...The Secret Fireplace of Vincent Street

This time around we really are going for a bit of a stroll, but if you want to see a couple of little-known gems, it’s well worth it. So let’s wander down Millbank towards Pimlico, and take a right when we get to Lambeth Bridge, up Horseferry Road. Bear left to walk along the southern perimeter of Westminster School’s playing fields. On your left, you’ll see Vincent Street. Walk down it a few dozen yards, and stop by a red brick building on your right. Opposite, you’ll see a pair of black iron gates. Look at the brick wall on their left, which forms the back of someone’s garden.

You may find it hard to spot, because of the ivy all over the wall, but embedded here is a little fireplace that survived the Blitz. It was a part of someone’s front room. Scores of bombs landed in this area between 1940 and 1941, and a V1 or V2 bomb wiped out much of it, such that Napier Hall (the red brick building opposite, now a community centre) is in fact the only pre-Second World War survivor.

Forty thousand people died in the Blitz and a million homes were damaged or destroyed – of which this fireplace belonged to one. There’s something rather haunting about this remnant of domesticity, left open to the elements for 80 years as a result of the brutality of war, isn’t there?

We’re not done yet. Head back the way you came, down Horseferry Road, but just before you reach the river, take a left into Smith Square and continue past St John’s, until you come to the elegant Georgian houses of Lord North Street. Look at the wall on your right, and you’ll see a fading painted sign, pointing to “Public shelters in vaults under pavements in this street.” Yes, this is the way to what was an air-raid shelter. The white paint was so that people could see it. Perhaps, 80 years ago, the siren sounded, and a family who had been fearfully huddled around that fireplace ran here.