The CR Ashbee Lecture 2018
Jewellery workshop at Guild of Handicraft in Bow, 1890s
Each year, the East End Preservation Society presents the CR Ashbee Memorial Lecture. The inaugural lecture was delivered by Oliver Wainwright on the Seven Dark Arts of Developers, the second lecture was delivered by Rowan Moore on The Future of London and last year Maria Brenton, Rachel Bagenal and Kareem Dayes spoke about Hope in the Housing Crisis.
This year’s CR Ashbee Memorial Lecture returns to its roots by taking the subject of CR ASHBEE IN THE EAST END and will be delivered by The Gentle Author at Bow Church on Monday 22nd October at 7:30pm
Perhaps more than anyone else, CR Ashbee tried to put the ideas of William Morris into practice. The lecture will explore Ashbee’s role in creating the Guild of Handicraft in Bow, in saving Trinity Green Almshouses from demolition and founding the East End Preservation Society in the eighteen-nineties.
The lecture offers an opportunity to visit the fourteenth century Bow Church which was repaired by CR Ashbee in the eighteen-nineties and has just completed a recent programme of repairs to the tower.
TICKETS ARE FREE BUT MUST BE BOOKED IN ADVANCE BY CLICKING HERE
This year’s CR Ashbee lecture will take place at Bow Church
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“To me, it is obvious that an East End Preservation Society is needed a) to gather and represent local opinion b) to help East London people stand together c) to give them a voice and make that voice count (to ensure it is not only heard but also that it is acted upon) and d) to reveal and promote an urban vision which is not governed by short-term and personal profit, but which evokes and embraces more worthy and more communal aims – and which enshrines the spirit and character of East London.
Our opinions – the opinions of ordinary Londoners – matter, and must not be cast aside by corporations or corporate politicians. United we stand, divided we fall.
If we become a coherent pressure group, national and local politicians and planners will be obliged to listen to us. We have much to lose but – if we stick together – much to gain.” – Dan Cruickshank
East End Preservation Society at Bishopsgate Institute
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East End Yiddisher Jazz
Broadcaster Alan Dein introduces a new compilation of East End Yiddisher Jazz that he has uncovered, reclaiming a charismatic lost musical world from undeserved obscurity
Dancing in the street in Whitechapel
“Music is the Most Beautiful Language in the World!” proclaimed Weinberg’s Brick Lane gramophone shop in an advert published in a Yiddish paper sold on the streets of Whitechapel in the twenties. This was the time when swinging dance bands were all the rage, and local venues like St George’s Town Hall, the Grand Palais and the King’s Hall proudly hosted ‘Jazz dances’ complete with live bands and fox trot competitions. At Levy’s record shop, 19 & 20 Whitechapel High St, which was known both locally and far and wide as ‘the Home of Music’, customers could find the latest red hot jazz imports, and even discs pressed up on Levy’s very own record labels, Levaphone and Oriole.
This was a musical landscape in which generations of gifted young Jewish Eastenders – musicians, singers, song writers as well as impresarios, club and record shop owners – forged a remarkable contribution to the development of the British music scene. Take Bud Flanagan, Joe Loss, Stanley Black, Ronnie Scott, Alma Cogan, Lionel Bart and Georgia Brown to name but a few.
Their recorded legacy can easily be found online. Yet surprisingly, given the cultural and religious backdrop, Jewish-themed jazz and dance band discs, or folk or musical comedy numbers recorded in London during this time have proved far more elusive. There is no problem in finding their equivalent in the United States, or even Jewish dance band music from pre-Nazi era Germany or Poland. So my quest has been to seek out and rescue the ‘Yiddisher Jazz’ soundtrack of the old Jewish East End from apparent aural oblivion.
What treasures they are! Thanks to a squad of supporters and fellow travellers, I have traced a series of remarkable 78 rpm discs in the archives of the British Library and the Jewish Museum, as well as in private collections, and via the charity shops of Hendon and Golders Green. These were districts where former East Enders moved in the last century and where – sadly after they have gone – some of their possessions end up for sale. Yet even after all these years, these recordings are still very much alive. Magically, they have preserved an atmosphere of a past world – mirroring the old Yiddish Theatre where audiences left with smiles on their faces and tears in their eyes.
We can delight in the cheeky street patter of the incomparable slapstick drummer Max Bacon rejoicing in the East Enders love affair with ‘Beigels’ – but also shed a tear with Leo Fuld, the remarkable Dutch Yiddish singer, whose recordings in post-war London were haunting reminders of a way of life decimated by the Holocaust.
