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Aldgate House, Bethnal Green

The hamlet of Bethnal Green, adjoining Spitalfields and Shoreditch, once belonged to Stepney parish until it was made a distinct parish in its own right in the thirteenth year of the reign of George II (1750). Bethnal Green lies on the ancient Roman way from London. In the eighteenth century Bethnal Green was considered a 'very pleasant spot'.

According to a letter written by Mr Gretton in 1806, the proprietor of Aldgate House (shown above), Aldgate House was a noble mansion built in the year 1643. "It came into the possession of Mr Mussell, with some fields adjacent thereto, by purchase, under a decree in chancery, about the year 1760. The citizens of London having ordered the city gates to be pulled down, this gentleman purchased the antique and most valuable part of Aldgate, consisting of Roman, Runic, Saxon, Danish, Norman and English bricks, stones, bas relievo's, and sculptures, which he re-edified as an adjacent to Aldgate House ..."

Gretton went on to write a little about the village of Bethnal Green itself: "A little beyond Aldgate House the cruel Bishop Bonner is said to have had his country residence, rendered infamous by the tortures in it upon the victims who were so unhappy as to be the objects of his persecuting power. A part of this building still remains on the north side of the field called Bonner's Field ...

"In a six-acre field, facing the great west wall of Aldgate House gardens, but on the other side the high road to Bow, is a fine spring of excellent water, dedicated so early as about 1160 to St Winifred; till of late years it was enclosed in a Gothic building, and from it were placed pipes of copper, to convey the water underground to the villages, monasteries, and other religious foundations in its vicinity; but the Bow water being laid into Bethnal Green, the spring was closed, the building pulled down, and the land made good for pasturage over it."

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