Barbican Tube Station - History

History

The station was first called "Aldersgate Street", this being the name of the street on which it stands. This changed to "Aldersgate" on 1 November 1910, then to "Aldersgate and Barbican" in 1923, and to the present name from 1 December 1968.

The station replaced an earlier building at 134 Aldersgate Street, which for many years had a sign claiming "This was Shakespeare's House". Although the building was very close to the nearby Fortune Playhouse, there is no documentary evidence that Shakespeare lived here; a subsidy roll from 1598 shows a "William Shakespeare" as owner of the property, but there is nothing to indicate that it is the playwright. On the road opposite the station, within the Golden Lane Estate, is a pub called "The Shakespeare".

On 4 April 1915, the body of seven-year-old Margaret Nally was found in the ladies' cloakroom at what was then Aldersgate Street Station; she had been sexually assaulted and suffocated with a cloth pushed down her throat.

Train services were disrupted during the Second World War when the station suffered severe bomb damage, particularly in December 1941. This led to the removal of the upper floors, and in 1955 the remainder of the street-level building was demolished.

Passenger trains from the Great Northern Line, via the York Road and Hotel curves at Kings Cross to the Widened Lines ran until the Great Northern Electrification of 1976 when platforms 3 & 4 were closed. Platforms 3 & 4 were reopened as part of the Midland City Line in 1982 with services from Luton and Bedford.

In late March 2009, Thameslink trains ceased to call at Barbican. This was part of the Thameslink Programme to allow Farringdon to have its mainline platforms extended across Thameslink's Moorgate branch. As a result, Barbican is no longer a multimodal station.

A display on the history of the station, including text and photographs, is just inside the barriers, on the southern side of the main entrance corridor.