Local haunts like Petticoat Lane market are mentioned regularly in these recordings, and in 1929 Mendel & His Mishpoche Band offered lyrics sung in Yiddish to a pounding fox trot: “the women rush to get bargains, a chicken with schmaltz, a new sock, a bit of chrain, soup, a beigel with a hole, all this you can get in the Lane. A fish-sweet, half a kishke, an onion, fish, a meaty bone, a bride with a dowry, a woman looking for a husband, such things you can get in the Lane.”
Besides bands with fictitious monikers like Mendel’s where the actual names of the musicians have been lost in time, there are terrific Jewish-themed numbers by the hugely successful stars of the era, like Whitechapel boys Bert Ambrose and Lew Stone, whose BBC Radio broadcasts in the thirties made them household names throughout the nation.
It was an unexpected treat to discover a small run of releases by Johnny Franks & his Kosher Ragtimers, who recorded for the short-lived independent Planet label – which operated from a first floor flat in Stamford Hill at the beginning of the fifties. As a lad, Franks worked in his father’s kosher butcher shop, and by his early twenties he was composing and playing on a series of extraordinary recordings. His orchestra can be heard accompanying Chaim Towber, the Ukrainian-born star of the Yiddish Theatre, on perhaps the most well-known track in the collection – the classic ‘Whitechapel’. It is a poignant homage to a way of life that was disappearing in front of the singer’s eyes as the Jewish community of the area moves out to a suburban homeland.
Another highlight was a collection of 78 rpm discs by the Stepney-born siren of the Yiddish song, Rita Marlowe. Rita graduated from her synagogue choir to performing with dance bands in the pre-war years. She would later devote her career to performing solely in Yiddish, and her recordings were issued on Levy’s Oriole label. Founded in 1890 by Jack Levy selling bicycle parts in Petticoat Lane, Levy’s grew from the ‘Home of Music’ to running recording studios and owning labels and pressing plants, before merging with CBS in the sixties.
Thankfully the Beautiful Music has been preserved in the grooves of ancient discs. Now they are ready for a new journey, offering a nostalgic reunion for those who grew up listening to these songs, perhaps performed live at family functions, or in the ballrooms of the kosher hotel circuit of Brighton or Bournemouth – the British equivalent of the American ‘Borsht Belt.’ I hope the music will also excite a new generation intrigued by the rich social history of a place that has continued to absorb new cultures, and which has such a remarkable track record of inspiring musical creativity.
Advertisement from the twenties for Weinberg’s Gramophone Shop in Brick Lane
Sheet music for Petticoat Lane, A ‘Kosher’ Medley Foxtrot, 1929
Levy’s label
Advertisement for Levy’s, The Home of Music, Whitechapel
Lew Stone featured on a Radio Celebrities cigarette card, 1934
Max Bacon featured in Radio Pictorial, 1934
Label for Whitechapel released by Planet Recordings, 1951
Advertisement in the Jewish Chronicle in the fifties for Johnny Franks
Label for Why be Angry, Sweetheart? released by Oriole
The LP comes with a fold-out insert including a detailed essay by Alan Dein, illustrated with rare photos and memorabilia. CDs are available from jwmrecordings@gmail.com
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Tim Hunkin’s Air B’n’Bug Machine
On a quiet Sunday morning in Holborn, I went along to visit the inventor Tim Hunkin at Novelty Automation, his magical arcade of handmade slot machines and automata just off Red Lion Sq, where he was installing his latest masterpiece. While peace prevailed in the empty streets, Tim was hard at work indoors, perfecting his AIR B’N’BUG machine.
Inspired by the ubiquitous and controversial website that enables people to rent their homes to guests, and by an outbreak of bedbugs that occurred recently in Holborn, Tim’s creation is an animated diorama comprising a series of mechanised tableaux dramatising the comic adventures of a pair of bed bugs setting out to explore the world through AIR B’N’B.
Once the machine was ready, I enjoyed the honour of being the first to savour its delights in advance of the grand unveiling next Thursday. Afterwards, Tim explained to me the genesis of his unlikely invention.
“I had been watching a lot of German Expressionist films and I was thinking of different ways of using machines to tell stories, and I accidentally made a version of it when I was working at the Exploratorium in San Francisco recently. I was experimenting with making dioramas in shoeboxes with LEDs and I thought of putting several together. So I made a story to link these random boxes and put them inside a bigger box. I liked it but I thought nobody would take a cardboard box seriously. A while later, I realised I could build a machine that was like a page of a comic and each of the scenes could light up one after another. Then I was hooked!
