Annie Besant and the Matchgirls

One hot June day in 1888 the journalists at 'The Link' newspaper were surprised to find dozens of young girls crowding into their offices, however surprise turned to shock as the reason for their visit began to unfold. The young women were workers at Bryant and May's match factory who had walked out of employment on behalf of their friends who had been fired for petty reasons. In those days before the Welfare system their actions were unprecedented and admirable.
The journalist who was determined to bring their story to the whole country was Annie Besant.

The Bryant and May factory stood in Fairfield Road which ran off of Bow Road. Its working conditions were horrendous as the matches had to be dipped in yellow phosphorous, a dangerous substances which led to what was known as 'phossy jaw' a form of cancer of the face.

In Annie Besant the matchgirls found a willing champion for their cause. In the following copy of 'The Link' her article was headed 'White Slavery in London' and went on to describe how the match girls, some as young as thirteen worked from 6am to 6pm with just two short breaks.

From their meagre wages her readers were told the women had to house, feed and clothe themselves, the wages were further decreased if they left a match on the bench and by the cost of paint, brushes and other equipment they needed to do their work. Then apart from the likelihood of developing 'phossy jaw' there were there dangers of losing a finger or even a hand in unguarded machinery.

The answer from the employers was to try and bully the woman back to work, but this failed when another worker was dismissed for no good reason and the whole workforce of 1.400 women walked out and and went on to set up their strike committee rooms in Bow Road.  While the women were on strike they were paid from the strike fund.

Eventually their employers conceded that working conditions would be improved and the fines abolished, with this and an improvement in pay the women went back to work and gradually yellow phosphorous was phased out in the production of matches.

This was quite a difference considering only six years before Mr Bryant, wishing to curry favour with the then present Prime Minister Mr Gladstone, arranged to have a statue erected of him in front of St Mary's church. Nothing wrong with this you might think until you learn that to pay for it he deducted a certain amount each week from his workers wages. When it was unveiled the matchgirls demonstrated by throwing stones, but this had little effect of the messers Bryant and May that was to come six years later when the women down tools and walked out.

There had been strikes at the factory before with little change in conditions, but it was to be these young women that caught the public imagination, maybe the reason was because they weren't afraid to state their case and were prepared to march and hold meetings and of course they faced the employers and won.

Ben Tillett, a union leader of the time,  paid tribute to the Match Workers whose strike he called 'the beginning of the social convulsion which produced the New Unionism'.

The  year following the matchgirls strike the gas workers and general labourers formed a union which secured an eight hour working day, and in the same year 60.000 dock workers called a strike which virtually close one stretch of the Thames for over a month. Through the matchgirls it seemed the working class had realised its power.

For anyone tracing their ancestry might like to see if one of the strikers were among their ancestors, if so you can check through the Strike Fund Register:

http://www.unionhistory.info/matchworkers/browse.php?Page=1&Book=Match+Workers+Strike+Fund+Register

Social and political reform seems not to have satisfied Annie Besant's hunger for some all-embracing truth to replace the religion of her youth. She became interested in Theosophy, a religious movement founded in 1875 and based on Hindu ideas of karma and reincarnation. As a member and later leader of the Theosophical Society, she helped to spread Theosophical beliefs around the world, notably in India.

Annie Besant first visited India in 1893 and later settled there, becoming involved in the Indian nationalist movement. In 1916 she established the Indian Home Rule League, of which she became president. She was also a leading member of the Indian National Congress.
Mahatma Gandhi said that Annie Besant awoke India from the deep sleep.

She died in India on 20 September 1933

Hannah Billig (The Angel of Cable Street)

Towards the end of the 19th century Russia began a series of anti-Semitic attacks known as pogroms, pogrom is a Russian word meaning devastation, and for the Jewish families who had lived there for generations it was devastation indeed. So given the choice between fleeing thecountry or death the exodus began.

Jews had always been discriminated against, there is a belief that each generation will have a new enemy, but what made the situation in Russia different was that it wasn' just a series of random attacks, this was officially sanctioned just as would occur on a more horrific scale in the middle of the next century.

One Jewish family, among the thousands, who escaped were the Billigs. They settled in Hanbury Street which was close to the Jewish community in Brick Lane it was here their daughter Hannah was born in 1901.

Barnet Billig worked as a newsagent and cigarette/cigar maker while his wife Millie took care of their six children, having settled in England the Billigs were determined the children would succeed at their studies and turned one of their rooms into a library where they would all study after school, and it says something for that determination that of their six children four of them qualified to become doctors, among them Hannah which was almost unheard of in the 1920's when women weren't expected to have a career.

Hannah had attended Myrtle Street School where she won a scholarship which gave her a place at the University of London to read Medicine, she trained at the Royal Free and London Hospitals before qualifying in 1925 after qualification she worked at the Jewish Maternity Hospital in Underwood Street for two years before opening her own practice in Watney Street.

The N.H.S was still over a decade away by the time Hannah moved her practice to Cable Street in 1935 so at this time if you needed to see a doctor you would have to pay, but payment or not Hannah was never known to turn a patient away and earned the title of ˜The Angel of Cable Street'' today a blue plaque marks the spot.

She reminds me of a doctor we had in Poplar, who at a time when most other doctors charged half a crown per visit Dr Goldie charged sixpence, and only then if the person could afford it. She was remembered with affection as 'The Sixpenny Doctor'

A year after Hannah moved to Cable Street she would probably have witnessed the day Moseley and his British Union of Facists tried to march through the area, the local people mobilised to stop them and it has since became known asthe 'Battle of Cable Street', there were many injuries that day and no-one should be surprised if Hannah was there to treat them.

Once in her own practice she worked endless hours, and remembering her own childhood she would encourage her child patients to study, even having them bring their books to her so she could help them with their reading. At this time Hannah was also called on as a police doctor, and duringWorld War Two was the doctor in charge of air raid shelters at Wapping, Hannah took to this extra responsibility with her usual energy, going from shelter to shelter even though the bombs were dropping around her.

