3-082-607 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Old Semaphore Station, Telegraph Hill, 1895. 'The Opening of Telegraph Hill, Hatcham. Another "lung of London" was formally handed over to the public on April 6 by the Chairman of the London County Council...Mr. George Livesey, the managing director of the South Metropolitan Gas Company...wrote to the Vestry of St. Paul, Deptford, offering to subscribe £2000 towards securing the land at the top of Telegraph Hill...The London County Council gave £2000, and the Haberdashers' Company sold the ground for £6000, taking off a generous discount of £2000. Thus Telegraph Hill has become public property by the joint liberality of these bodies and Mr. Livesey. It was formerly one of the stations on the line of semaphores used by the Admiralty Board before the days of the electric telegraph...From it in days past bonfires had glared, flashing upon the capital the proud news of joyful victory, or the tidings of coming tribulation. From that hill was signalled news of Nelson and Trafalgar, of Wellington and Waterloo. It was, indeed, hallowed ground, and it would have been sacrilege to allow it to pass into private use. One is glad that such a happy and beneficial issue has come from what is still a painful memory in industrial struggles'. From "Illustrated London News", 1895.