I was looking for a story and it materialised here in Holborn. The flat upstairs got infested with bed bugs. I got bitten and had an allergic reaction. Then a nearby hotel got infested as well and I was able to observe how they got rid of them.
I must confess I have never stayed in an AIR B’N’B property, although I think it is good idea and I would stay in one. It is a phenomenon of our times. I was thinking about it because a lot of my friends rent out rooms and it seems to put them in a state of constant anxiety.
It was a lot of fun to have an excuse to experiment with all the different visual ideas that are possible in this format. I collaborated with Paul Spooner who makes automata, he made our dream machine at Novelty Automation. I love working with him and we teach each other tricks. Once I had divided the space, I sent him some boxes to fill. He made all the carved figures, while I explored the use of video.
It took much longer than I expected. I wrote a story at the beginning of last year and went down to see Paul. Then I set to work seriously in April and I tested it on Southwold Pier during last year’s autumn half term in October. I am not used to working on this tiny scale and there’s so much of it, I had to be systematic about how everything is connected.
When I first got it on the pier, I hated it – it really didn’t work for me. So I left it for three months while I got on with other things and then went back to it with fresh enthusiasm. I simplified the story.
An important part of my original idea was that the person using the machine was going to get bitten by a bug through the headphones. I just could not get it to work, because the headphones conduct so much sound that it distracted from the sensations. I tried building in a poking device and puffing air through the headphones too, but the noise of the machine is so intense that people did not notice.
Finally, I added the curtain placing the user in a confined space with the machine and it completely transformed people’s reactions. I was amazed and delighted! It is satisfying to make something that is completely different from everything else I have made.”
All are welcome to join Tim Hunkin at the unveiling of AIR B’N’BUG at Novelty Automation next Thursday 11th October from 6:30pm until 8pm
Tim Hunkin’s arcade is situated in the last remaining Tudor house in Holborn
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Novelty Automation, 1 Princeton St, Holborn, WC1R 4AX. Open Wednesday- Sunday 11am-5pm, with late opening until 8pm on Thursdays.
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A Cockney Sikh
Spitalfields Life Books will be publishing A MODEST LIVING, Memoirs of Cockney Sikh by Suresh Singh in October. Here is the fifth instalment and further excerpts will follow over coming weeks.
In this first London Sikh biography, Suresh tells the story of his family who have lived in their house in Princelet St for nearly seventy years, longer I believe than any other family in Spitalfields. In the book, chapters of biography are alternated with a series of Sikh recipes by Jagir Kaur, Suresh’s wife.
You can support publication by pre-ordering a copy now, which will be signed by Suresh Singh and sent to you on publication.
Click here to order a signed copy of A MODEST LIVING for £20
Suresh Singh & Jagir Kaur at 38 Princelet St this summer (Photograph by Patricia Niven)
There was a lot of violence at Daneford School for Boys in Bethnal Green in the seventies. ‘Paki-bashing’ they called it. There were punch-ups in class, boys would bring bike chains to school to protect themselves and teachers got beaten up on a regular basis.
The years at Daneford were the scariest time of my life in England. When I was twelve I got my nose broken in Buxton Street in the shadow of the Truman Brewery. It was dark and there was a smell of hops in the air. I was cornered by five white National Front thugs of sixteen and seventeen years old. Two were skinheads in Harrington jackets and knee-high steel toe-capped Dr Martens bought on Cheshire Street. They saw me looking at their boots and said, ’What are you looking at?’ When I replied, ‘Nothing,’ they said, ‘You smell and you look like a Paki.’ One grabbed my arms from behind and the other punched me with his fist on my nose. They all laughed. I crumpled to the ground and they all kicked me before running away. I said nothing the whole time. Mum cleaned me up with Dettol and my cousin took me to Outpatients at the Royal London Hospital. We never reported the incident to the police.
It hurt Mum that her son had been attacked, and brought it home to her that we were in a foreign land where her son could be beaten up for the colour of his skin. She believed we had no choice but to continue working to make life better. She also knew that not all white people were racists.
The pain of that evil encounter will stay with me forever. The Sikhism I learned from Dad gave me the strength to protect myself physically and spiritually. I learned how to avoid violence. I worked out which routes to take and which not to take, and which times of the day it was safe. Sundays were the worst because that was when the National Front sold their newspapers at the top of Brick Lane.
