Mysterious carvings in Islington… 🧐#london #londonhistory

Video ID: tblwnjrTwt4

YouTube URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tblwnjrTwt4

Added At: 13-06-25 21:18:45

Processed: No

Sentiment: Neutral

Categories: Education, History

Tags: mystery, history, Victorian era, policemen, carvings

Summary

• A quiet back street in Islington has a mysterious brick wall with carvings. • The carvings are believed to be the marks left by Victorian policemen. • They carved their collar number followed by the letter of their division.

Transcript

in Islington not far from Angel station
you'll find a quiet back street called
Middleton passage go down it and you'll
see that it looks at first glance fairly
ordinary look closely however at this
brick wall on the left and you'll notice
something strange lots of the bricks
have these odd carvings on them they're
mostly numbers followed by a letter
sometimes names sometimes places what
are they for many years it was a mystery
the local story was that the wall was
built by prisoners in the Napoleonic
Wars and that these were their prisoner
numbers in 20 0 6 however the mystery
was solved an investigator from English
Heritage worked out that they are in
fact Victorian left by Victorian
policemen no less in the mid 19th
century this poorly lit secluded spot
had a reputation for crime and so
policemen would be stationed here
regularly clearly bored they started to
leave their marks usually they carved
their colar number followed by the
letter of their division most RG for the
Finsbury division that covered this area
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