake Havasu City, Arizona, and rebuilt over the Colorado River in 1971. It was reconstructed around a steel frame so it wouldn’t sink into the Colorado as it had in the Thames. The stones were used as cladding for the steel framework.
Nothing I had ever read or heard about the Tower of London prepared me for the spectacle of the Tower Ravens. These birds inhabited the garden and were quite accustomed to the presence of humans. Their wings were clipped so they could not fly far, though they were certainly able to get around the Tower grounds with ease. They were well-cared for by the custodians of the Tower; they had bands around their legs to keep track of them and were quite aware of their privileged status.
The ravens were fractious and quarrelsome; they fought amongst one another ferociously, and at one point I saw one raven pinning another down on the ground and pecking its head like a hammer. I was not quick enough to get a picture of that episode, and when I turned back after retrieving my camera, the peckee was gone and its assailant was digging into a piece of bloody meat. I first thought with horror that the dominant bird had dismembered its victim and was eating it, but it turned out that while I wasn’t looking the victim had fled and the victor was merely enjoying chunks of meat that the keepers had thrown in the yard in the interim. But there was no doubt that these birds are rowdy characters.
Elegant residential and office buildings facing a London park, which might have been the location of master detective Hercule Poirot’s office. Actually his office was in Florin Court, aka Whitehaven Mansions, on the eastern side of Charterhouse Square in Smithfield, London. But I didn’t know that at the time.
While strolling near Buckingham Palace I was witness to a scene where a girl got tossed into the pool beside Victoria Memorial by a couple of her friends, who then pulled her out, soaking wet. I called it the Case of the Drenched Debutante.
After an all-too-short stay in London, I hopped a Boeing 747 for the flight back to Los Angeles. On the way I was able to get a shot of the coast of Greenland from the plane.