My white mates would say, ‘Oh Singhy, you’re all right because you’re one of us.’ They adopted me, even though I came from Brick Lane where the Bengalis lived. I started to go to the pie and mash shop in Bethnal Green Road with them, but I did not like the way they treated my Brick Lane Bengali friends.
I could exist in both worlds because I was neither white nor Bengali. When the white kids said, ‘They can’t speak English properly,’ I thought, ‘It’s back-fired!’ My Bengali friends spoke in broken English, but there I was talking the Cockney lingo. The white boys would say to the Asians, ‘Go back to your own country’ and hit them – bang! I decided I could not accept this, I stood my ground and said, ‘I’m not go- ing to listen to you,’ but it was always, ‘We’ll leave you alone but we’ll beat this one up.’
I left Daneford School with one O Level in Art. I had a lovely art teacher, Christopher Price who ran an antiques stall in Camden Passage. We called him Chris. He used to dress well, smoke in class and tell us ghost stories to calm us down. I had to do a fifteen-hour painting for my O Level exam and Chris encouraged me to use colour like Matisse. Even though I did not like Matisse because I was looking at punk graphics, I took his advice because I knew it would get me a qualification. I may have moaned about it at the time but I enjoyed it too.
At Daneford, there were boys from many different cultures. My schoolmates were Isaac Julien and Mark Banks. We went to jumble sales together, a black kid, a white kid and an Asian kid. We were the best dressed boys in the school. We enjoyed the discourse with our Maoist, Socialist Worker Party, Christian Socialist and International Marxist teachers about politics, sexuality and music. Isaac and Mark became soul boys but I stayed a punk. I was the most rebellious of the three of us. My Sikhism made me fearless.
Me, Mark Banks & Isaac Julien, 1977 (Reproduced courtesy of Isaac Julien & Victoria Miro)
Suresh Singh will be in conversation with Stefan Dickers at the Write Idea Festival at the Whitechapel Idea Store on Saturday November 17th at 1pm. CLICK HERE TO BOOK A FREE TICKET
How To Make A Chapati
Spitalfields Life Books will be publishing A MODEST LIVING, Memoirs of Cockney Sikh by Suresh Singh on 18th October.
Today we present one of Jagir Kaur’s recipes from the book, as photographed Patricia Niven. These recipes have been eaten by Suresh & Jagir’s families for generations in the Punjab and they still cook them today in the East End.
I was lucky enough to eat many chapatis cooked by Jagir while we were working on the book and the magic of watching them inflate like balloons never ceased to delight me.
In this first London Sikh biography, Suresh tells the story of his family who have lived in their house in Princelet St for nearly seventy years, longer I believe than any other family in Spitalfields. Chapters of biography alternate with Punjabi recipes by Jagir.
You can support publication by pre-ordering a signed copy now, which will be sent to you on publication.
Click here to order a signed copy of A MODEST LIVING for £20
Suresh Singh & Jagir Kaur in their Spitalfields kitchen
Chapatis are the grain staple of the Punjab where most of the grain harvest of India is cultivated. We always include rotis and they are part of our blessed ceremony.
Makes about fifteen chapatis
3 cups atta (wheat) flour
1 cup cold water
1–2 teaspoons of oil (optional)
butter, ghee, or vegetable oil for coating the finished roti (optional)
Knead the flour, water, and oil (if you are using it) into a smooth dough. Then let the dough rest in the fridge for at least half an hour.
Take half-handfuls from the dough and shape them into round saucers with your palms, these shapes are known as ‘perras.’
Flatten out the perras from the centre using your thumbs to make thick, disc-like shapes, using a rolling pin to further flatten them out. Shape the chapati by tossing it back and forth from one hand to the other, making a clapping sound.
Use a tawa (flat cooking plate) to cook the chapatis. Set the tawa on a medium heat and place the flattened-out dough on the hot plate, flipping the chapati every fifteen to twenty seconds.
Towards the end of the cooking process, the chapati may be toasted briefly on the naked flame to puff it up like a balloon. This also helps cook it more evenly. You can dab a little butter or ghee on the finished chapatis to keep them fresh. Be careful not to get any grease on the cooking plate as this will make your kitchen very smoky.
Keep the chapatis warm by wrapping them in a clean tea towel.