One night during the Blitz she was attending to residents at Orient Wharf in Wapping when an explosion blew her down the shelters steps, typically of Hannah she merely picked herself up and bandaged her painful ankle and continued treating her patients, it was only when she had finished four hours later that it was discovered she had broken her ankle. As well as treating those in shelters Hannah worked alongside the ARP wardens in freeing those trapped by the fallen buildings, for her work she received the George Medal.

In 1942 Hannah moved on once again by enlisting Indian Army Medical Corps where she was known as Captain H Billing, she soon arrived in Assam where she treated the sick and wounded British soldier fighting in the steamy heat of the Burmese jungle, and here she accounted the two diseases of Malaria and typhus. In 1944 a grain shortage meant starvation for thousands who poured into Calcutta where her work among the thousands of starving mothers and children earned her an MBE, but Hannah was too busy to leave India to collect it at Buckingham Palace, instead she asked that it be posted to her.

When Hannah returned to England the NHS had been established, so she returned to Watney Street and worked within the NHS for the next twenty years. In 1964 she decided to retired and parties all over the eastend were held in her honour by the people she called the salt of the earth. She had decided to retire to Israel, and although the people were sad to see her leave they agree that she had earned a well deserved rest, but they really should have known that wasn't Hannah's style.

Once in Israel and settled in her new home in Caesarea Hannah couldn't rest and she began working in the Israeli and Arab villages, where she continued to do so for the next twenty years.

Hannah died in 1987 and 'The Angel of Cable Street' finally folded her wings and rested, However her memory remains close to Cable Street where you can find Angel Mews.
The inscription on her grave in Hadera Cemetery Israel reads: 'In loving memory of Hannah, who devoted her life to healing the sick in England and in Israel'.

Phoebe Hessel (The Woman Who Went to War for Love)

Phoebe Hessel was born in Stepney in 1713 and baptized at the local church of St Dunstans. There are two stories of her early life, one that when her mother died young her father, who was a soldier had two options one to put her into care of the parish, or two take him with him, he chose the second option but as girls or women weren't allowed in the army he dressed her as a boy taught her the fife and drum and returned with Phoebe to his unit.

The second is a little more romantic, it is said that when Phoebe was fifteen years old she fell desperately in love with a soldier named Samuel Golding, when he was recalled to duty Phoebe couldn't bear the thought of their separation so she dressed herself as a man and went off to war beside the man she loved.

Which ever story is true one thing that can't be denied is that Phoebe did disguise herself as a man and join the army. She fought with the 5th Regiment of Foot this was one of the 'Six Old Corps', which entitled it to use a badge (St George killing the Dragon) on its Regimental Colours. She stayed in the army for seventeen year seeing action in the Caribbean and Europe.

It was while she was in under the command of the Duke of Cumberland fighting for the Austrian succession in Belgium that she was wounded in the arm by a French bayonet and was invalided out of the army, or at least that was one story claims, for just like her early life this part also has two claims, that being the first and the second being that it was Samuel Golding that was wounded and invalided out, and not wanting to be separated from him once again she disclosed her secret to the wife of their commanding officer who obtained her discharge.

Once back in civvy street the two married and settled in Plymouth where the couple had nine children, all but one died in infancy and their only surviving son died while serving at sea. When Samuel died she moved to Brighton and married a fisherman Thomas Hessel. Phoebe was eighty years old Thomas died so with the little money she had she bought a donkey and traveled Brighton and the surrounding villages selling fish and vegetables. Soon however this became too much for a woman of her years so she settled for selling oranges, gingerbread and pincushions at the corner of Marine Parade and Old Steine where her customers came as much for her stories of her long live as for her goods.

As her celebrity grew she came to the attention of the Prince Regent who spent much of his time in Brighton, so that when at the age of ninety five she was forced to go into the workhouse the Prince granted her half a guinea a week, with this Phoebe left the workhouse and began selling her wares once again. When in 1820 the Prince succeeded to the throne he remembered Phoebe and invited her to his coronation, which was an honour he didn't extend to his own wife Caroline of Brunswick who was forbidden to attend the ceremony, she was in fact turned away at the doors of Westminster Abbey while the ceremony took place inside.

Phoebe died the following year at the age of one hundred and eight and was buried in a prime plot in St. Nicholas' Churchyard, a local pawnbroker, Hyam Lewis, paid for the headstone which marks her grave, the inscription reads:

''In Memory of Phoebe Hessel who was born at Stepney in the Year 1713. She served for many years as a private soldier in the 5th Reg. of foot in different parts of Europe and in the year 1745 fought under the command of the Duke of Cumberland at the Battle of Fontenoy where she received a bayonet wound in her arm. Her long life which commenced in the time of Queen Anne extended to the reign of George IV by whose munificence she received comfort and support in her latter years. She died at Brighton where she had long resided: December 12th 1821 Aged 108 Years.'' Although Phoebe had moved away from her eastend roots the eastend didn't forget her, and if you should ever walk along Hessel Street perhaps you'll give a thought to the young woman who went of to warrather than be seperated from the man she loved.

Clara Grant (The Farthing Bundle lady)

Clara Grant was born in a small village in wiltshire in 1867, her father was a local shopkeeper but Clara's dreams stretched further than the confines of the village, in her heart she knew he future lay elsewhere.


She was a bright child and decided at a young age that education would be the way out of poverty for so many people, and as the east end of London was one of the poorest areas in the country this is where she would go.

When she was just thirteen years old she left the security of her family and set out for London, here she became a pupil teacher in St. John’s Infants in Hoxton, the area when Clara arrived there was in a transition from a safe and wealthy area to becomming overcrowded slum. In time Clara moved from Hoxton to a school in Brewhouse Lane Wapping, athough the distnce between the two schools wasn't that great the enviroment was quite different.

Wapping is situated close to the river Thames and of course the London Docks where ships would bring cargo from all over the world, dock areas being as they were Clara would have seem a great deal of poverty, usually caused by the convenience of the many public houses that prolifigated the area.

