Toffs in Spitalfields

[Ben]

Hi Jez,

Are you saying that it was impossible for a man so blingly wealthy as Mr A. to be strolling in Commercial street, on the look out for a prostitute, at 2 am?

No, just extremely unlikely.

Or are you saying that Hutchinson's description was so minutely detailed that Astrokhan man was an invention?

The description - yes, although it's more difficult to say for certain that he invented the "man". It's not impossible that he saw someone, but either invented or heavily embellished the description.

[Jez]

Just to clarify, Ben.
Are you saying that it was impossible for a man so blingly wealthy as Mr A. to be strolling in Commercial street, on the look out for a prostitute, at 2 am?

Or are you saying that Hutchinson's description was so minutely detailed that Astrokhan man was an invention?

Two totally different questions, as I'm sure you'd agree.

[Ben]

Ben, I am seriously beginning to wonder about Booth and his maps.

Sorry, Norma, but you really have it backwards.

Rather than assuming the contemporary maps and Charles Booth must be in error, it's far more circumspect to "begin to wonder" about the validity of your own views with regard to the prevalence of "toffs" in the area. It is completely and utterly irrelevent what buildings were constructed in 1721, as they have no bearing whatsoever on who lived there in 1888, and if Charles Booth thought the people living there had "good, ordinary wages" and were "fairly comfortable", I'd say he needs listening too. I'd say he's better qualified than anyone here to make pronouncements about the social conditions that existed on 1888 Fournier Street. Also of no siginificance whatsoever is what the uphosltery and chandeliers look like insider NOW.

Booth is correct. Indisputably, irrefutably so. Debate crushed for eternity on that score, I'm afraid.

He also had several other mistresses from his own class as well as a wife,but it seems he loved nothing better than to go and seek out slumming looking for his bits of rough.

Where? The East End? Spitalfields? If not, he's irrelevent. All prostitutes would have been considered a "bit of rough" to any well-heeled individual, so he didn't need to venture into the East End for that purpose, considering that prostitution existed everywhere in London.

Cleveland Street was another massive scandal- this time concerning the homosexual antics of nobless oblige.

Yeah, Cleveland Street. Now, I wonder where that was?

Hutchinson living where he did which is right next to the City of London where the bankers congregate would have seen lots of men dressed fashionably in exactly this way.

Yes - in the City.

But Dorset Street wasn't in the City.

Dorset Street was heavily advertised as one of the worst streets in the entirety of Greater London. That was bad enough in isolation, but with the full and certain knowledge that a serial killer was active in the district, and that the local denizens were extremely twitchy as a consequence when it came to anyone remotely out of place? I catergorise a "toff" as someone from the upper or upper middle classes, denoted on the Booth map by the colour yellow, and there is conspicuous absence of any "yellow spots" on the map of the murder district.

The pattern of dress,tie pin and watch chain was probably like reciting your two times table.

No, it was probably like reciting your Bollocks Times Table. It's probably like reciting your "How to create a false sense by pandering, in the most unsubtle manner possible, to people's basest fears".

No more distracting me, please. People to see, porter to drink.

Happy new year everyone!

Best regards,
Ben

[Sam Flynn]

It was probably the religious hypocrisy and self righteousness of the age that gave rise to some of the predilections of these licentious libertines but their antics are well documented .

Indeed, Nats, but I've yet to see anything that specifically documents that toffs - or even lower middle class persons - frequented Spitalfields for the purpose of wenching, whether singly or in any great numbers. To me, the notion is about on a par with the idea of Egon Ronay calling round to the Dagenham branch of Aldi's to get his weekly supply of Chewits, Pot Noodle and White Lightning.

[Natalie Severn]

Some of the debauched life Edward ,Prince of Wales led in the 1880"s and 90"s is quite well documented,Sam.Like Randolph Churchill he is said to have contracted a STD -mostly ,in Edward"s case ,it seems from prostitutes in Paris"s Moulin Rouge type venues.It has also been stated on these boards -some time ago -that he kept a flat just off Fenchurch Street where he "dressed down" and went slumming himself but I haven"t been able to find the facts on that about Edward,if indeed he did slum .Pall Mall Gazette in the 1880"s had several goes at outing some of the more child oriented of these roue"s-but the paper seems to have concentrated on those like Ernest Dowson and Aubrey Beardsley ,debauchees who were only keen on very young girls.
It was probably the religious hypocrisy and self righteousness of the age that gave rise to some of the predilections of these licentious libertines but their antics are well documented .