For yellow chapatis, which are eaten with Sarson da Saag, use corn flour instead of atta (wheat) flour, and hot water instead of cold water.
Makes about ten chapatis
2 cups of fine corn flour
3⁄4 cup boiling water (start with half a cup, and add a tablespoon at a time to get the right consistency)
Mix the ingredients with a spoon until the corn flour absorbs all the liquid, making a sticky (not runny) dough. Add more water or corn flour as needed. Then knead with your hands into a ball.
Divide the dough into five equal portions. Wet your hands and flatten the dough by tossing it between your hands, making a clapping sound.
Place the tawa on high heat and place the flattened-out dough on the hot plate. Toast for about three minutes, turning frequently until brown on both sides and puffing up in the middle.
You can dab a little butter or vegetable oil on the finished chapatis to keep them fresh.
Chapati ready for cooking
Turning the chapati
Flipping the inflated chapati
A finished chapati
Buttering the chapati
Jagir Kaur with her cat Lohri Ji at 38 Princelet St
Photographs copyright ©Patricia Niven
Click here to order a signed copy of A MODEST LIVING for £20
You may also like to read these other extracts from A MODEST LIVING
The Tailor Of Horsleydown
I am delighted to publish these extracts of THE TAILOR OF HORSLEYDOWN from A London Family, written by The Incidental Genealogist, a graduate of my blog writing course. The Genealogist worked briefly as a probate genealogist thirty years ago and now she is using her professional skills to uncover her own family’s history. Click here to follow A London Family
We are now taking bookings for this autumn’s course, HOW TO WRITE A BLOG THAT PEOPLE WILL WANT TO READ on November 10th & 11th. Come to Spitalfields and spend a weekend with me in an eighteenth century weaver’s house in Fournier St, enjoy delicious lunches from Leila’s Cafe, eat cakes baked to historic recipes by Townhouse and learn how to write your own blog. Click here for details
If you are a graduate of my course and you would like me to feature your blog, please drop me a line.
St John’s, Horsleydown
When James Skelton, my great-great grandfather, married his first wife, Sarah, in Bermondsey in 1823, three years into the reign of George IV, the couple were not yet in their mid-twenties. They took their oaths at St John’s Church, in the parish of Horsleydown on Tuesday 14th October, after a summer which had been one of the coolest since observations began in 1659.
Thanks to the meticulous records of Luke Howard (the ‘godfather of clouds’), we know that their special day was one which was relatively mild for the time of year – dry and sunny, but unmistakeably autumn, with a gentle breeze and a light scattering of yellowing leaves. As they crossed the churchyard, the earth damp under their feet from the previous day’s rain, I hope they paused for a moment and allowed themselves to feel a thrill at being alive at this time and place, unaware that they would have only a limited time together.
Despite the old rhyme which says Tuesday for health, their choice of wedding day did not bring longevity. Twenty-five years later, Sarah would be struck down with an undiagnosed womb disease after raising their five children, precipitating a crisis that sent James in search of ‘fulfilment’ elsewhere. As I sat with their birth, marriage and death certificates, and those of their children and grandchildren, laid out before me like some macabre game of Happy Families, I felt privy to a horrible secret, imagining them arriving at St John’s, all nervous excitement, without knowing what was in store for them.
But on that mild Tuesday in 1823, the church was only ninety years old and yet to be hit by a bomb from the air in an unimaginable future war. To James and Sarah, the Hawksmoor church already seemed like an antiquity. It had become a joke on account of its strange weathervane. This huge iron construction was meant to represent a comet whizzing through the heavens but it reminded the parishioners of the wriggling body of a louse. Locally, the church was often referred to as ‘St John’s Lousydown’, or simply ‘The Louse Church’. No doubt James and Sarah found it amusing because – like everyone then – they would have been familiar with the common problem of body lice. But to a traveller from the twenty-first century it requires a leap of imagination to morph the iron ‘comet’ into the legs and body of a parasite they have rarely encountered.
Walking through the churchyard today, all that remains of St John’s are the foundations and crypt, controversially built over in the seventies and used as offices by the London City Mission. The graveyard is now a dreary public park, frequented by dog walkers and pram-pushing mothers, while the last remaining headstones lean forlornly against the foundations of the church.
