Saracen’s Head Inn (1880)
Aldgate High Street was once a street leading to one of the eight gates of London and was thus a important travelling route in and out of the city. Due to this the street developed a collection of grand timber framed buildings, of which many used as pubs and inns for travellers. Most of the buildings on the road dated from the seventeenth century, although there were too some of the mid sixteenth century. The Great Fire of London left the area untouched, it stopped only 50 metres from the street which allowed many of the buildings to survive until the Victorian era.
The Saracen’s Head Inn was on the south side of Aldgate (on the corner with Jewry Street) with a name taken from crusades. There is only evidence for its existence after 1721. Through the passage which can be glimpsed when you look to ground level (under the left bay) led to ‘poor’ Jewry lane. By 1868 the Inn had gone and by 1909 the building was being used as a restaurant – the building was demolished sometime after 1909.
The late Victorian period changed the look of Aldgate drastically. The Aldgate buildings were demolished as they stood in the way of progress, more specifically the development of London’s railway infrastructure. Much of the north side was demolished first to build Aldgate station in 1876, although some of the pubs survived (e.g Bull inn) but they were too demolished later for offices. Most of the south side was then demolished in 1880 to build the southbound extension of the Metropolitan railway to Tower Hill which was completed in 1882.
Today much of the street feels drained of character with many empty gaps on the south side and large modern office buildings on the north. Quite a contrast to the medieval buildings which stood compactly on small pieces of land.
Source: http://medieval-london.blogspot.nl/2012/06/aldgate-high-street.html
Aldgate High Street (1912)