24hourlondon

While the rest of the country sleeps, Smithfield's meat market buzzes and slams. Right through the night during the week, the ownership of huge slabs of meat is transferred and refrigerated lorries come and go. Time was that cattle would be driven there on foot from all over the country for the same purpose: the records at the London Metropolitan Archive are full of the trouble that ensued. Locals getting trampled by herds that stampeded their way along Cowcross through to their steaming, teeming destination; the complaints of customers who'd been short-changed; and the traders done out of a livelihood by market administrators trying to clamp down on this kind of behaviour. These are the Rigs of the Times ... Originally called "Smoothfield" because it was once a flat, grassy area, over the centuries it's been a place of execution, the site of the oldest hospital in the country (Barts is still there), a fairground and a market. It's also home to one of the ...