So when in 1900 Clara Grant became the head teacher of Devons Road school in Bow she was shocked at the amount of local poverty. Like many of those other Victorian English women, and her past experience, she didn't just wring her hands as say how terrible, she set out to do something about it. with

In 1905 the Poplar Distress Committee took a survey of the unemployed and it showed that the area in which Clara was working had the worstfigures in the whole borough. It was the same year that a new school was built and Clara moved to Fern Street. In Clara's class there were ninety children with ages varying from two years old the regime at the school was harsh, and not one Clara agreed with. If children moved in class they were expected to be caned. One day she saw nineteen small boys for not being able to knit.

To Clara this was unexceptable and she made her anger clear that doing useless drills, such as the 'thimble drill' where children had to keep a thimble on their finger for an hour a day were useless, and no way to teach. Instead she put more thoughtful practices in place, she began supplying them with a hot breakfast, for no child can learn if they are hungry, to some she supplied clothes and shoes. For the younger children she devised little games, and early example of 'learning through play'.

Two years later she opened a settlement where adults could go to learn a trade.Women who until then were pay virtually nothing for their work in the 'rag trade' by making dresses they could never afford to buy even if they worked a lifetime came to the settlement, there they could work for themselves producing goods which were sold through the settlement.

She also set up boot clubs, spectacle,cradle and fireguard clubs, as an emphasis on hygiene and safety. As knowledge of her work spread people of all classes began making donations of clothing, toys, beads. games and all sorts of things, most of these were of no practical use to the settlement,then she had the idea of the 'farthing bundle', even, it is said Queen Mary made donations to the cause.

Little bundles of toys, games and various other things were wrapped in newspaper to be sold for a farthing, with the money going back into the settlement funds. Once word got out the settlement was besieged by hundreds of children queuing up from a quarter to sevewn each Saturday morning. So popular were the bundles that eventually boys and girls had to go on alternate weeks.

“Farthing bundles are full of very human things such as children love,” Clara explained. “Tiny toys of wood, or tin, whole or broken, little balls, doll-less heads or head-less dolls, whistles, shells, beads, reels, marbles, fancy boxes, decorated pill boxes, scraps of patchwork, odds and ends of silk or wool, coloured paper for dressing up, cigarette cards and scraps.”

In 1913 an arch had to be fitted to the door bearing the words "Enter now, ye children small. None can come who are too tall." to get a bundle children had too pass under this without stooping.

Clara Grant died in 1949 shortly after receiving an O.B.E for her work and is buried in Tower Hamlets cemetery' She is still remembered though, Devons Road School bears her name and the Fern Street settlement still remains in name and in the shape of an anonymous modern building but the original has vanished with much of the east end that Clara came as a thirteen year old country girl and brought happiness into the lives of so many deprived city children.

The Great London Smog of 1952

To some people, especially to Hollywood film directors London is synonymous with fog.

However it's not just directors for even our own Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had Sherlock Holmes referring to a 'London Particular', and Stephen King used a fog to create terror in a small town, but nothing either writers mind could create those
frightening days of  December 1952.

The previous month had been unusually colder than normal, so without the benefit of central heating, which was a scare thing in those days, coal fires were banked up to keep the homes warm and comfortable.

 Normally the thick black smoke belching ouut from homes and factories would have been dispersed by the wind but it wasn't to be so in this case. By some fluke of nature an anti cyclone was moving in from the continent, bringing with it pollution from the industrial areas in the east and  trapping it with those pollutants already released in the atmosphere by Londons chimneys.

For each day the fog lasted according to the Met Office 1,000 tonnes of smoke particles, 2,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide, 140 tonnes of hydrochloric acid and 14 tonnes of fluorine compounds. In addition, and perhaps most dangerously, 370 tonnes of sulphur dioxide were converted into 800 tonnes of sulphuric acid.

Although Londoners at that time were used to fogs, giving them the name of 'peasoupers', this they felt was somehow different. It seeped everywhere cinemas and theatre closed because the screen and stages couldn't be seen by the audiences. Cattle brought to London for the Smithfield show were reported as having died in the stalls.

By the second day 6th December over 500 people had died, by the second day 900 people had perished. Ambulances had largely stopped running, and for those who found their way to hospital on foot it was already too late. Poorly insulated houses in the eastend witnessed a death rate nine times higher than elsewhere. It was here that they had taken the full force of Hitlers Luftwaffa so that if not completely destroyed in the attacks were left in such a poor condition there was no way of stopping the fog fron seeping in. On the Isle of  Dogs not being able to see their feet which had disappeared into the dirty yellow swirling mass.

On the 10th December when the fog finally lifted by then 12.000 people had died. One of the contributing factors was that the country was almost bankrupt due to the recent war of 1939-1945. It was decided the one thing we could export quickly was the best low sulpher coal, leaving the high that with a sulfer for the domestic market. It was sold at a lower price to the domestic market and became known as 'nutty slack', it was remembered as being smaller than normal coal and spitting and sparking while burning.

The only good thing to come out of that disastrous and deadly week of 1952 was that it brought in the 'Clean Air Act' where only smoke free coal was allowed to be burnt, London has had fogs since then but thankfully none as deadly.


The Great London Fog of 1952 Parts 1 2 and 3

Upper North Street School Bombing

In June 1917 the 'Great' war had been waging for three years, but that was away in France. In the eastend of London the 13th of June started like any other. No-one could ever have imagined that it would end in a tragedy that would send shock and sadness throughout the country. It affected everyone even the King himself.

It was mid morning when people began to notice something strange in the summer sky. By his time in the war the people were used to Zeppelin raids, but this time it was different. Some people described them as looking like dragonflies. As they came nearer it became clear they were planes fourteen in number, and as they flew they dropped bombs leaving devistation in their wake. As they flew overhead one witness said ''the sun had been shining but it seemed to go out in a roar of thunder''. This was the first fixed wing bombing raid by fixed wings aircraft on women and children.

