Defoe wrote about the college in his Tour Through Great Britain, published in 1724: "It was built by Sir John Morden, a Turkey merchant of London, but who liv'd in a great house at the going off from the heath, a little south of the Hospital, on the road to Eltham. His first design, as I had it from his own mouth the year before he began to build, was to make apartments for forty decay'd merchants, to whom he resolved to allow £40 per annum each, with coals, a gown (and servants to look after their apartments) and many other conveniences so as to make their lives as comfortable as possible, and that, as they had liv'd like Gentlemen, they might dye so." Sir John Morden died in 1708, aged 86, and was buried in Morden College chapel crypt. Created c. 1717–1725, statues of Sir John and his wife, Lady Susan Morden, adorn the western front of the college. The college has since expanded several times and continues its charitable work. Apart from the college, Sir John's name lives on in the name of pubs on Brand Street (Greenwich) and Campshill Road (Lewisham), and local street names in the Royal Borough of Greenwich. References 1623 births 1708 deaths Morden, John, 1st Baronet English MPs 1695–1698 English philanthropists 17th-century English merchants 17th-century philanthropists