Field Lane, Holborn

This watercolour depicts Field Lane, Holborn abutting Fleet Ditch.
In 'Oliver Twist' Chapter 26 Field Lane, Holborn,is described as a narrow street running from the foot of Holborn Hill to Saffron Hill. It was one of the most disreputable thoroughfares in London, inhabited largely by thieves and receivers of stolen property. 'Near to the spot on which Snow Hill and Holborn Hill meet...In its filthy shops are exposed for sale bunches of second-hand handkerchiefs, of all sizes and patterns; for here reside the traders who purchase them from pickpockets...It is a commercial colony of itself: the emporium of petty larceny: visited at early morning, and setting-in of dusk, by silent merchants, who traffic in dark-parlours; and who go as strangely as they come.'

Very little is known about James Lawson Stewart who exhibited watercolours in various London galleries between 1883-89. He died in c. 1918 and towards the end of life was employed to copy prints of London; the accuracy of some of the locations should therefore be questioned.

The Museum was gifted a large selection of watercolours featuring locations which appeared in Dickens's works in 1934 and a set of cigarette cards was issued by R and J Hill Ltd in 1926 and 1934 entitled Historic Places from Dickens Classics which featured watercolours by Stewart.