Built on the site of the Old Ludgate Prison on Ludgate Hill (Lud was, appropriately, the Celtic god of Light), the London Coffee House stood on the left when facing S.Paul’s Cathedral. Opening its doors during the reign of King George II, its proprietor issued the following advertisement in May 1731 :
    Whereas, it is customary for Coffee Houses and other Public-Houses, to take 8s, for a quart of Arrack, and 6s for a quart of Brandy or Rum, made into Punch : This is to give notice That James Ashley Has opened, on Ludgate Hill, The London Coffee House, Punch House, Dorchester Beer House, and Welsh Ale Warehouse, where the finest old Arrack Rum and French Brandy made into Punch with other of the Finest ingredients-viz. A quart of Arrack made into Punch six shillings; and so in proportion to the smallest quantity, which is half-quarter for fourpence halfpenny. A quart of Rum or Brandy made into Punch for four shillings; and so in proportion to the smallest quantity, which is half-a-quarter for fourpence halfpenny; and the Gentlemen may have it as soon as made, as a Gill of Wine can be drawn.
    Lane’s Masonic Records tells us that Lodge No. 140 ‘got in’ first in 1736, with a number change to 125 in 1740. This unnamed lodge is listed as having met in Ashley’s London Punch House, paying over £2.2s. for its Constitution on 6 April 1736. On 27 December of that year the Master and Wardens attended Grand Lodge, twelve years before the lodge’s demise in 1748.
    James Ashley issued another advertisement in 1738, describing his establishment as “The London Punch House, with the Sign of Two Punch Bowls, on iron pedestals before the door.” Enjoying such success with his punch trade, Ashley relinquished his other pursuits and died at the good age of 78 at Ludgate Hill in 1776, while enflamed colonists sought independence from the Crown in the Americas.
    Freemason James Boswell’s London Journal records a visit to Ashley’s House on Saturday 4 June 1763 : “I then went as far as St Pauls Church-yard, roaring along, And then came to Ashley’s Punch House and drunk three threepenny bowls. In the Strand I picked up a little profligate wretch and gave her sixpence. She allowed me entrance. But the miscreant refused me performance. ... I came home about two o’clock, much fatigued.” Eight years later the House became “The London Coffee House” and as such, between 1772 and 1773, became the meeting-place of a club frequented by Boswell (the biographer of Dr Johnson) which had formerly convened in S.Paul’s Church-Yard : “I went to my Club at the London Coffee House..., the club is composed principally of Physicians, dissenting Clergy, and Masters of Academies”.
    The first lodge of note to stay there was the London Lodge No 108 in 1772 (see Box for lodges and their meeting-dates). Roach’s London Pocket Pilot, 1793, records that “The London Coffee House is a large and Superb Mansion with a Profusion of attendants, first rate cooks, the best of Waiters, the Smartest Chambermaids, Hair Dressers, Porters and Shoe Blacks.” Standing within the Rules of Fleet Prison, the House was used by the Old Bailey to lock up disagreeing juries until they could reach a verdict. The Guildhall Library possesses an illustration of the Jurors’ Sleeping Apartment from 1856. Dress fashions were published in The Bond Street Lounge at the Coffee House in 1796.
    Building work in 1806 revealed a single tower and staircase from the Old City Wall (the old Lud Gate had been removed as an impediment to traffic in 1760) at the back of the Coffee House. Three feet below the pavement, builders found the trunk of a statue of Hercules (see illustration below), half life-size, and an hexagonal altar or pedestal, nearly four feet high and two feet wide, bearing a Latin inscription : Diis Manibus : Claudie Martine; Annorum XI. Anenclutus Provincialis Conjugi Pientissime hoc Sepulchre erexit - a monument erected by a husband to the memory of one Claudia Martina in Roman times. This discovery doubtless stirred the imagination of masons, among whom it was widely held that Freemasonry had come to England at the time of S.Alban.
    The London Directories note changes of ownership after 1811 Rowley & Leach to Leach & Co. and then Leach & Dallimore (the Leaches were related to John Leach, celebrated cartoonist). A year after Waterloo (1815) the Paviors’ Company dined there, as did the Glaziers’ Company, the Bricklayers’ Company and other Livery companies. Samuel Lovegrove took over in 1839 and Robert Cadell’s book collection was auctioned at the House in 1851, an event reported as the largest trade gathering ever witnessed. This was the year of the Great Exhibition and on 27 October George Peabody (no relation) gave a banquet for all the Americans connected with that epoch-marking phenomenon.
    Charles Dickens mentioned the London Coffee House in Little Dorrit in 1857 and again in Household Words in 1861, when the building looked like the above photograph taken in c.1850, with S.Paul’s at the end of Ludgate Street. Above the door of the Coffee House you can read ‘Lovegrove’, and ‘Family Hotel’.
    Closed in August 1867, the London Coffee House site was bought by the Corporation of London for £38,500 and demolished in 1872. Rebuilt by W.Younger & Co., it became the “Ye Olde London” which stands today (see photograph), next to a wine bar called “All Bar One” on the corner.
    Recently, and by a strange coincidence, after members of the Goose & Gridiron Society had finished a plaque ceremony at the site of the Goose & Gridiron Alehouse (that tavern which was home to one of the four London Lodges which began the Grand Lodge of England in June 1717), we all went to the nearest pub, which just happened to be the Ye Olde London, on Ludgate Hill.

Lodges that met at the London Coffee House

1736		No Name	No 140
1772		London Lodge	No 108
1781		United Traders Lodge	No 15
1787		Grand Masters Lodge	No 1
1795		Universal Lodge	No 181
1802		Pilgrim Lodge	No 238
1805		Shakespeare Lodge	No 99
1843		S.Paul’s Lodge	No 194
1846		Caledonian Lodge	No 134
1851		Royal Athelstan Lodge	No 19
1854		St Alban’s Lodge	No 29
1860		Lion & Lamb Lodge	No 192
1860		Lodge of Israel	No 205
1861		Gihon Lodge	No 49
1862		Lodge of Amity	No 171
1866		City of London Lodge	No 901

David Peabody is President of the Goose & Gridiron Society and an elected member of the Quatuor Coronati Lodge of Research No. 2076.