Xtra Diary: Mozart: did he slum it? - Tim Bryars' campaign for recognition of composer's Cecil Court stay

Published: 17 June 2011
by JOSH LOEB

THREE weeks ago this newspaper reported on a campaign by antiquarian map trader Tim Bryars for a plaque commemorating Mozart’s stay in Cecil Court, the West End street now famous for its specialist bookshops.

The maestro stayed at 9 Cecil Court from April 24 until August 6 1764, and some scholars believe he composed his first symphonies there.

Mr Bryars used his cartographical know-how to pinpoint the site, but he has also delved into the more recent history of the street and discovered it was the focus of another notable campaign picked up on by newspapers in days of yore.

In the late 1880s, the supposedly wretched state of Cecil Court was highlighted by housing campaigners who set great store by the fact that the buildings there were owned by then Prime Minister Lord Salisbury. 

“Cecil Court was a mere stone’s throw from Parliament,” explained Mr Bryars. “On October 1 1888, under the headline ‘The Premier’s Rookeries Fall,’ the Star thundered: ‘The roof of one of Lord Salisbury’s rookeries in Cecil Court has given way. We recently described the dilapidated and dangerous condition of his lordship’s property, which he still refuses to repair…’” 

Part of the background to this was apparently hysteria surrounding the Ripper murders. Policemen were needed in the East End and so were not stationed at either end of Cecil Court, as had previously been the case, to prevent people from being crushed by falling masonry. 

But just how bad were conditions in Cecil Court at the time?

Philanthropist Charles Booth’s “poverty maps”, produced in the late 1880s to show conditions in different areas of London, described Cecil Court’s inhabitants as “comfortable”. 

As Mr Bryars told Diary: “There were probably worse places to live.”