Twice before the Gotha's of the 'English Squadron' led by Squadron Commander Hauptmann Ernst Branderberg had tried to bomb Britan, this time when they reurned to base leaving a hundred and sixty two people dead and over five hundred injured they probably counted their mission a success. Amongst those killed and injured were the children of Upper North Street school.

Whether he pilot recognised he building he hit was a school or not will never be known. What is known is that the bomb landed on the roof of he school then continued through o the top floor where the girls were taught, it carried on through the second floor which was the boys classroom and finally carried on to the ground floor before exploding in the infants classroom.

Local people, including the mothers of the children rushed to the school to join the teachers digging in the

rubble praying all the time they would find their child alive. The injured were taken to hopitals and those killed were taken to the morque with their greiving mothers. The women of the eastend, like women elsewhere had somewhere in their hearts prepared themselves that their menfolk might never come back, but not their children. Never during their darkest moments did they believe that their children were in any danger in the safety of their school.

The children who lost their lives that day were:
Louise Annie Acampora aged 5 ... Alfred Ernest Batt aged 5 ... Leaonard Charles Barford aged 5 ... John Percy Brennan aged 5 ... William Thomas Henry Challen aged 4 ... Vera May Clayson aged 5 ...  Alice Maud Cross aged 5 ... William Hollis aged 5 ... George Albert Hyde aged 5 ... Grace Jones aged 5 ... Rose Martin aged 11 ... George Morris aged 6 ... Edwin Cecil William Powell aged 12 ... Robert Stimson aged 5 ... Elizabeth Taylor aged 5 ... Rose Tuffin aged 5 ... Frank Winfield aged 5 ... Florence L Woods aged 5.

A week later on the twentieth of June when the funerals were being held hundreds lined the streets in silent respect. Over six hundred wreaths were sent from all over the world. The funeral service at the parish church of All Saints. Among the mourners were many children who had survived the attack.

The Bishop of London conducted the service and knowing what was being demanded on the streets he said ''Little did we expect, after 2000 years of teaching Christianity, that war would be made on women and children ... we must be careful that indignation drives us into the right action. There is much looseness of thought and phrases about retribution. I do not believe that the mourners wish that sixteen German babies should lie dead to avenge their own.

He also read out a message from King George V who visited the eastend immediately after the tragedy.The message read that he and, with Queen Mary. were thinking of the childrens parents and ''their saddened homes, especially today when the bodies of their little ones were laid to rest''. The Kings message went on ''of young innocent lives, at all times pathetic, is made more so that ever in these tragic circumstances. Their Majesties pray that the mourners may be blessed with God's help and comfort in their sorrow''.

The mayor and local  MP Will Crooks decided it would be fitting to set up a memorial fund, The memorisl stands in Poplar recreation park. it was paid for by public donations and unveiled on the twentieth of June 1919.

April 2014 From East London Advertiser

Thieves have stolen trees from a WWI memorial just days after they were planted to mark the deaths of 18 children killed in a German wartime bombing raid.


The trees were placed by Mayor Lutfur Rahman in Trinity Gardens, Poplar, near the site of the bombing of Upper North Street School in 1917 in a ceremony on April 1 attended by the Royal British Legion.

But within days, residents alerted the Advertiser that some of the trees had gone missing, along with a memorial plaque for the site.

Tower Hamlets Council confirmed the trees had been stolen, but said they would be quickly replaced.

A spokeman said: “We are saddened to find that three out of the 10 elm trees along with the black poplar tree planted by the council in Trinity Gardens to commemorate the First World War-era bombing of a local school have been taken.

“We will be looking to replant the missing trees as soon as possible.”

She said no crime had been reported to the Met police as the trees will be replaced, adding: “Parks staff have been informed to keep a close eye on the trees once they are replanted.”

She added the memorial plaque had yet to be “concreted” and was removed from the site by the council after the mayor’s ceremony.

Upper North Street School was struck by one of the first aerial bombings of the First World War on June 13, 1917. The attack targeted the East India and Millwall docks.

 

  

                                                                          

                                                                            

 

The Kindertransport

This statue wasn’t erected in memory of one person but of thousands, they are the children who were saved from Nazi persecution at the start of World War Two and perhaps if you should ever be passing by Liverpool Street Station you might spare a thought to remember the millions of other children who tragically never had the chance to be part of the Kindertransport.

In 1933 Adolph Hitler and his Nazi party came to power in Germany and for the Jewish population and others it was it was the beginning of a nightmare, within months of his appointment as Chancellor work began on the concentration camp Dachau where arrested Communists, Socialists, and labour leaders were held. It was here that the guards practiced their ‘skills’ of dehumanizing prisoners. 
 
It was the same years that specific laws were brought in for the Jewish population, they were barred from holding positions in the civil service, in legal and medical professions, and in teaching and university positions. The Nazis encouraged boycotts of Jewish-owned shops and businesses and began the ook burnings of writings by Jews and by others not approved by the Reich.

In 1935 something called the Nuremberg Laws were brought into force. These laws stripped Jews of their civil rights as German citizens and separated them from Germans legally, socially, and politically. This law also forbade marriages or sexual relations between Jews and Germans. Hitler warned darkly that if this law did not resolve the problem, he would turn to the Nazi Party for a final solution.

During this time thousands left Germany but gradually this slowed to a trickle as visa’s became impossible to obtain and those that were luckier enough to get a visa were not allowed to take out any possessions or money, also they found many countries had closed their borders to them. Then when the Nazi’s marched into Austria and were welcomed by the Austrian people more Jews became under control of the Nazi’s, then on October 15th, 1938 Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia came under the Nazi jackboot, two months later came the event known as Kristallnacht (The Night of the Broken Glass) when nearly 1,000 synagogues were set on fire,76 were destroyed.

More than 7,000 Jewish businesses and homes were looted, about one hundred Jews were killed and as many as 30,000 Jews were arrested and sent to concentration camps to be tormented, many for months. Within days, the Nazis forced the Jews to transfer their businesses to Aryan hands and expelled all Jewish pupils from public schools. With brazen arrogance, the Nazis further persecuted the Jews by forcing them to pay for the damages of Kristallnacht.

