The Grapes, Limehouse

Front of The Grapes public house, Limehouse, Narrow St., over the River Thames. Dating from '1583', built in 1720, on the site of a previous pub, the Grapes was a working class tavern, serving the workers of the Limehouse Basin. There are unsavoury stories of watermen taking drunks from the pub, drowning them in the river, then selling their corpses for medical dissection. English novelist Charles Dickens knew this pub well. As a child, he was made to stand on a table and sing to the customers. As an adult, he immortalised it as the Six Jolly Fellowship Porters pub in Our Mutual Friend .