Newgate market

An illustration of Newgate market from the book 'Journeys through London, or, byways of modern Babylon' by James Greenwood, undated, c.1873. Greenwood must have visited the market before November 1868 when it closed. At 5 am on a November morning and observed the unloading of carts and setting up of stalls. Following a breakfast break, wholesale purchasing takes place: 'By mere pinches or pokes with the finger, they [the butchers] decided on one-hundred guinea purchases in less time than your cautious reader or I would take to choose a quarter of lamb; and, making their way through the wall of flesh to the watch-box counting-houses behind, paid down their crisp bank-notes and clinking gold like true British butchers'.

Later in the day the general public arrive at the market, such as 'the hard-up man, his wife's week's charing concluded, [who] brings her all the way from Camden Town, and they purchase enormous joints of veal at an absurdly low figure'. However, Greenwood is dubious of the quality of meat left over after the wholesale business has been completed, and notes: 'What I have seen of the retail business of Newgate market disposes me to believe that if you want sound, nutritious, animal food, you can't do better than patronise the butcher round the corner. The meat that goes so wonderfully cheap in the market, the butcher round the corner would not keep on his premises'.