Although Jewish and Quaker groups had been trying for months to get Britain to allow free access of Jews to Britain it was this event that spurred them on to greater efforts. They appealed to Neville Chamberlain to permit the temporary admission of Jewish children and teenagers who would later re-emigrate. The Jewish community here promised to pay guarantees for the refugee children. 

With a speed not usually associated with government it was agreed that unaccompanied children ranging from infants up to teenagers under the age of 17 would be able to come, no limit to the number of refugees was ever publicly announced. A comparable U.S. effort to absorb up to 10,000 refugee children by relaxing restrictive immigration statutes failed to even make it out of Congressional committees debating the issue, One congressional committee studied a proposal to bring in refugee children and piously declined, saying it was "contrary to the rules of God" to take children away from their parents

In Germany, a network of organizers was established, and these volunteers worked around the clock to make priority lists of those most imperiled: teenagers who were in concentration camps or in danger of arrest, Polish children or teenagers threatened with deportation, children in Jewish orphanages, children whose parents were too impoverished to keep them, or children with a parent in a concentration camp. Once the children were identified or grouped by list, their guardians or parents were issued a travel date and departure details. 

Each child was allowed to bring a small suitcase and ten Reichsmarks.Upon arrival at port in Great Britain, Kinder without prearranged foster families were sheltered at temporary holding centers located at summer holiday camps such as Dover Court and Pakefield. Finding foster families was not always easy, and being chosen for a home was not necessarily the end of the discomfort or distress.

Although many children were well-treated and grew up to develop close ties to their British hosts, some were mistreated or abused. Some families took in teenage girls as a way of acquiring a maid. There was little sensitivity toward the cultural and religious needs of the children and, for some, their heritage was all but erased.

In all nearly 10.000 children were saved, the German government allowed this to happen with one proviso, that the convoys of children didn’t block the ports so they traveled by train to the Hook of Holland. From there, the children traveled by ferry to the British ports of Harwich or Southampton and travelled to London by train, arriving at Liverpool Street Station.

The last group of children from Germany departed on September 1, 1939, the day the German army invaded Poland and provoked Great Britain, France, and other countries to declare war. The last known transport of children from the Netherlands left on May 14, 1940, the day the Dutch army surrendered to Germany. Most of the children that were part of the Kindertransport never saw their parents again.

In 1940 the British government brought in laws which meant that all ‘enemy aliens’ should be interred, and unbelievably someone decided that the ‘kinder’ fell into this group so about a thousand 16 to 17 year olds were held in interment camps while nearly five hundred more were sent to Australia and Canada, and over a thousand Kinder teenagers served in the British armed forces, including combat units. Several dozen joined elite formations such as the Special Forces, where their language skills could be put to good use.

There have been two Kindertransport memorials outside Liverpool Street Station in Hope Square. 

The first was of a young girl beside a giant Perspex suitcase representing everything each child was allowed to bring with them, unfortunately some of the exhibits began to deteriorate so the were removed to the Imperial War Museum. 

A new memorial was commissioned and it was unveiled in 2006 the sculptor was Frank Meisler designed a group of children who like himself arrived at Liverpool Street Station as part of the Kindertransport.

The adage quoted in the notice at the base of sculpture is: "Whosoever rescues a single soul is credited as though they had saved the whole world." (Talmud, Baba Batra 

Anglo Saxon East London

Anglo Saxons is just a phrase as to who arrived in Britain after the Romans departed, they were all northern europeans but the Angles came from southern Denmark, the Saxons from Germany and the Jutes, who also arrived came from Jutland.

Although these were the main groups of newcomers there were also others that came along as well, so it's just convenient to use the term Anglo Saxon for this period of history. Although it is from them that we inherited our name, Angles Land over time became England there is very little remaining arctifacts of their early history in east London.

When the Romans left Londinium was deserted and in spite of the city being a well built up, for after the destruction by Boudicca the city was rebuilt but this time in stone rather than wood as it was before, even so the first Anglo Saxons choose not just to move in, instead they built their own city, Lundenwic, which was built to the west of the Roman city walls.

East London seems to have been neglected, possibly because the terrain of wooded areas and marshland were only suitable to small settlements,  though some names are thought to have their origin in Anglo Saxon times, Stepney for instance is thought to have derived from Steben and Hythe meaning a wooden wharf so some activity may have been going on there, then there is Bethnal Green or Blithehale meaning a happy corner, Hackney is thought to have been named after a Dane called Haca or Hacon and ey meaning island. So it looks likely that there were small settlements at these places.

There has been some evidence though that they continued to use the Old Ford crossing and a Roman causeway to cross the marshes, for much of east London

was marshy with little inlets of rivers.

It would appear that the area which is now Lefevre road was a much favoured place to build a settlement since the Bronze/Iron age. The Anglo Saxon's also choose this area to build their settlement. Their homes were very similar to those of earlier times differing only in shape.

At first the Romano/British carried on in the way they had under Roman rule, but as the new invaders spread across the country they began to adopt their ways. As they intermarried the differences between them dissolved, they began speaking the same language and adopting their ways and dress. Finally and naming themselves a corruption of one of the invading tribes they became known as the English.

Queen Alexandra and London Hospital

There are not many members of the royal family associated with the east end of London. The exception however was Princess Alexandra of Denmark who

was to become to consort of King Edward Vll. Alexandra was the Princess Diana of her day for their lives seems to follow the same path in many ways.

Born in Copenhagen on the first of December 1844 to Prince Christian and Princess Louise it was only natural that her future husband would also be of royal blood. Her sister married Tsar Alexander lll of Russia and was to become the mother of the ill fated Tsar Nicholas ll. 

However it was towards England that her parents looked to for a suitable match for her youngest daughter, and it came in the form of Prince Albert Edward, later to become King Edward Vll.

