City Wall at Old Broad Street (Crossrail XSZ11)

Abstract

• Archaeological watching brief on Crossrail utility diversions at Old Broad Street in the predicted location of the City Wall (Scheduled Monument LO26N). A trench (19.00m long x 0.60 to 1.00m wide) was dug to install new utility ducts, and was between 0.45 to 0.80m deep. The trench was located at the south end of Old Broad Street, at the junction with London Wall. Although within the area of the City Wall, no archaeological remains were encountered in this area at this depth. An archaeological watching brief on three gas main trial trenches in London Wall (between the junctions with Coleman Street and Blomfield Street). This followed a previous phase involving a watching brief on a utility trench in Old Broad Street (molas1-117511). The trenches on London Wall revealed truncated sections of circa 17th to 19th-century brick walls and floors between 0.30 and 3.90m below the existing road surface. These features were not fully exposed but were possibly the remnants of backfilled cellars or culverts. Although the monitoring was carried out to prevent damage to the City Wall (Scheduled Monument (LO26N and LO26P)), no remains relating to the City Wall were encountered. The area was found to have been extensively disturbed by numerous modern utilities. A small section of The London wall (LO26P) was exposed, recorded and surveyed- the earliest deposit identified. The 0.38m by 0.2m fragment been heavily truncated by 19th-20th century utilities, and only survived as an isolated feature slightly to the north of the junction between Blomfield Street and London Wall. A larger section of wall was also exposed to the south-east, which had been previously exposed during earlier Crossrail works, also monitored by MOLA (MOLA 2010). The anticipated postern (gate) that had also been previously recorded by Compass to the north of the traffic island (southern end of Blomfield Street) did not survive within the narrow utilities trench. MOLA's fieldwork helped to more accurately record and locate these surviving parts of the wall, adding to the wider database of the predicted east-west wall alignment along London Wall. No archaeologically significant deposits were exposed in the trial hole adjacent to 41/42 London wall.