Getting to College

The 'Intended Railroad at Greenwich' by FG Strong, King's College School, 1834Hard up students often had to walk between their digs and College, although they sometimes took the horse bus.

Civil Service student Harry Field later recalled his daily commute on board a bus, and the day of an examination when,

'There was a pea-soup fog covering the city proper and it took me four hours to reach King's from my rooms and I had to be guided for more than two thirds of the distance by a small boy who preceded me with a torch.'

James Lowther, 1st Viscount Ullswater and Speaker of the Commons, remembered the early Underground railway system in the 1870s that 'stank abominably of sulphur but was useful in wet weather'.

Pedestrians had an easy time: 'omnibuses were few and very uncomfortable and cabs dear and cabdrivers abusive'.

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