Alexandra wouldn’t have been Victoria’s first choice, for Alexandra being a Dane her dislike of the Germans was well known, and as most of Victoria’s relatives including her beloved late husband Albert were from that country she was a little dubious at having Alexandra for a daughter-in-law. However when the two women met all Victoria’s fears vanished, and as well as meeting with the approval of both the Queen and Prince Edward the British public also took the Danish Princess to their hearts.

The marriage took place at St George’s Chapel, Windsor on the tenth of March

1863, they were seen off on honeymoon by Randolph Churchill and his wife Jenny Jerome who was to become the mother of Winston Churchill and the lover of Prince Edward, it was while still on honeymoon that Edward described the event of meeting Jenny when he wrote home, similar to the phone call to Camilla while Charles was on his honeymoon with Diana.

The royal couple went on to have six children, their youngest Prince Alexander Edward died at one day old, and their eldest Prince Albert Victor, the Duke of Clarence, people will recall is always named in the list of Jack the Ripper suspects, died in 1892 at the age of twenty eight, Alexandra was understandably grief stricken at this loss and kept his rooms exactly has he had left them for the rest of her life.

Unlike other British royals to Alexandra her children were the most important thing in her life, she also treated her servants far better than was the norm for the time, she loved dancing and ice-skating but also even without trying she became a trend setter in fashion, her style was avidly copied by women all over the country, even the when complications with the birth of her third child left her with a limp this too was seen as a fashionable thing to acquire and was also copied.

Another thing that became the fashion of the day was the high pearl chocker and high collars that Alexandra always wore to hide a scar on her neck, it was said she received the scar accidentally but others claimed it was a failed suicide attempt, perhaps she wasn’t as immune to her husbands philandering ways as has been suggested.

Like the present Prince Charles, Edward was heir to a long lived monarch, so he filled his time with all the common pursuits of an Edwardian gentleman, as well as hunting and shooting he indulged in gambling, horseracing and of course then there were his mistresses. A common thing among royals and the aristocracy of his time, wives were expected to turn a blind eye to their husbands wandering eye. Edward had a string of mistresses the main ones being Lillie Langtry; Daisy Greville, the Countess of Warwick; the beautiful but married Jennie Jerome, humanitarian Agnes Keyser, and the Great Grandmother of Camila Parker-Bowles Alice Keppel. 

In 1870 he was accused in divorce court of having an affair with Lady Mordaunt. Queen Victoria was horrified by her son's behaviour and warned that evidence of a pleasure-loving and immoral aristocracy might provoke the working class into adopting radical political ideas.

It was expected of Alexandra to tolerate these women and was even said to enjoy the company of Jenny Jerome who she found amusing, but it was Agnes Keyser that was most accepted by both Alexandra and so welcomed in royal circles, for Agnes was unmarried and conducted her relationship with the prince in private so as not to embarrass his wife, unlike Alice Kepple of whom Alexandra once complained ‘wherever we go she is always there’, it could also be that Agnes and Alexandra had other things in common for during the Boer War Alexandra set up Queen Alexandra's Nursing Corps, and Agnes and her sister Fanny Keyser were to establish the King Edward Vll hospital.

Alexandra was a supporter of many charities and had a natural affinity with the sick and poor, but perhaps her special love was the Royal London Hospital in

Whitechapel where her statue stands, and where she would spend hours visiting the wards, it was here too she persuaded the hospital to send a representative to her home city of Copenhagen to study the results of the Finsen ultra-violet light cure for lupus (tuberculosis of the skin) It proved remarkably successful; they treated 100 patients a day for 25 years and the incidence of the disease was reduced for the first time'. On the first lamp is the engraving "Nothing but Perseverance" in recognition of Alexandra’s gentle bullying to have the treatment introduced into Britain.

In 1904 Alexandra was made president of the hospital. 1908 saw a bronze statue of Alexandra in her full coronation robes erected in the hospital grounds. 

The statue was created by George Edward Wade, the base contains plaques showing the lupus treatment that Alexandra introduced to the hospital.

On the day of the unveiling the statue in he weather was unfavourable but the hospital authorities had arranged for the ceremony to take place in a huge marquee, the sides of which were sufficiently drawn back to enable those patients well enough to view some of the proceedings from their ward balconies. 

The statue was moved in spring 1959 to allow a new ward block to be built. It was returned after it had been cleaned and restored to its original condition. It was placed in the same courtyard facing north on a lower plinth to enable the very fine detail of the sculpture. Over the following years the hospital has been rebuilt in parts, and the statue was once again moved. Today it stands on Stepney Way, just over a hundred yards where it first stood and overlooks the main entrance. 

In 1910, Edward VII was terminally ill and as he lay on his death bed he asked for Alice Kepple. Queen Alexandra reluctantly allowed her to be present whilst he was still conscious. However, when the king lost consciousness, she hissed to the doctor, "Get that woman away." After his death the Kepple’s left Britain and went traveling for two years.

As a mark of the affection in which Alexandra was held two years later it was suggested that there should be a nationwide celebration to mark the 50th

anniversary of her first arrival in Britain, but is equally a measure of the woman that she would have none of this instead suggesting that artificial roses should be sold for charity, so it was that ‘Alexandra Rose Day’ was born, The first event raised £32,000 (the equivalent of well over £2 million in todays money). The funds raised were a great benefit to hospitals, 

By 1920, £775,000 for London hospitals had been raised. Queen Alexandra’s last special Rose Day was 1923, the 60th anniversary of her arrival in England. She died two years later, in 1925. The charity still exists today continuing to do good work.Today the event raises money for charities that do not normally get national attention for fundraising. The Prime Minister traditionally launches the day by being the first to buy a rose.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEQLJgiIBGQ

On November 26th her coffin was removed from Sandringham where she died to Wolferton station; from there to King’s Cross station and then to St. James’s Palace, and finally to the Chapel Royal where it was guarded throughout

the night. On the following day, with all the honour of military pageantry, the coffin was borne to Westminster Abbey for the funeral service and public lying-in-state. On November 28th there was a Memorial Service in St. Paul’s, after which the coffin was taken to Windsor for the final burial.

