Dickens was a passionate walker, both of the Kent countryside but especially of the streets of London, the setting for so much of his writing.

From my present weekday venue in the radiology department of University College London Hospital I have followed the great writer’s example and done some of my own explorations.

Although born and bred in the ‘great wen’ I always discover some little-known, yet fascinating, corners.
Yesterday, for example, I stumbled across St George’s gardens which are located between St Pancras station and Brunswick square and can be reached via the appropriately named Handel street (Handel was a generous benefactor of the square’s Foundling Hospital).

The gardens are an amalgam of two eighteenth century burial grounds belonging to the two St George’s churches in the area: St George’s, Bloomsbury and St George’s, Queen square. Both churches had filled their own grounds to the full with inhumations and these gardens are the first example of a burial ground separated from any church. Indeed, they could be said to be London’s first cemetery.

Opened in 1715 the gardens were closed to further burial in 1854 and were opened to the public as an open space in the 1880’s.
By the 1990’s they had become very run-down and were the den of drug dealers and illicit sexual encounters. A local group was, therefore, set up to recuperate the gardens and, with the help of volunteers and grants, this little gem of greenery has returned to be an oasis of peace set in the midst of its bustling surroundings.

There are some fine trees and delightful garden ‘snugs’ here.

Even in winter the atmosphere is very appealing. Along the wall, built originally to dissuade body-snatchers from supplying nearby medical schools with corpses for anatomy lessons, are placed many, now largely indecipherable, tombstones. (Ps body-snatchers, or ‘resurrectionists’ are now no longer around, I hope).

Still in their original place in the gardens are chest tombs and an impressive obelisk to a certain Thomas Faulkner.

However, what really took my fancy was a lovely terracotta statue to the lyric muse Euterpe, originally from a nearby theatre.

These pretty gardens are an excellent example of the secrets London can reveal to those who will dedicate some hours walking its ever-fascinating streets. They are also a fine example of how the local community (which holds a festival here around St George’s day) can get together and reclaim a neglected space for public enjoyment. Bagni di Lucca take this as an example and do more to reclaim your own lovely gardens around two of your grand but uninhabited villas!