Red Bull Yard - Red Cross Street, East Smithfield

Red Bull Yard

South out of Upper Thames Street at No.89, west of Red Bull Wharf (P.O. Directory). In Dowgate Ward.

First mention: O.S. 1848-51.

Former name : " Red Bull Alley " (O. and M. 1677-Boyle, 1799).

Red Cow Alley

Tower Hill, 1660 (L. and P. Commonwealth, 1659-60, p.545).

No further reference.

Red Cross

In Watling Street. Rent given to parish of All Hallows, Bread_Street (Strype, ed. 1720, I. iii. 101).

Not further identified.

Red Cross (The)

A messuage so called in parish of St. Nicholas Olave in Bredstrete, opening into Huggen Lane, in ward of Queenhithe, 1588 and 1601 (Lond. I. p.m. III. 297).

No later mention.

Red Cross (The), Cripplegate

Probably a house with this sign, for in an Inquisition 2 Ed. I. Alicia de Batonia is said to have died at the Red Cross without Crepelgate (Ch. I. p.m. I).

The same description might, of course, have been used to indicate a house situated near to an actual cross of wood or stone, of which there were many to be found in the streets of medieval towns in England, as there are to this day in the towns of France and Italy and other parts of the Continent. But whether the name and sign were used to indicate a house or a cross the Red Cross appears to have been situated at the junction of Beech Street and Redcross Street, for in 14 Ed. I. houses of Robert de Meldeburn in the parish of St. Giles without Crepelgate are described as opposite the Red Cross and in the street called "Bechestrete" (Ct. H.W. I. 74), while tenements in Redecrouche strete extra Barram Rubee Crucis" are described as "juxta rubeam Crucem" (H. MSS. Com. 9th Rep. p.11).

Stow places the cross at the north end of the east side of Red Cross Street (S. 304).

Red Cross Alley

East out of Church Alley to London Bridge (Rocque, 1746-Boyle, i 799). In Bridge Ward Within.

There is a Red Cross Alley in Leake's map, 1666, and in O. and M. 1677, and Hatton, 1708, but it lies west of Churchyard Alley running north and south from Thames Street to the river and is called Graves' Wharf in Rocque.

The site is now occupied by Adelaide Place.

Red Cross Alley

South out of Jewen Street, in Cripplegate Ward Without (O. and M. 167 7-Boyle, 1799).

See Red Cross Square and Hamsell Street.

Red Cross Alley

North out of Little Britain, in Aldersgate Ward Without (O. and M. 1677-Strype, 1755).

The site has been rebuilt for business purposes.

Red Cross Alley, Minories

See Maidenhead Alley.

Red Cross Coal Wharf

South out of Upper Thames Street, on the west side of London Bridge, near Old Swan (Lockie, 1810 and 1816).

Not named in the maps.

Red Cross Court

South out of Cow Lane, in Farringdon Ward Without (Strype, ed. 1720, I. iii. 284, to Elmes, 1831).

Site now occupied by business houses in King Street (Cow Lane).

Red Cross Court

West out of the Minories. In Portsoken Ward (P.C. 1732-Boyle, 1799).

Former names : " Wheelers Alley " (O. and M. 1677). " Wheelers Yard " (Hatton, 1708).

Site or part of it occupied by Hammet Street (q.v.).

The earlier name suggests an owner, the later one is derived from the sign.

Red Cross Court

East out of Old Bailey, in Farringdon Ward Without (O. and M. 1677-Boyle, 1799).

Site afterwards occupied by Newgate Prison, now by the Central Criminal Court.

Red Cross Court

See Black Horse Yard, Aldgate High Street.

Red Cross Court

South out of Denmark Court, Golden Lane, in Cripplegate Ward Without, north of Barbican at No.32, behind the Red Cross public house (Lockie, 1810 O.S. 1875).

Site now covered by offices and business houses.

Red Cross Court, Great Tower Street

See Red Cross Square.

Red Cross Square

North out of Great Tower Street, between Mark Lane and Seething Lane (O.S. 25 in. 1880).

Earliest mention: Horwood, 1799.

Former name: " Red Cross Court" (O. and M. 1677-L. Guide, 1758).

Removed for the formation of Byward Street 1889-1906.

Red Cross Square

See Hamsell Street and Nicholl Square.

Red Cross Street

North from No. 1 Fore Street to Barbican at No. 31 (P.O. Directory). In Cripplegate Ward Without.

First mention : " Redecrochestrete," 1274-5 (Ct. H.W. I. 23).

Other forms: " Redecrouchestrate," 22 Ed. I. (MS. D. and C. St. Paul's, Press A, Box 10, 1013-14). " Redcrouchestrete," 1353 (Riley's Mem. XV.). Redecruchestrete," 1368 (Ct. H.W. II. 110). " Red Cross Street " (S. 293).

There was a tavern called the " Redcrosse" in Barbican at the end of Redcrosse Streete, 31 Chas. II. (L.C.C. Deeds, Harben Bequest, 1600-1700, No. 18).

This may have occupied the site of an older house of the same sign, named from a cross there.

A School founded here in 1709 by Dame Eleanor Hollis for fifty poor girls was kept the same house with that of the parish boys of St. Giles, Cripplegate (Dodsley, 1761). Denton suggests that the names of the street and of Whitecross Street were derived from the armorial bearings of the Abbey of Ramsay and of the Priory of Holy Trinity spectively, who both possessed houses in these streets. But it seems more probable that the name was derived from the Red Cross standing at the north end of the street, hether a house bearing this sign or an actual wayside Cross, it is not easy to determine.

Red Cross Street, East Smithfield

North-east out of Butcher Row to Nightingale Lane (Hatton, 1708-Lockie, 1810).

Removed for the formation of St. Katherine's Docks and the adjacent warehouses 1827.