Sir, Michael Cole (Sept 3) is wrong to say that no Victorian author mentions fish and chips, and that they originated in the East End. In George Gissing’s Thyrza (1887) fried fish and potatoes were regularly enjoyed at the end of the working week by the citizens of Lambeth Walk, including Thyrza and her wayward friend Totty Nancarrow.
Mary Henry
London W4
Sir, As a junior probationer at St Thomas’ Hospital in 1957 I was assigned to the children’s medical ward. I was attempting to feed a three-year-old Lambethian boy with fish and chips. He would have none of it. Sister came by and said to me “No nurse, not like that. Wrap them in newspaper and feed them through the bars of the cot.”
They were consumed in no time.
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Dr Mary Lynch-Staunton
Nunney, Somerset