For this week’s post in our Camden at 60 series, we visit the Foundling Museum with guide Louise, who runs a walk on the Legacy of Thomas Coram. Booking details at the end of the post.
Becoming a Camden Guide
As part of the Camden Guiding course, we spend 6 weeks learning about the history of the Foundling Hospital at the Foundling Museum. After that period, we do a practical Indoor Guiding Exam delivering any of 2-3 out of 14 stops to two examiners.
Before I started the course, I knew of the Foundling Museum having visited it for concerts and family art activities. I had also enjoyed watching the CBBC television adaptation of author Jacqueline Wilson’s Hetty Feather series which follows the lives of a fictional foundling pupil and her friends. However, I was still amazed to realise that this tiny corner of Bloomsbury has so many organisations linked to the Foundling Hospital.
2 Objects
After the indoor guiding exam, I became a volunteer guide at the Foundling Museum. Two of my favourite objects in the museum’s collection include:
Keith Newstead’s Foundling Museum Donation Box
Any fans of hidden gem Novelty Automation will enjoy Keith Newstead’s Foundling Museum Donation Box . I love this piece as it brings 3 key people in the Foundling Hospital’s history together in a fun and interactive way.
After 17 years of arduous campaigning, former shipwright Thomas Coram obtained a Royal Charter from King George II to establish the Foundling Hospital to provide a place for hospitality for babies at risk of abandonment.
Artist William Hogarth spent over 25 years supporting the Foundling Hospital, donating not only money but skills. He painted and gifted the fine portrait of Thomas Coram in the museum’s Picture Gallery, designed the Foundling Hospital’s coat of arms and the pupils’ uniforms. Hogarth also instigated other contemporary artists to contribute their works to the Foundling Hospital, eventually making it the UK’s first public art gallery.
Composer George Frederick Handel cemented the Foundling Hospital’s fundraising success by organising concerts in its chapel. Handel composed the Foundling Anthem based on the “Hallelujah Chorus” from the sacred oratorio “Messiah” that he wrote with friend and librettist Charles Jennens.
A 20p donation will activate this amazing device with representations of 2 Foundling pupils and a scene-stealing pug that is likely a reference to Hogarth’s dog, Trump.
Musical Armchair in the Handel Gallery/Gerald Coke Collection
The Gerald Coke collection has over 15000 items of Handel memorabilia. The central table with lovely display drawers and a tabletop showing the events in Handel’s lifetime, both personal and worldwide is fascinating. However, being able to sink into one of the musical armchairs to listen to a bit of Handel before starting a tour, makes this object a favourite. Apparently, each armchair plays 12 hours of excerpts of Handel’s music – perfect for weary walkers or museum visitors. Sadly, I’ve never had a chance to stay in one of the chairs long enough to verify this and normal museum hours won’t typically allow you either!
2 Neighbours
While the Foundling Museum brings the story of the Foundling Hospital to life, two of the museum’s neighbours “Coram’s Fields” and Coram are also part of Thomas Coram’s legacy.
Coram’s Fields and the Harmsworth Memorial Playground
Though everyone locally refers to this 7-acre site as “Coram’s” or “Coram’s Fields”, its full name is “Coram’s Fields and the Harmsworth Memorial Playground”. Since the 1740s, the Foundling Hospital was based on the land that now forms “Coram’s Fields”. Only the gates and colonnades remain after the Foundling Hospital was re-located ultimately to Berkhamsted and the original hospital building demolished with only select remnants historically reconstructed in the Foundling Museum.
Since 1936 “Coram’s Fields” has been a playground where adults are only allowed entry if accompanied by a child. Its services include a nursery, after-school playcentre, youth centre and sports development programme.
As a local parent regularly congregating in Coram’s Fields for after school playdates, chin-wagging and collectively shivering in the colder months, I’ve often sheltered in the pavilion with the green roof and a clock on top that can be seen either from outside the Coram’s Fields gates or alternatively from the statue of Thomas Coram outside the Foundling Museum. Inside the pavilion are memorials to the sons of 2 key people who saved the Foundling Hospital site from redevelopment in the 1930s, ensuring that Coram’s Fields would continue Thomas Coram’s legacy of helping children.
Harold Sidney Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Rothermere & co-founder of The Daily Mail, who had 2 sons who were killed during the First World War.
Local Janet Trevelyan, a keen supporter of the play centre movement, whose son died age 5.
Coram
The Coram group of charities has evolved out of the Foundling Hospital and continues its mission as the UK’s oldest children’s charity. Today, Coram champions children’s rights and wellbeing, improves lives through legal support, expert advocacy, adoption services, and a range of therapeutic, educational, and cultural programmes. Over the next few months, I will be raising money for Coram via a series of guided walks on different themes. Contact me by email below.
So, once you’ve visited the Foundling Museum and spotted possibly the smallest artwork in the borough outside the museum, why not join me for a walk to explore some of the land that used to be part of the Foundling Estate and see the church that is Thomas Coram’s final resting place?
Walk Title: The Legacy of Thomas Coram
Ever wonder who was the Scottish artist who created the statue of Thomas Coram outside the Foundling museum? Or where you can find other examples of his work? Join me to explore the legacy of Thomas Coram and other causes he supported.
We’ll pass by Coram’s Fields, the original site of the Foundling Hospital that is now a unique playground where adults are only admitted if accompanied by a child. Along the way we’ll pass the homes of a barrister, a writer and an infamous prison.
Walk Starting Point: Outside the Foundling Museum by the statue of Thomas Coram, 40 Brunswick Square, London, WC1N 1AZ, (Nearest tube: Russell Square Station) See Photo above.
Walk Finishing Point: St. Andrew’s Church, Holborn, London EC4A 3AF, (Nearest tube: Chancery Lane or Farringdon Station)
Duration: 1.5-2hours depending on group walking speed
Days: Sun, Apr 27, May 11, 2025 at 14:00
Booking: Email: walk.deliberately@gmail.com