London - April 2025

On the way to our riverboat cruise, my mother and I spent five April days in London and we managed to squeeze in quite a bit of sightseeing. After dropping our luggage at the Charlotte Guest House in West Hampstead (which kindly allowed us into our room at 11 am – it is amazing how much of a difference this makes when you have been on a plane since 8 pm the previous night, then on the Tube for what seems like several hours), we headed to the William Morris Gallery in Walthamstow, in northeast London.

It had been Morris's childhood home from 1848 to 1856. The museum features an extensive collection of his textiles, wallpapers, furniture, and personal artifacts. Tea, a sandwich, and a salt-caramel brownie gave us enough energy to explore the Collection and the grounds. I love Morris designs and mostly resisted temptation in the gift shop.

We had dinner at a Thai restaurant near the hotel. I did a little exploring in the neighborhood, visiting two bookstores, the local library, and some charity shops. I bought a book by Jane Dunn I’d had my eye on but missed out on something else I meant to go back for later (a fatal phrase).

Saturday morning we were a little mesmerized by the BBC coverage of the Pope’s funeral (although we had both set our DVRs to capture it at home) but resolutely left it behind for a quick bite at a branch of Gail’s Bakery (I had fond memories of the one in Marylebone), then set off for St. Albans. Although I had researched where to get the train, which was very close to our hotel, I had not realized there were multiple train stations. I asked a British Rail employee which one to take and (alas) he told me the one farther away from our destination so we had a very long walk from the center of town to the historic area.

St. Albans is a city north of London that is now close enough for commuting but of interest to us for its cathedral and for its history as a Roman town. We started at the St. Albans Museum, which covers the development of St Albans over the centuries, from a market town to the modern city of the 21st century. The museum was once the Town Hall and Courthouse, built in 1826, but replacing a courtroom that had been in use since the 16th century. However, what I found most interesting was learning about the area’s importance in the Wars of the Roses.

The First Battle of St Albans took place in May 1455, at St Albans and traditionally marks the beginning of the Wars of the Roses in England. Richard, Duke of York (father of Edward IV and Richard III), and his allies defeated a royal army commanded by Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset (grandson of Katherine Swynford, from everyone’s favorite book by Anya Seton). The battle took place in the town of St Albans itself, which was unusual, and when the battle was lost by the Plantagenets, Somerset and some of his men took refuge in a local tavern called the Castle Inn, forgetting a soothsayer had warned him to beware castles. He was killed as he tried to fight his way out and Henry VI captured, allowing a parliament wavering between loyalties to appoint Richard of York Lord Protector (which the king did not want because he didn’t trust his kinsman).

Next, we visited St. Albans Cathedral and had a great tour, admiring its Norman architecture as well as medieval wall paintings. It claims to be the oldest site of continuous Christian worship in Britain, although given that Henry VIII dissolved it as an abbey in the 16th century, weren’t there some missing years in there before it became a church again? St. Alban was the first British saint, having protected a priest, Amphibalus (escaping from ICE-like persecutors), and sheltering him. Alban was so impressed with the priest's faith that he converted to Christianity (on the spot?). The Roman soldiers executed him for harboring Amphibalus. Pilgrims still come to visit St. Alban's shrine and presumably to admire the longest nave (85 meters) in Britain.

We walked through a park with ornamental lakes, swans, and several other varieties of water fowl, past the remains of the city’s ancient Roman wall to reach the Verulamium Museum. It was built on the site of the Roman city and was full of treasures and ordinary daily life items dug up from nearby digs and mosaics recreated from the homes of affluent Romans. We arrived in time for a talk on burial customs, which we enjoyed, and stayed until the museum closed. A promised bus turned out not to run on Saturdays but we got an Uber back to the train station, dined at Le Pain Quotidien (convenient if not elegant), and then went to the theatre.

The Score featured Brian Cox as the composer Johann Sebastian Bach tricked into a bet to improvise a fugue begun by Prussian monarch Frederick II, who has musical aspirations. Cox is a British stage actor most recently known for starring as Logan Roy in Succession on HBO. Set in 1747, when Bach’s hometown of Leipzig has been overrun with misbehaving Prussian soldiers, Bach has an ax to grind with his monarch when he reaches Potsdam. His son Carl is worried about losing his job as a court composer, while his three colleagues - court composers, Johann Quantz, Franz Benda and Carl Graun - provide light relief in their eagerness to avoid the king’s disfavor by getting the Bachs in trouble. Another actor played an over-the-top version of Voltaire (whom I erroneously expected to be in France, but it turns out he spent a lot of time in Frederick’s court, receiving a salary of 20,000 French livres a year). We really liked the show and it turned out to be the final performance of the short run so there were many curtain calls.

(photo credits to come)