London's cab shelter

London's cab shelter

During the Victorian Era in the streets of London you could find these compact green huts built in order to offer cabbies a place where they could get hot meals and drinks. At the time was illegal for a driver to leave the vehicle unattended and he would have to pay someone else to watch his horse and cab. The idea to build a dedicated shelter for cabbies was the brainchild of an ex-soldier: Captain Armstrong. On a cold winter's day in 1875 he sent out his assistant into a blizzard only to find that all the drivers were getting drunk in a local pub and were unable to drive. So a furious Cpt. Armstrong decided to set up the Cabmen's shelter fund on February 6th, 1875. This fund provided cabbie drivers with: a shelter, food and drinks at reasonable prices. In total were built 61 shelters between 1875-1882. Unfortunately today only 13 cab shelters are still "alive" since a large number of them were destroyed by nazis during the blitz of the Second World War.