As the London Oratory chalks up 150 years and its neighbour a couple of miles north, the Cardinal Vaughan Memorial School, celebrates its centenary, Michael Walsh looks at the world from which they grew It is an ill wind: the Revolution in France that wreaked such havoc on the Church there brought unexpected benefits to the Church in Britain. There was a sudden influx into England of large numbers of émigré clergy, among them the redoubtable Abbé Caron who started the parish of Somers Town beside what is now Euston Station in central London. The abbé’s first concern was the instruction of the children of French refugees, both boys and girls, but in 1796 he also rented two houses in Hammersmith, west London, to serve as schools both for French émig