Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
FOUNDLING MUSEUM
40 Brunswick Square Russell Square 020 7841 3600,
www.foundlingmuseum.org.uk
.Tues-Sat
10am-5pm, Sun 11am-5pm.£7.50.
MAP
This museum tells the fascinating story of the
Foundling Hospital
, London's first home for
abandoned children founded in 1756 by retired sea captain Thomas Coram. As soon as it
was opened, it was besieged, and soon forced to reduce its admissions drastically and intro-
duce a ballot system. Among the most tragic exhibits are the tokens left by the mothers in
order to identify the children should they ever be in a position to reclaim them: these range
from a heart-rending poem to a simple enamel pot label reading “ale”. The museum also
boasts an impressive
art collection
including works by Hogarth, Gainsborough and Reyn-
olds, now hung in carefully preserved eighteenth-century interiors of the original hospital.
CHARLES DICKENS MUSEUM
48 Doughty St Russell Square 020 7405 2127,
www.dickensmuseum.com
.
Daily 10am-5pm.£8.
MAP
Dickens moved to this house, now a museum, in 1837 shortly after his marriage to Cather-
ine Hogarth, and they lived here for two years, during which time he wrote
Nicholas
Nickleby
and
Oliver Twist
. Catherine gave birth to two of their children in the bedroom here,
and her youngest sister, who lived with them after their marriage, died tragically in Dick-
ens's arms aged only seventeen. Much of the house's furniture belonged to Dickens, at one
time or another, and there's an early portrait miniature painted by his aunt in 1830. The mu-
seum puts on special exhibitions in the adjacent house, no. 49, where you'll also find a café.
WELLCOME COLLECTION
183 Euston Rd Euston or Euston Square 020 7611 2222,
www.wellcomecollection.org
.Mon-Sat
10am-6pm, Thurs until 10pm, Sun 11am-6pm.Free.
MAP
Excellent temporary exhibitions on topical scientific issues are staged in the ground-floor
gallery of the Wellcome Collection, originally founded by American-born pharmaceutical
magnate Henry Wellcome (1853-1936). Also worth a look is the permanent collection, on
the first floor, beginning with
Medicine Now
, which focuses on contemporary medical
questions such as the body, genomes, obesity and malaria. Next door,
Medicine Man
show-
cases the weird and wonderful collection of historical and scientific artefacts amassed by
Wellcome himself. These range from Florence Nightingale's moccasins to a sign for a
Chinese doctor's hung with human teeth, and from erotic figurines and phallic amulets to
Inuit snow goggles and a leper clapper - in other words, this section is an absolute must.
BRITISH LIBRARY
9.30am-8pm, Sat 9.30am-5pm, Sun 11am-5pm.Free.
MAP
The red-brick brutalism of the British Library may be horribly out of fashion, but the public
exhibition galleries inside are superb. The first place to head for is the dimly lit
John Rit-
blat Gallery
, where a superlative selection of ancient manuscripts, maps, documents and
