LONDON’S legal enclaves are home to some of the capital’s best-kept secrets.
The tranquil courts and squares of the four inns of court are self-contained precincts so well hidden from prying eyes that few tourists stumble across their subtle entrances.
Find the right path and wander into the peaceful oasis of Lincoln’s Inn, however, and you might stumble across a tiny, ornate structure that harks back to the era of horse-drawn traffic.
It’s easy to overlook amid the imposing silhouettes of the buildings that tower over it: like other inns of court, Lincoln’s Inn looks for all the world like an Oxford college, complete with dining room, library, chapel and professional accommodation – the traditional requirements for any formal legal training.
It’s only a stone’s throw from the bustling thoroughfares of High Holborn, Kingsway and Fleet Street, but this is another world, eleven peaceful acres where barristers have learned their trade for centuries.
And here, amid the collegiate buildings, barristers’ chambers, commercial premises and residential apartments, stands the diminutive Ostler’s Hut, an unassuming reminder of a bygone world where horse-drawn traffic was the primary mode of transport for both people and goods.
When the hut was built in 1860, London’s streets were awash with horse-drawn traffic, from wagons and carts to horse-bus services, trams and private carriages.
And though the nearby Royal Courts of Justice had yet to be built, this tiny edifice provided shelter for the “ostler” responsible for tending the horses of the inn’s lawyers and guests.
While the advent of automobiles would eventually render the role obsolete, for half a century or so the 13ft by 10ft “hut”, with its charming fireplace, provided a welcome all-weather refuge for the horse handlers serving their wealthy legal clientele.
Noawadays it lays claim to being London’s smallest listed building (Grade II), though naturally that title is hotly contested, not least by the Lilliputian stone police box in Trafalgar Square built in the 1920s to serve as a watch-post over London’s unruly protesters and with room only for a single officer.
Armed with a direct telephone line to Scotland Yard and castle-style slits in the walls to keep an eye on any rioters, it’s said that when the officer picked up the phone to call for backup, the light on top of the tiny station would flash like a beacon to alert other nearby officers.
Whichever building actually holds the prize for having the most modest dimensions, the Ostler’s Hut should win the prize for being the prettiest, particularly since its careful refurbishment, which included meticulous repairs to the timber and brickwork.
You may not be able to hear the clip-clop of horses’ hooves echoing around Lincoln’s Inn any more, but lean up close against these bricks and you can almost imagine that you can…