Whenever I imagine Sarah and James walking up the wide stone steps of the church, I cannot help but see them in typical late-regency outfits: Sarah in a fashionably high-waisted dress with bonnet, gloves and shawl – James in a smart dark dress coat and waistcoat, his legs encased in the new style of long trousers (all of which he probably made himself) and his youthful hair covered with a top hat made by a Bermondsey hatter. Sarah congratulated herself on marrying a smart young man who knew the cut of cloth and had attained the rank of a master tailor, thus giving him the freedom to set up his own business and take on apprentices.
Tailoring was a common profession at the time, with most based in the communities they served. Notions of separating work from home were new and, like many skilled artisans, records show James lived over the shop. The whole family were involved in the business, from running messages to greeting customers, and their young domestic servant would have provided much-needed help for Sarah – especially once the babies came along. This spot by the Thames was where the family lived for twenty years before their move out of an increasingly-industrialised Bermondsey to the more genteel semi-rural suburb of Brixton in the eighteen-forties.
As soon as I discovered the existence of these forebears, I set off to visit the evocatively-sounding Horsleydown Lane to see if I could discover any traces of their old neighbourhood for myself. This was the first time I had been in the capital to do any fieldwork since my last foray to South London in 1992. I knew that Horsleydown Lane still existed but I had no idea of what it would look like in the twenty-first century.
It is a strange feeling to walk through streets where your ancestors once set foot, moving ever closer to the place where – for better or worse – they carved out a living. In Horsleydown, some things have not changed – the old watermen’s stairs at the foot of the lane where the Thames covered and uncovered the slipway twice a day, the glimpse of the imposing White Tower from that spot and the Anchor Tap which still has beer on tap. Yet many things had changed too and I was disappointed that so much from that time had gone, but I was delighted to come across some unexpected tangible reminders of the family’s life.
The cobblestones on Horsleydown Lane continued to reverberate with the clatter of the drayhorses and their wagons from the Anchor Brewery until the final demise of workhorses in the mid-twentieth century. Nowadays, Horsleydown Lane is relatively quiet, as visitors tend not to stray much from Shad Thames and the prevailing sound is the thrum of traffic on Tower Bridge Rd.
Popping into the Anchor Tap for an impulsive mid-afternoon pint, I grew even more confused – time seemed to telescope as I stepped through a series of interlinking rooms. The barman encouraged me to look around the place, intrigued by my genealogical search. As I wandered through the pleasing muddle of spaces and headed up the narrow twisting staircase towards the deserted dining room, I experienced the sensation of walking in my ancestors’ footsteps. All at once I realised that they might also have struggled with the demands of such steep stairs too.
Walking out of the dark pub afterwards, I blinked and narrowed my eyes in the bright spring sunshine. For a moment, I could imagine that I have stepped into the bustling street of the eighteen-thirties. I sat watching the Thames as it surged and swirled, past the neo-gothic wonder of Tower Bridge. The thought occurred to me that I myself was like a ghost – a ghost from the future trying to find a way back into the past.
Then suddenly it struck me that the Tower of London, partially seen from those algae-covered steps, has not changed over the years that separated me from my ancestors. My great-great grandfather, James, waited on this same slippery spot for a penny ride over the river from a waterman. He also felt in awe of the ancient building across the water that symbolised the power of the city he now called home. He knew the same legend about the ravens and passed it on to his children – in the same way my father had told me the story as a child. At that moment, I felt the centuries roll back to connect us.
The White Tower
Horselydown Lane 1830
Horselydown Old Stairs
The Anchor, Horselydown Lane
Images courtesy A London Family
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Derek Brook’s East End
Take a walk around the East End on a foggy day in the sixties with Derek Brook, courtesy of his pictures which are published here for the first time today.
Derek Brook was a commercial photographer who came from Australia to London and photographed the explosion in fashion and music, including The Beatles. Yet he also recorded political protests, and came one day to capture his impressions of the East End in these considered and atmospheric pictures.
Whitechapel Rd
Whitechapel Rd
Whitechapel Rd
Whitechapel Rd with Royal London Hospital in the distance
Whitechapel Rd
Whitechapel Station
Whitechapel Station
Whitechapel Market
Mile End
Mile End
Mile End
The Anchor, Mile End Rd
The Railway Tavern, Commercial Rd, Limehouse
The Oporto Tavern, West India Dock Rd
The Prince Alfred, Poplar High St
Wood St, off Cheshire St
Great Eastern Buildings, Quaker St
Brick Lane
On the steps of the synagogue, Brick Lane
Spitalfields
Middlesex St
Middlesex St
Middlesex St with The Bell
Middlesex St
Photographs courtesy Bishopsgate Institute
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