[John Bennett]

Sorry Nats, not 1740s, I should say late 1720s. Still, a little head start, but the houses on the south side are considered (by the Survey of London) to be the finest of their kind on the estate. I'd have to agree.

That's probably why they attracted nice people...!

JOHN

[John Bennett]

Nats,

One fact that may be worth noting is that all the other streets had a head start on Fournier Street, which wasn't laid out until after Christ Church was built.

I think most of them date from around 1740-ish, whereas the others (Wilkes, Princelet, Hanbury) had properties built possibly 20-30 years earlier.

Plenty of time to get wobbly!

[Sam Flynn]

Some of these "poverty maps " appear to be somewhat in error.

I hardly think so, Nats - the meticulousness of Booth's notebooks testify to the rigour of his research, although I'd be the first to admit that he may have overblown things on occasion. What may be more a cause for concern is our tendency to interpret those "blackest streets" as the abode of dragons, when I'm sure that there were plenty of poor but decent folk preserving some vestiges of dignity there.

The problem is, that if that's our perception of the "black-spots" in these more liberal times, how much more cut-and-dried would the opinion of a conservative, middle-class Victorian have been? And, frankly, how many would have frequently bothered to find out, still less take the risk, when there were "gels" aplenty in far less ill-reputed areas of town, and better places of entertainment out West - or even, as we've seen, down in Lambeth?

[Natalie Severn]

Thanks John.I think Fournier Street is exceptional in that the builders house,which is the one with all the original features intact,is easily one of the most elegant of this "Silk Weaver"s estate of elegant three hundred year old properties.But Fournier Street has larger houses than most,it runs alongside and one side of it backs onto the church.Hawksmoor"s house,next door, is truly magnificent!However,I am not denying that some of these streets clearly became quite run down periodically----but not the Builder"s house or Hawksmoor"s in Fournier Street!

[Natalie Severn]

H Sam.just seen your above posts.If you are serious about finding out about Lambeth in the 1880"s/90"s/turn of the century etc Somerset Maughan is a good place to start.Your hair will stand on end reading about the dire poverty and starvation suffered by some of the populace.Read his "Lisa of Lambeth"----said to be a true account of his experiences as a young doctor.I doubt you will ever be the same again.Charlie Chaplin makes a similar case about Lambeth in his autobiography.Some of these "poverty maps " appear to be somewhat in error.

[John Bennett]

Ben, I am seriously beginning to wonder about Booth and his maps.
I say this because I have personally been inside some of these Fournier Street "palaces",quite recently.The one that was built by the Huguenot "master builder" of that area of silk weaving "cottages" was built in 1721 and has changed hardly at all since it was built.It has the original gilt chandeliers,the original green silk tapestries hanging from the walls of the main upstairs rooms,the original dining table and chairs,etc---all of these almost 300 years old and looking quite luxurious still.The house has never had electricity and the chandeliers had gas replacing candles in the 1850"s.The owner now is a millionaire-as are numbers of the people who live in Fournier Street.Right next door to the master builders house stands the house that belonged to Nicholas Hawksmoor,the architect of Christchurch and the gifted pupil of Christopher Wren who built St Paul"s----his old house also has tons of original features ,never disturbed.
So ,no,I doubt very much Booth is correct as all the evidence that exists today reveal these houses of immense luxury have never been owned by anyone other than the wealthy.

Fournier/Church Street does seem to get lumped in with the other more notorious places, but the Booth map suggests that it wasn't that bad.

On another point, I too have been into a few of these wonderful places. No 4 Princelet Street is the one in which they film BBC period dramas, where Ben Truman was born. The owner gave me a little tour last year - he bought it in 1987. The previous owners had been two Jewish brothers who had lived there since the 1930s, but they only really used one room! Hence the 'characterful' condition of the rest of the house. Believe me, there isn't a right-angle in the whole property!

Also, he remembers that at that time, hardly any of the other houses in Princelet Street were actually lived in. Many of them were used for commercial or storage purposes. But he said they were never as cheap as people assumed they were at that time, what with being so close to the City and all.

