PAST AND PRESENT. BY WILLIAM ROBINS. “Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties.”— Milton . PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR, BY ARTHUR AND WARREN HALL, CAXTON STEAM PRINTING OFFICES, 10, CAMBRIDGE TERRACE, CAMDEN TOWN, AND SOLD BY ALL BOOKSELLERS. History is valuable, not merely for the facts which it records, but in a much higher degree for the lessons it teaches; for the Future will be benefited by the Past and the Present, more in proportio

  Houses . Population . Years . Inhabit. Uninhab. Building. Males. Females Persons. 1801 324 33 — 870 1011 1881 1811 879 24 32 1994 2615 4609 1821 1139 13 28 2852 3624 6476 1831 1933 104 93 6278 8262 14,540 1841 3479 221 390 10,784 14,425 25,173 1851 6103 416 222 18,784 27,521 46,306...

Years . Rates levied . Rental .   £ s. d. 1838 14,418 12 8 118,540 1839 16,860 10 11½ 130,631 1840 16,780 11 141,145 1841 18,244 12 10½ 159,412 1842 19,469 3½ 178,060 1843 22,798 15 11½ 196,030 1844 25,272 5 0 214,357 1845 25,928 1 238,712 1846 28,261 2 5 260,001 1847 32,319 16 11½ 317,739 1848 35,878 9 10 332,557 1849 38,619 11 1½ 343,066 1850 41,855 2 6 374,036 1851 37,792 10 5 390,732 1852 34,554 0 34 410,617 These Tables clearly shew that the simile used by Canning— “Pitt is to Addington, As

So many fabulous stories are told us relative to the christian church, that we cannot be surprised to find the history of its territorial possessions, in any particular spot, mixed up with legends which have no foundation in fact. Paddington has its story.  We are told even to this day, [1a] that King Edgar gave lands here to the Monks of Westminster.  And considering what Kings did give to Monks, and also the kind of services rendered by Dunstan and his friends to this usurper of his brother’s

If we accept the definition of the word manor given by the learned Judge Blackstone, in his Commentaries on the Laws of England, [19] or look upon a manor to be “the subinfeudation of a particular district made by A to B,” I think we must come to the conclusion, that neither Westbourn nor Paddington, in ancient times, were manors in either of these senses, unless indeed we consider Westbourn and Tybourn synonymous terms, for we find no account of any lordly residence in either of these places ti

The history of the lands which have been claimed by the Bishop of London, and the Dean and Chapter of Westminster, as their portion of the spoils of the Convent can be completely written by those only who have free access to all the records in the archives of St. Paul’s and St. Peter’s.  And as it would appear that the time is not yet come for placing at the disposal of the public, for public uses, many of the important documents held in charge by Deans and Chapters, we must be content with that

The question “What has become of the Charity Lands?” which has been so often asked in other parishes, has been occasionally put to those in authority in this; but so far as I can discover, no satisfactory answer has been returned—unless indeed we may deem it satisfactory to hear “that charity has been so little needed here, that much of that land which was given for this purpose, has been lost.” In the “Abstract of the returns of charitable donations for the benefit of poor persons, made to the

The policy which has raised the manor and rectory of Paddington to its present value [72] —three-quarters of a million sterling; which has effectually transferred, (so far as private Acts of Parliament can transfer,) two-thirds of the interest of this “small estate” into private hands; and which at the same time has kindly permitted the rate-payers of Paddington to saddle themselves with almost the entire “costs and charges” of those duties for which the whole of this estate was originally desig

DEFINITION—SITUATION—BOUNDARIES AND EXTENT—GENERAL AND MEDICAL TOPOGRAPHY—ETYMOLOGY OF NAMES—ORIGIN. Blackstone defines a parish to be “that circuit of ground which is committed to the charge of one parson, or vicar, or other minister having cure of souls therein.”  In ordinary language a parish is “that place, or district, which manages its local affairs, and maintains its own poor.” Newcourt says, “This parish of Paddington (which is a very small one) is within the liberties of Finsbury and We

THE PARSON—ORIGIN AND USE OF TITHE—PARSONAGE, RECTORY, OR VICARAGE—APPROPRIATION, AND IMPROPRIATION—A LIVING—A SINECURE—A CURACY WITHOUT THE MEANS OF CURE. “A Parson , persona ecclesiae ,” says Blackstone, “is one that hath full possession of all the rights of a parochial church.  He is called parson, persona , because by his person the church, which is an invisible body, is represented; and he is in himself a body corporate, in order to protect and defend the rights of the church, (which he per

ANCIENT CHURCHES—ACT OF PARLIAMENT CHURCHES AND CHAPELS—CHURCH-YARDS—CHURCH-RATES—PARSONAGE-HOUSES—ECCLESIASTICAL DIVISIONS—PLACES OF WORSHIP BUILT AND SUPPORTED BY VOLUNTARY CONTRIBUTIONS, UPHOLDING THE STATE RELIGION; AND THOSE DISSENTING THEREFROM. It is not worth while to enter into an elaborate enquiry, to shew that the parish of Paddington was at one time included in the parish of Tybourn, and that the ancient Tybourn church was the mother-church of the whole of those districts, now includ

SCHOOLS—CHARITABLE INSTITUTIONS—PUBLIC ESTABLISHMENTS AND ESTABLISHMENTS OF PUBLIC UTILITY. A Sunday School , in connection with the Church, was established in Paddington, during the last century; but it was not till the beginning of this, that any public means of instruction existed for the children of the poor on week days.  Lysons, in his second Edition, tells us that “A charity school for thirty boys and thirty girls was established in this parish in 1802;” and that it was “supported by volu

A REVIEW OF THE CONDITION OF THE PARISH AND THE PEOPLE, AT VARIOUS PERIODS OF THEIR HISTORY. Those people who have been the most completely governed by ecclesiastics, are proverbial for having made the slowest progress in all the elements of knowledge which concern man; and the people of Paddington formed no exception to that rule which has been found to hold good in other places.  Here, as elsewhere, the spiritual governors of the people made but poor attempts to develope the mind; and those to