There is a memorial statue which was unveiled seven years after her death. It is built into the wall Marlborough House and is opposite St James Palace. 

 

Roman East London

When the Romans finally settled in Britain for in was on the third attempt in 43AD under the emperor Claudius that they finally came to stay. They landed in Kent and made their way northwards.

Soon they reach a place called Londinium, this wasn't named by the invading Romans for it is thought to derive from the Celtic word 'lond' meaning wild. When they reach what probably the heart of what is now the modern london the historian Guy de la Bedoyere wrote ''they found nothing like a town, no settlement of tribal people.

They found a river valley that was tidal, swampy, marshy inlets around the river banks, a lot of forest and, in the distance, smoke rising from scattered native homesteads.'' it's possible that the settlements they were seeing were those of the bronze/iron settlements in the east.

With its wide tidal river  the Romans recognised Londinium as a perfect place for trading throughout their empire according to Tatitus who wrote ''Londinium was much frequented by a number of merchants and trading vessels'. 

To extend their ambition of a trading post the Romans built a bridge

across the Thames together with a large pier. The remains of which were discovered by archaeologists in the early 1980's. To their surprise it had stood just a short distance from where the present London bridge now stands.

The bridge was thought to have been built in the first century, but according to a recent discovery it may have been earlier.

In 60AD Boudicca first burnt down Colchester and St Albans then travelled on to London to do the same, in any of the remains of buildings that stood at the time the mark of the inferno can still be seen.

It seems however that Boudicca didn't just stop at  what is now the city

of London for a recent archaeology dig in Southwark has discovered the same mark of burning on the Roman remains there.

If there this was caused by Boudicca's followers it's more than possible that they use the already existing Roman bridge to cross the Thames which would mean it wasn't built in the 1st century as stated. It is also possible that the bridge discovered in the 1980's was the second bridge built after the first was destroyed by Boudicca.

After the destruction and slaughter was over Londinium was rebuilt bigger and better than before. For added security a wall encircling the city was built in 200BC. 

There were there were several gates in the wall leading to various parts of the country and it's thought the gate at Aldgate was built before the wall finished, and it was this gate that lead to the east end. The gate remained until it was demolished in 1761.

Romans built their cemeteries outside their cities so that is why archaeology in east London comprises mainly of graves and grave goods. It's also claimed that when Boudicca and her followers rode into London the came through east London and desecrated the graves they found there. As London grew over the centuries it spread out in all directions either demolishing or building over what had gone before.

During World War Two east London was badly hit and afterwards the need for rebuilding became a priority giving little thought to what lay beneath, however one site remained untouched.

Since the end of the war Prescot Street in Aldgate was left relatively alone mostly used for a car park. When the land was bought recently by Grange Hotels they gave permission for it to be excavated before being built on and among the many graves something beautiful and unique was found.  

At first it started like any of the other excavations but it soon became obvious that this was the grave of a person of importance, someone whose life, or at least in part, had been spent a few yards away on the other side of the wall in Londinium.

As the archaeologists began to uncover the contents of the grave they found what they were expecting, the cremation urn, an assortment of pottery and glass phials that once long ago had contained perfume, all pointed to their first decsion that this was the grave of a wealthy person and then they found something which confirmed it.

Buried at the bottom of the grave was a glass dish, something so unusual to find in Britain that it was treated with the utmost care to, but in spite of lifting it with the utmost care the realised it was only being held together by the earth that surrounded it.

Piecing it together was to be a long and patient process to be done by one of the most experienced conservators, Liz Goodman, at the Museum of London.The dish was made using the millefiori (a thousand flowers} method and the dish lived up to its name, tiny pieces of blue and white glass had been fused together to create magnificent work of craftmanship.

Not only was this find beautiful it was also very rare only one more such dish had been found and that was in Egypt, this was the only one of its kind found in the western empire.

Although this particular find caused quite a flurry in the press it was only one of hundreds graves dug there in the Roman period, then the cemetery would have covered a much larger site. The archaeologists only had access to a small part for over time the rest of what would have been the cemetery was built upon and  in almost continued occupation from the 17th century.

This wasn't the only unexpected find in a cemetery for in Spitalfields there was anothersurprising find. When excavating Spitalfields market the site offered up over 200 grave sites, and one very special one. To find an undamaged limestone from the fourth was rare enough but to find an equally undamaged and ornate lead coffin inside was unbelievable.

The lead coffin was decorated with scallop shells. In pagan beliefs of the time the scallop was often used in funerals as it was meant to depicted the departeds journey to the 'Isles of the Blessed'.   

Later the same symbol was adopted by Christian pilgrims to the Holy Land and is the symbol of StJames patron saint of Spain. St James was beheaded in the Holy Land in 44AD and afterwards his body. Later in Spain a wedding was taking place on the beach when a mysterious ship appeared a short way out in the sea.

This spooked a horse which was standing among the wedding party so much so that it ran into the sea only to appear a few minutes later covered in scallop shells and carrying the body of St James. Ever since the scallop shell has been the symbol of the saint.

I mention this because when the lead coffin was open it was found to contain the skeleton of a fourth century young woman, between twenty and twenty five with her left arm crossed over her chest in the Christian manner and whose DNA proved she came from Spain, possibly the Basque region. 

So was she someone whose family were edging their bets for thei daughter by giving her a Christian burial inside a coffin with pagan symbols, or were the scallop shells in keeping with her faith and in tribute to the patron saint of her homeland. Of course it's impossible to say one was or the other but as well as being a rare find it is also an interesting one. 

Whatever the faith of the young woman it was obvious, by the grave goods, that she came froma wealthy family. Her head was resting on a pillow of Bay leaves and the was an assortment of jewellery made of Jet, including hair ornaments, a small bos made of lignite and a glass phal that had contained perfume.

