A sign on the pavement that points to a place that no longer exists
THE EAST SIDE of London’s Russell Square is lined by large hotels, one of which is the Imperial. On the pavement where Guilford Street enters the eastern side of Russell Square, there is some lettering, which reads:
“Turkish Baths”.
Beneath this is an arrow pointing southwards, and below that, the word:
“Arcade”.
Kimpton Fitzroy Hotel in the background
If you follow the arrow, you will pass the west facing side of the 20th century Imperial Hotel, but you will not neither an arcade nor any Turkish baths. You will pass a vehicle entrance to a courtyard within the hotel. Being puzzled by this old, and it seemed redundant, writing on the pavement, I researched it on the Internet, and soon found out something about it (see for example: https://carolineld.blogspot.com/2012/11/turkish-baths-russell-square.html & www.londonremembers.com/sites/imperial-hotel-statues)
The current Imperial Hotel was built in the late 1960s on the site of an earlier hotel of the same name (built in 1898), which was demolished, rather than restored, in 1966. It was in this first Imperial Hotel that the Imperial Turkish Baths were located. These were demolished along with the hotel that contained them. However, some statues that used to decorate the highly ornate baths were rescued, and now surround the above-mentioned courtyard.
The lettering on the pavement is outside the entrance to a Pret A Manger café. This eatery stands on the site of the former Librairie International bookshop, which might well have been a place where Communist and Anarchist publications were sold. A web page that describes this shop (https://alondoninheritance.com/london-parks-and-gardens/russell-square-and-librairie-internationale/) revealed:
“I have found references to the Librairie Internationale selling copies of Karl Marx publications in the 1920s and in the 1930s as one of the bookshops in London where you could purchase pamphlets such as those produced by the London Freedom Group, whose paper “Freedom – A Journal of Libertarian Thought, Work And Literature” included the address of the Librairie Internationale in Russell Square as one of the London bookshops and newsagents where Freedom could be purchased.”
I had never heard of this bookshop or the Turkish Baths at the Imperial Hotel, and would not have known about either of them had I not noticed the lettering in the pavement. I spotted this after having met a person, whom I had not seen since 1968, when we were both pupils at north London’s Highgate School. We had just met for coffee at a café within the Kimpton Fitzroy Hotel, which was built as The Russell Hotel and opened in 1900. Unlike its neighbour The Imperial, it was not demolished and replaced by something newer. The old Imperial would have been built in the same flamboyant style. Having noticed my interest in signs, my friend from schooldays pointed out another sign on the north side of the Kimpton Fitzroy. It commemorates the fact that a house where the suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst (1858-1928) lived with her daughters (Christabel and Sylvia) between 1888 and 1893. The house was demolished – possibly to make way for the construction of the hotel, which began in 1898.
Everything I have described above lies within a stretch of road less than 200 yards in length. And I have said almost nothing about the historic Russell Hotel that lies along this stretch. This and many other parts of London are so rich in history, which is one of many reasons that I am happy to be a resident of the city.
