This post is dedicated to Laura Lynn as an extra pair of eyes for her to see the more hidden parts of London, until she can come and visit again x

There is a nearly secret garden literally buried deep in the heart of the City, almost under the far reaching shadows of St. Pauls Cathedral.

It’a called the Postman’s Park and was once the graveyards of St. Leonards Foster Lane St Botolph Aldersgate and Christ Church Newgate.  Which sounds huge, but it’s only a little place with a rich atmosphere of peace and tranquility.  Ordinary yet quietly extraordinary.

Through the gates and past the pond  is a memorial created by George Fredrick Watts, a painter and social radical.  In 1887 he had the idea to commemorate ‘heroic men and women’ for Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee year.  No-one else felt it was a particularly good idea so he financed it himself.

Set into the wall are over fifty plaques catching frozen moments in time, each bringing a spotlight to the pendulum swings of fate and lifes’ vulnerabilities.  Every plaque commemorates a selfless act of bravery and with simple words to make you bleed they open up a theatre in the mind as you picture the stories and comprehend the consequences.

 It is a small place, a poignant place where history lives on.

Laters, Kate x