Coleman Street

Coleman Street

South from Fore Street crossing London Wall to Gresham Street (P.O. Directory). In Coleman Street Ward.

Earliest mention: "Colemnannestrate," (sic.) 1227 (Cal. Charter Rolls, H. III. Vol. I. p. 55.)

Other forms: "Colemanestrat," 1235 (ib. p. 202). "Colemanstrete," 1259 (ib. II. p. 23). "Collemannestrate," 1290 (Ct. H.W. I. 95). "Colmanstrete," 1309–10 (Ct. H.W. I. 211).

In 1666 the street only extended north to London Wall, the northern end to Fore Street being called Moor Court.

In the 13th century it seems to have formed one street with Old Jewry, and to have been called "Colechurch Lane," "Colechurchstrete," or "Colemanstrete," interchangeably.

House at the south-west corner to be pulled down 1760 to widen the thoroughfare (Gent. Mag. Lib. XV. 227).

Kingsford suggests that the name is derived from "Ceolmundingehaga," or farm of Ceolmund near the Westgate mentioned in a charter of Burhred of Mercia, c. 857 (Thorpe, Dip. 118). But this street seems to be too far distant from the Westgate to make this derivation likely.

Riley's suggestion is that the name was derived from the "coalmen" or charcoal burners, who settled there near the Moor (Mem. p. xix.).

The earliest forms suggest an owner's name.

Near the Swan's Nest Public-house, a pit or well full of vessels was found, having an entire depth of 30 ft. (R. Smith, 142). Also a brick pavement at a depth of 20 feet.

Coleman str. (so called from Coleman the first Builder thereof) a spacious str. of good Buildings, betn Loathbury S. and London Wall N. L. 320 Yds. and from P. C. (Paul's Cross) near E. 640 Yds; and the Ward is so named from the str.

Coleman street. This street is large and long, and runs Northwards unto London Wall; very well inhabited by divers noted Merchants and Shopkeepers. In this street are divers Courts and Alleys, some of which are very good, and others as mean and ordinary.

Coleman street, Lothbury. †

Coleman-Street, Lothbury,—the N. continuation of the Old Jewry from Cheapside, bearing to the R. extending to 53, Fore-st. Cripplegate.

Coleman-St., Lothbury, is the north continuation of the Old Jewry from Cheapside, bearing to the right, and extending to No. 53, Fore-street, Cripplegate. This street gives its name to the ward in which it is situated.

Coleman Street, City, runs from Lothbury to Fore Street, Cripplegate. Stow says that it was "so called of Coleman, the first builder and owner thereof,"¹ but this is a mistake. The Robert Coleman here referred to as "the first builder" was the son of Reginald Coleman, who died in 1483, whereas Coleman Street is mentioned in the City Letter Books at least two centuries earlier; and "had its name, there can hardly be a doubt, from the charcoal-burners, or colemen, who settled in that extremity of the City, adjoining the Moor, at an early date."² William Cunningham, physician and astronomer, author of the Speculum Cosmographi&ae (London 1559), lived in this street. Another noted physician and astrologer, Dr. William Fludd (or, as he styled himself, De Fluctibus), died here September 8, 1637. On September 24, 1598, as Francis Bacon was returning to his chambers in Gray's Inn from conducting an examination in the Tower, he was arrested in the neighbourhood of Lombard Street, "for £300 principal," ... "without warning either by letter or message," by one Sympson, a goldsmith, "a man noted much," writes Bacon, "for extremities and stoutness upon his purse." ... "He would have urged it to have had me in prison; which he had done, had not Sheriff More, to whom I sent, gently recommended me to an handsome house in Coleman Street, where I am."³ The five members accused of treason by Charles I. concealed themselves in this street. "The Star, in Coleman Street," was a tavern where Oliver Cromwell and several of his party occasionally met.

Counsel. Mr. Gunter, what can you say concerning a meeting and consultation at the Star, in Coleman Street ?
Gunter. My Lord, I was a servant at the Star, in Coleman Street, with one Mr. Hildesley. That house was a house where Oliver Cromwell and several of that party did use to meet in consultation; they had several meetings: I do remember very well one amongst the rest, in particular, that Mr. Peters was there: he came in the afternoon about four o'clock, and was there till ten or eleven at night; I, being but a drawer, could not hear much of their discourse, but the subject was tending towards the king, after he was a prisoner, for they called him by the name of Charles Stuart; I heard not much of the discourse; they were writing, but what I knew not, but I guessed it to be something drawn up against the king; I perceived that Mr. Peters was privy to it, and pleasant in the company.&mdaqshTrial of Hugh Peters.

The street was in these times often referred to as a haunt of Puritans. In a conventicle in "Swan Alley," on the east side of this street, Venner, a wine-cooper and Millennarian, preached the opinions of his sect to "the soldiers of King Jesus." The result is matter of history: an insurrection followed—"Venner's Insurrection;" and Venner, their leader, was hanged and quartered in Coleman Street, January 19, 1661. John Goodwin, minister in Coleman Street, waited on Charles I. the day before the King's execution, tendered his services, and offered to pray for him. The King thanked him, but said he had chosen Dr. Juxon, whom he knew. Vicars wrote an attack on Goodwin, called the "Coleman Street Conclave Visited," in which he speaks of that grand impostor, Mr. John Goodwin, "whose big-braggadocchio, wave-like, swelling and swaggering writings, full fraught with six-footed terms and fleshlie rhetorical phrases," have misled the "credulous soul-murdered proselytes of Coleman Street." Justice Clement, in Ben Jonson's Every Man in his Humour, lived in Coleman Street; and the house of Oliver Cob, the water-bearer,—"at the sign of the Water Tankard hard by the Green Lattice,"—stood by the Wall [i.e. London Wall] at the bottom of Coleman Street. Cowley wrote a play, called Cutter of Coleman Street: and Dryden refers to its inhabitants:—

Some have expected from our Bills to-day
To find a Satire in our Poet's play.
The zealous rout from Coleman Street did run,
To see the story of the Friar and Nun;
Or tales yet more ridiculous to hear
Vouched by their vicar of ten pounds a year.
Dryden's Epilogue to the Assignation, or Love in a Nunnery, 1672.

Bloomfield, author of the Farmer's Boy, lived in Great Bell Alley, Coleman Street. [See Bell Alley.]

The carriers of Cambridge doe lodge at the Bell in Coleman Street; they come every Thursday.—Taylor's Carriers' Cosmographie, 4to, 1637.

Coleman Street is now the principal centre for the wool-merchants and wool-brokers of the City; and on the west side is the Wool Exchange, a large and handsome building erected in 1874. On the same side is the church of St. Stephen; and on the east side, at the corner of London Wall, the Armourers' and Braziers' Hall. [See those headings.]

---

¹ Stow, p. 107.
² Riley, Memorials, p. 19.
³ Bacon to Lord Keeper Egerton; Spedding's Life of Bacon, vol. ii. p. 107; Account of Life and Times, vol. i. p. 233.