I certainly remember the area in the mid 1980s as being rather delapidated and noticed, as the years went by, individual properties getting a lick of paint etc. until it ended up as it looks today.

[Sam Flynn]

Let us all hope that the criminal Victorian element stuck to those colour schemes. But they probably didn't, being law breakers and all...

Come to think of it, Scott, they wouldn't have stuck to those colour schemes for the simple reason that they weren't nailed to the floor. Those "black-spots" were part of a residential survey, but of course the residents didn't stay put all day. Once work had finished, the folks would have spent a fair amount of time outside their doss-houses, if only to stretch their legs and get a breath of air.

A more "dynamic" view of the Booth Map, showing the distribution of "black" and "dark-blue" classes during the late afternoon/evening, could have looked something like this:



Given the population density of the poorer streets, it's inevitable that the residents would have spilled over into non-black/dark-blue areas of an evening.

[Natalie Severn]

Thanks for that, Gareth.

It was mentioned recently that Fournier Street must have been home to the wealthy on account of its fine architecture, and yet according to the Poverty Map, the street's occupany comprised the "fairly comfortable" and those with "good, ordinary earnings" - a description that would apply to butchers and plasterers. A cautionary note, methinks, against assigning to much significance to 18th Century architecture.

Best regards,
Ben

Ben, I am seriously beginning to wonder about Booth and his maps.
I say this because I have personally been inside some of these Fournier Street "palaces",quite recently.The one that was built by the Huguenot "master builder" of that area of silk weaving "cottages" was built in 1721 and has changed hardly at all since it was built.It has the original gilt chandeliers,the original green silk tapestries hanging from the walls of the main upstairs rooms,the original dining table and chairs,etc---all of these almost 300 years old and looking quite luxurious still.The house has never had electricity and the chandeliers had gas replacing candles in the 1850"s.The owner now is a millionaire-as are numbers of the people who live in Fournier Street.Right next door to the master builders house stands the house that belonged to Nicholas Hawksmoor,the architect of Christchurch and the gifted pupil of Christopher Wren who built St Paul"s----his old house also has tons of original features ,never disturbed.
So ,no,I doubt very much Booth is correct as all the evidence that exists today reveal at least half a dozen of these houses of immense luxury have never been owned by anyone other than the wealthy.

I have just been watching the Ballet ,"Mayerling".This is a true to life account of the January 1889 deaths,thought to have been double suicides, of the Crown Prince of Austria [a drug addict] and his 17 year old mistress in an Austrian Hunting Lodge.What is fascinating is to read up on the research the choreographer did into the taverns and inns the Crown Prince frequented -from 1881 onwards with his horrified wife-both in disguise -but not particularly dressed down,which were full of prostitutes and thieves ----"of the lowest kind".He also had several other mistresses from his own class as well as a wife,but it seems he loved nothing better than to go and seek out slumming looking for his bits of rough.

I honestly believe Sara is right on the button here.Sam and Ben appear a bit unworldly about these urbane,middle and upper class men and what turned them on.It was part of Victorian life and the famous Victorian hypocrisy.Cleveland Street was another massive scandal- this time concerning the homosexual antics of nobless oblige.
Regarding the specifics of dress I take issue here too.Hutchinson living where he did which is right next to the City of London where the bankers congregate would have seen lots of men dressed fashionably in exactly this way.The pattern of dress,tie pin and watch chain was probably like reciting your two times table.It was how they dressed.The eye-brows,the detail of facial hair was probably his answer to a multiple choice question from Abberline!
No problems Claire-point accepted.
Cheers everyone and Happy New Year to All!

[Sam Flynn]

The part of Lambeth in which the Canterbury was located was significantly free of "vicious, semi-criminal" areas according to Booth's Poverty Map of 1889

To round this off I thought it'd help to give us an idea of where the Royal Cambridge Music Hall, Commercial Street was located. This excerpt from Booth's 1889 map shows the rough location of the Cambridge as a green square, beneath the white arrow:



That wodge of black just around the corner, and to the North of the Cambridge, is Great Pearl Street.

[Sam Flynn]

Let us all hope that the criminal Victorian element stuck to those colour schemes. But they probably didn't, being law breakers and all.

The colour schemes relate to the people who lived in these places, not their places of work. Imagine a map of Gaza, and picture an Israeli swaggering jauntily into a "dark blue" area today. Something like that.