Part Of Former House Of Detention, Below Kingsway College Clerkenwell Centre

ISLINGTON

TQ3182SW SANS WALK 635-1/73/752 (North side) 29/12/50 Part of former House of Detention, below Kingsway College Clerkenwell Centre (Formerly Listed as: SKINNER STREET Hugh Myddelton Secondary School)

II

Former prison. Part of the lowest floor of the former Middlesex House of Detention survives below the playground and main buildings of the former Hugh Myddelton Schools, now Kingsway College Clerkenwell Centre. 1845-1847 by William Moseley; altered during the Second World War for use as an air-raid shelter. Brick, stone and wrought iron. The largest accessible part of the prison is the former female corridor, which runs from the south-west to the north-east, with broad 'transepts' off its middle stages. There are cells off either side of the passage, and elsewhere, and the passage is interrupted but not blocked by later, transverse walls acting as screens; the walls are of brick, the roofs formed of shallow brick arches except for one space in the 'north transept', formerly the warders' hall and clerk's office which has granite columns and wrought iron beams; the floor is generally of stone. The cells have cambered-arched entrances , some remaining metal window grilles, and some cast iron 'eyes' in the wall, presumably for chaining up prisoners. The female corridor was the southernmost range of the prison; to the north of it was a central hall, roughly underneath the hall of the present college building, with male corridors running off to the west, north and east, and a shorter administrative corridor to the south; part of the western corridor is included separately (q.v.), and some parts underneath the present college building are used by the college (q.v.). (Historians' file, English Heritage London Division).

Listing NGR: TQ3149082308