HIDDEN histories of the world’s great cities
From explosions to executions, a fascinating new series digs beneath the surface of the world’s major metropolises
What makes steam billow from New York’s pavements? Which dark episode in Britain’s past is marked by a black splodge on the clock tower at Horse Guards Parade? Why does San Francisco have a single golden fire hydrant? The answers are to be found in a fascinating new series called Searching For Secrets, which asked experts from across the globe to dig up – literally, in some cases – intriguing historical nuggets as a means of telling more expansive stories about some of the world’s great cities.
The series begins on Monday on the Smithsonian Channel with a delve into New York’s hidden history. London, Berlin, Paris, Singapore and San Francisco feature in future episodes, but before that, here’s a taster of some of the historical treats in store...
QUEEN VICTORIA’S MOVING MONUMENT
HAVING given birth to five children in the first six years of her marriage to Prince Albert, Queen Victoria found herself short of space at Buckingham Palace and in urgent need of either a new home, or a major extension to her existing one. ‘She chose to expand when she found she didn’t have enough space, but there was a problem,’ explains London history expert Katie Wignall in the show. ‘There was something in the way…’
That something was Marble Arch, the grand entrance to Buckingham Palace at the time. Depicting scenes from the battles of Waterloo and Trafalgar, two key British victories during the Napoleonic Wars, the magnificent structure made of Carrara marble and completed in 1833 was too valuable and historically important to simply be demolished. So in 1850, teams of labourers and artisans, under the guidance of architect Thomas Cubitt, moved it lock, stock and barrel almost two miles across London and rebuilt it as the grand entrance to Hyde Park, where it still stands today.
A newer front wing to Buckingham Palace was built where Marble Arch once stood and now, more than a century and a half on, it needs an expert’s eye to spot the royal join. ‘Look closely at the iconic front of the building, complete with the balcony where the royal family greet the public – and then gaze away to the right,’ says Katie Wignall.
‘The older building on the right is slightly behind the other one and made of a different stone. This is the clue to understanding that these are two different buildings.’
ESCAPE FROM THE GALLOWS
A SMALL circular stone (pictured right), trodden on by thousands of shoppers and office workers every day as they make their way past Marble Arch and onto Oxford Street, marks the site of the Tyburn Tree, the gallows around which up to 100,000 people would gather to witness hangings – and occasionally miraculous reprieves.
Burglar John Smith remained alive for 15 minutes, dangling in the air with a noose around his neck, on Christmas Eve 1705, before word arrived of a judicial reprieve. He was known as
Half-hanged Smith for the rest of his life.
The London episode also explains why the city’s taxis owe part of their unique design to Victorian gentlemen and their top hats, and reveals the pungent and potentially dangerous power source beneath the streets that has kept a gas-powered streetlight flickering for more than a century outside the Savoy Hotel.