LINK WITH DICKENS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 2 April 1938, Page 5

LINK WITH DICKENS

CLOSING OF LUDGATE HILL RESTAURANT. Another link with Dickens has been severed by the closing of the restaurant at Ludgate Hill Station, which has served generations of journalists and city workers for three-quarters of a century. Ludgate Hill station was closed nine years ago, when electric traction was substituted for steam working, but the restaurant remained open until the end of last week, when Frederick Hotels, Limited, by whom it was run in recent years, by arrangement with the Southern Railway Company, decided to close it. The restaurant was first opened in 1863, and attracted the attention of Charles Dickens as one of the first places in the country at which the railway traveller could usually provide himself with ‘wholesome food decently served.” He wrote an article about it entitled “Genii of the Cave,” which appeared in All the Year Round in 1867, after an inspection of the premises and a talk with one of the partners of Messrs Spiers and Pond, the firm responsible for starting it. It was one of the first English ventures of the firm after their arrival in England from Australia, and was carried on by them for many years.