XVI—THE GATEHOUSE TAVERN
Ground Landlord.
The proprietor is Mr. A. M. Shuter.
General Description And Date Of Structure.
Although the greater portion of this building stands within the
boundary of the parish of Hornsey, just sufficient is within St. Pancras to
enable the story to be given here. It has little architectural interest, but it is
important because of its connection with the name of the hamlet. The old
tavern has been entirely modernised, but a view taken about 40 years ago
(Plate 85a) shows a Georgian building of two periods, the northern portion
being the earlier. The arch of the gateway adjoined the latter and there was
until recently an old stair (Plate 86) from which the passage over the gate was
approached.
The parish boundary stones can be seen in the external view, the
upper one bearing the date 1791.
Condition of Repair.
Newly constructed.
Historical Notes.
Probably this site has been occupied by a building as long as any in Highgate, since the
Gatehouse was one of the three entrances to the Bishop of London's Park of "Haringeye" or Hornsey,
the two other gates being at the Spaniards, and at Newgate by East Finchley Railway Station. For
the use of the road across their Park from Highgate to Finchley (where it debouched on to Finchley
Common), the Bishops exacted tolls at the Gatehouse, the collection of which was leased by them for
a fixed yearly amount. Thus in the year 1408–9 Henry Smith, "farmer of the tolls of the Park,"
paid 30s. on 1st March, and 60s. by the hands of John Ellis on 16th July. (ref. 110) Again in 1420–1,
William Payable paid 66s. 8d. for the farm of the tolls that year. In 1638–9, John Bette, who then
leased the tolls, paid £6 13s. 4d. Generally the tolls were leased with the pasturage of the Park, as
in the lease of 20th May, 1541, of the herbage, pannage, and pasturage of the "Greate Parke of
Haringhey alias Harnesey" with "a messuage and tenement with the appurtenances at Hyegate
some tyme an hermitage." The hermitage appears to have stood adjacent to the Chapel which
occupied the site of the present Chapel of Highgate School.
London Bishopric
On 23rd May, 1503, the Vicar of St. Pancras and his parishioners were beating the bounds
when they came into conflict with "Thomas Walterkyn, heremyte of St. Michel besides Highgate,
in the parisshe of Harnesey," possibly owing to some uncertainty, real or pretended, as to the parish
boundary. According to the hermit, when he was in the garden with his servant they came into his
house, broke down the paling of his orchard and garden, hit him over the arm with a bill, and would
have murdered him if he had not escaped to the steeple of the hermitage, where he remained until
they had gone. He also alleged that they stole two altar cloths, a surplice and "grayle," i.e. a book
of antiphons. The Vicar replied that they were going in procession as usual about their parish when
the hermit would not allow them to pass, although courteously asked to do so. The hermit was in his
garden, armed with a great club, and having with him two others also armed with clubs, they
suddenly struck at William Chadwick, of St. Pancras, yeoman, over the pale. They broke some of the
pales and then the St. Pancras people pulled down some more to make room to pass and so departed
peaceably. The Vicar then went on to say that so far from the "grayle" having been stolen by
them, the hermit, who was a man of ill conversation and rule, had pawned the book and other
stuff to one John Phelippe, who was ready to testify the same. The hermit rejoined that the Vicar
and his parishioners were guilty of the riot, that the hermitage was in Hornsey and not in St. Pancras,
although divers persons had been accustomed to enter the chapel to hear divine service at convenient
times. He denied the Vicar's allegation of being a man of misrule or that he had pledged any stuff
belonging to the hermitage. It is likely that the Vicar had a grudge against the hermit because his
Highgate parishioners found it more convenient to attend mass at the chapel and make their offerings
there than to travel all the way to old St. Pancras Church. There is no record of the verdict of the
Court of Star Chamber (who tried the case), and it is hardly possible to determine the rights and
wrongs of the matter, but the St. Pancras people must have been wrong in going through the
hermitage, since that lay entirely in Hornsey. (ref. 111)
The present Gatehouse Tavern stands partly in Hornsey and partly in St. Pancras, the
part in St. Pancras having been added by encroachment on Highgate Green. In 1670 Edward
Cutler, gentleman, who then owned the Gatehouse, obtained "a parcel of the waste at Highgate,
adjoining to the Gatehouse, containing from east to west from the highway from Highgate to
Islington (High Street) 30 feet and from north to south 12 feet." On his death in 1680 his brother,
Henry Cutler, gentleman, of London, obtained the property, and he conveyed it in 1682 to Elizabeth
Marshall, widow, of Highgate, who obtained a grant in 1682 of a parcel of waste at the Gatehouse,
containing from north to south at the east end 26 feet, abutting north on the manor of Hornsey, east
on the king's way to the Gatehouse, and containing from north to south on the west, 36 feet abutting
on Hornsey, from east to west on the south 46 feet, abutting west on the house of widow Barnes, and
north on the manor of Hornsey. The "Widow Barnes" was Judith Barnes, living at the house now
No. 52, South Grove (see p. 100). Elizabeth Marshall married Thomas Simonds, who was ordered
at the Middlesex Sessions in July, 1690, to pay 1s. 6d. per annum assessed upon him for the relief of
the poor of St. Pancras for that part of the Gatehouse at Highgate which is in the parish of St.
Pancras, and in his possession. (ref. 112)
Until about the year 1790 the road from the Gatehouse to the Spaniards followed the
parish boundary, as was natural, because that boundary was formerly the line of the paling enclosing
the Park. Between the Gatehouse and The Grove the road formed the northern boundary of
Highgate Green until houses were built there in the 17th century. Hampstead Lane was substituted
to the north of the old road, at the instance of Lord Mansfield and Lord Southampton when they
were developing the Ken Wood and Fitzroy Park estates. Highgate Green may be visualised in its
earliest state as a triangular space lying before the entrance to Haringey Park, having a large pond
on the site of Pond Square, the base of the triangle being approximately South Grove and the other
sides the High Street and the Grove. The Gatehouse stood at the apex of the triangle, the Angel and
the Flask at the ends of the base.