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City & Village Tours: 0845 812 5000 info@cityandvillagetours.com
Above: Doggett’s Men including the Bargemaster of the
Company of Watermen and Lightermen. Note his blue
uniform and tri-corn hat.
Theatres & Pleasure Gardens
Theatre managers like Doggett knew the value of the
watermen for delivering their audiences. There were
also pleasure gardens along the river which relied on
the watermen. Vauxhall and Ranelagh are the best
remembered today but below bridge, the Cherry Garden
at Redriff was much in vogue and above bridge the Swan
and the Globe theatres competed for custom with Paris
Garden which was the scene of all sorts of saucy
adventures. Cuper's or Cupids Garden opposite Somerset
House was famous for its fireworks.
Thames River Pageants & Processions
On Sunday 3rd June 2012, more than one thousand boats
will muster on the River for the Diamond Jubilee Thames
River Pageant in honour of HM Queen Elizabeth. Six
weeks later the Olympic Torch will travel along the River
from Richmond to Tower Bridge en route to the opening
ceremony in the Olympic Stadium at Stratford. The River
Thames has long provided some of the greatest “shows”
seen on water. From the 1400s the Lord Mayor’s Show
was an annual Thames event with City Livery barges
covered in leaf of gold and rowed with oars of silver.
This came to an abrupt halt in the 1850s by which time the
river was a stinking open sewer and the city bigwigs just
couldn’t stomach it. They took to the bumpy streets
instead and since that time each November the new Lord
Mayor has to fight the queasy sea-sickness that comes
from being bounced up and down and slung from side to
side in that beautiful but suspension-less carriage that
spends the rest of the year stabled at the Museum of
London. New Lord Mayors do sometimes still venture
onto the River for a bit of a show as seen, for example,
below where two Lord Mayors, attended by Doggett’s
Men, wave from on board an ornate Thames shallop
owned by Lloyds of London.