Description:
Looking down towards Narrow Marsh.
The following is extracted from www.nottshistory.org.uk, entitled 'Links with Old Nottingham'. Historical notes by J Holland Walker edited by Percy G Whatnall (1928):
LONG STAIRS, now closed, which gave communication from Commerce-square, via Malin-hill (oft High Pavement, opposite St. Mary’s Church to Narrow Marsh (later Red Lion-street and now Cliff-road), probably began life ages ago, long before the Romans came to Britain, as a covered way leading from the low ground or marshes along the Leen, to the summit of the cliff some 90 feet above it; upon which stood the primitive settlement that has developed into Nottingham.
The rise of Long Stairs is from right to left, so that an enemy ascending it would be unable to use his shield as a defence against defenders stationed on the summit of the cliff.
The demolition of the slums of the Marsh area, and the planning of a new residential estate by the Corporation, led to the closing of Long Stairs of which only the iron-fenced upper entrance on Malin Hill now remains.
Thomas William Hammond 1854-1935. Born in Philadelphia of Nottingham emigres, and orphaned at the age of four, he came to England with his younger sister Maria and lived for a short while with his grandparents in Mount Street. In 1868 age 14 he enrolled in the Government School of Art. On the 1871 census he is described as a lace curtain designer, and in 1872 he was awarded the 'Queen's Prize for a Design of a Lace Curtain'. Other prizes followed and in 1877 he was again awarded the Queen's Prize, this time for the design for a damask table Cloth.
Hammond was an indefatigable worker, and soon began to use his skills as a draftsman to record aspects of the changing town. He began showing his work at local venues in 1882 and in 1890 exhibited for the first time at the Royal academy. His real hobby was black and white sketching in charcoal. He drew about 350 pictures all together mainly scenes of a Nottingham he knew but which has largely passed away today.
Extracted from 'The Changing Face of Tom Hammond's Nottingham' by John Beckett which is the introductory essay in 'A City in the Making Drawings of Tom Hammond'.