There were also scraps of material that had survived, she had been dressed in the finest silk with gold thread at the waist and wrists. Some woollen material had also survived but this wasn't thought to be the remains of a garment but possible a woollen blanket that had covered her or had been a cushion that had once held the Bay leaves.

As the skeleton was in such good condition it was possible to make a good likeness of how the young woman had looked like in life and it is seen here. It may seem like the area that is now east London was simply one great cemetery in Roman times and maybe that is right but there were other places that served a different purpose. 

Like all areas east London has it's markets and one that runs from Bethnal Green to Bow is called Roman road although in earlier times it was called Green Street. Whether this Roman roadway is yet to be verified although a few shards of Roman pottery have been found on the south side of the road, 

In 2005 a housing development was planned for the area in which evidence was discovered of a hypercourse and shards of high quality marble giving evidence of a high status Roman building.

Nearby is ancient trackway mention previously at Old Ford. It was here that the Romans improved to make it able to run from the Centre of

Londinium to Colchester the Essex town that was most prized by the Romans. The road was used food transpoting goods between the two cities. It could also have been used by Boudicca when she and her followers came to Londinium after she had put Colchester to the torch.

2013

During the excavation by Crossrail which is digging a new tunnel deep

beneath London workmen discovered twenty Roman skulls. The skulls were found beneath Liverpool Street Station.

Close by the site is the river Walbrook, one of Londons rivers that went underground centuries ago. It's thought the river may have washed the skulls downstream from a nearby Roman cemetery.

Another suggestion is that there were the remains of Boudicca's attack on the city. This was the conclusion of earier historians when they found Roman skulls in the

same area.

The Museum of London will examine the skulls over the coming few months and the findings.  

When finished Crossrail will run for seventy three miles across London that will link the city to Canary Wharf the West End and Heathrow to commuter areas of east and west London, so could be many more archeaological sites will probably be found.   

Roman rule of Britain lasted for 367 years when the legions were needed to prevent what they called 'barbarians' from invading their european empire, by 410AD all Roman troops had left Britain but the marks of its presence still exist today.

Mary Tudor and the Stratford Martyrs

Mary Tudor was the eldest child of King Henry Vlll and Katherine of Aragon, but as we all know Henry had this marriage annulled to marry Anne Bolyen, but when Anne produced only a daughter, Elizabeth, and a not male her fate was sealed by the executioners block.

By that time Henry had another wife in waiting and this time Jane Seymour produced his long awaited son, christened Edward, but she was to lose her life in doing so.

At the marriage of Henry to Jane both Mary and Elizabeth were declared illegitimate by parliament. Time passed and Henry’s reign came to an end which brought his nine year old son Edward to the throne, sadly Edward wasn’t to live to adulthood and he died in 1553 at the age of fifteen.

Now Mary saw her chance to take her rightful place on the English throne and validate her birth and her mothers marriage, but John Dudley the chief councilor to the late King Edward, and second only to the King in his power, had other ideas, he knew that should Mary, or even Elizabeth take the throne he would not only lose his special position, but would be lucky to keep his head.

Some years earlier Henry Vlll’s sister had sent her daughter Jane to court and

Dudley had become her guardian, it was in Jane that he sought to retain his power, he convinced her parents that the marriage of Jane to his son would be benifical to all, they agreed and a marriage was hastily arranged for May 25th 1553. 

Somehow Dudley convinced the Council that Mary was not fit for three reasons; her mother's divorce from Henry VIII, her Catholicism and her sex, and Jane was declared Queen even though she protested saying "The crown is not my right and pleaseth me not. The Lady Mary is the rightful heir." But it was no good others thought they had more at stake, but how wrong they were for because of their lust for power young Lady Jane Grey was only Queen for nine days before Mary was announced as rightful Queen and poor Lady Jane Grey took the short walk from the tower to the execution block.

From the start of her reign Mary intended to bring England back to Catholicism, even having secret negotiations with the Pope, but at the same time she tried to compromise with the Protestant population, it was only after news of her proposed marriage to Phillip of Spain and the failed raising of a force against her by the Protestant Sir Thomas Wyatt that the burnings began.

By Christmas Parliament had passed 'An Act for the Renewing of The Three Statues made for the Punishment of Heresies', which reinstated the Act for the Burning of Heretics of 1401. Protestants up and down the country from villages and towns, labourers and craftsmen, intellectuals and men of religion were all sent to the stake. Nicholas Ridley, Bishop of London, Hugh Latimer, Bishop of Worcester, John Philpot, Archdeacon of Westminster, John Hooper, Bishop of Gloucester and John Rogers, a married priest, were all burnt at the stake by Mary's order. The former Protestant Archbishop Cranmer was burned in November of 1555 dramatically thrusting his right hand into the fire as a symbol of his dismissing the recantation he had written Queen Mary.

Of course all the burnings were scenes of inhumanity and horror such as one that happened on 27th of June 1557 in that part of east London which is now known as Stratford. On that summers day

eleven men and two women went to the stake.
They were Henry Wye a brewer, W Hallywell a smith, R Jackson a servant, L Perman a smith, J Derifall a labourer, Edmund Hurst a labourer, T Bowyer a weaver, G Seales a tailor, Lyon Cawch a merchant, H Addington a sawyer,  J Routh a labourer, Elizabeth Pepper wife of T Pepper a weaver, and Agnes George wife of R George.

They had been brought from Newgate prison where they had been held, there had originally been fifteen in their number but three had recanted so they didn't face the flames. 

The men were tied together like so much firewood tossed on the blaze to keep the fire burning, the two women, one of whom was pregnant was allowed to walk into the flames, it‘s said that all died bravely for their faith.

This tragic event happened on a large green space which extended from where St John’s now the Stratford martyrs memorial stands to Water Lane and the site of the university of East London which was once called Gallow’s Green.

Only a small part still exists and that is the churchyard of St John’s church where in 1879 a memorial was unveiled in their memory.

Mary Tudor died the following May, and Protestant Elizabeth came to the throne. It was during Elizabeth's reign that her half sister became known as 'Bloody Mary'.