Recent work

Exhibition Coming Soon – November 6th 2008

It Happened Here, East London's Landscape of Struggle

The streets we live in and walk through are steeped in history, yet much of the time we remain unaware of the dramatic and intense moments that took place in the past and deeply affected people at the time. When we visit foreign cities we might often follow a guidebook to places of significance but we are unlikely to take such a tourist approach to the streets we inhabit daily.

East London is an area rich in history of drama and conflict. History reveals itself slowly, so that after walking the same streets for a number of years we might notice a blue plaque and wonder what its presence signifies, eventually reading it and finding out. Certain structures stand out in the landscape but the moments of history that these places are connected to often remain hidden. In the not so distant past these places were witness to the struggles of Suffragettes, low paid dock workers, teenage “match girls”, radical councillors and communities opposing fascism.

These are not places that are stained by a history so traumatic that they have to be removed from normal life and can only function as a museum or a memorial. They are places lived, worked and played in. But there is a relationship between place, memory and history. A certain place may change significance for us when we know its history. Perhaps it maintains an aura of what has happened there or perhaps we only imagine that.

They are landscapes where perhaps we can picture the events taking place in, people taking a stand, attempting to make a difference and fighting for what they believe in. And if we can picture them and we remember them then they succeeded.

Cable Street, Shadwell, 4th October 1936

In October 1936, Oswald Mosley's fascist Blackshirts attempted to march through a mainly Jewish area of East London.

Between 300-500,000 anti-fascist residents gathered to block the fascists. Originally the Blackshirts intended to march through Commercial Road, but found an overturned tram blocked the way. They attempted to outflank the protesters and march through Cable Street.

Over 6,000 police on foot along with all of London's mounted police force repeatedly attempted to clear a way for the fascists to march through. Residents barricaded the streets with whatever was available, paving stones were torn up and mattresses thrown out of windows. People threw marbles on the road to stop police horses.

After the Battle of Cable Street, parliament passed the Public Order Act, banning political uniforms such as those worn by the Blackshirts being worn on political marches. The Battle was an important moment in stopping the rise of fascism in Britain in the 1930s.

Commercial Road, Aldgate, August-September 1889

The late 19th century Port of London was a hub of commerce, and one of the wealthiest ports in the world. Around 150,000 workers and their families depended on the port for a living but work was casual so that every day men would go to the docks and compete to get a work ticket. Wages were low and the work was dangerous and physically taxing. Injury and disability was common.

Trade unions had begun to organise dock workers and on 14 August 1889 the dockers of The West India Dock Company began a strike to improve working conditions and pay. The strike was soon joined by workers on the Victoria and Albert, London, St Katherine’s, Millwall and Tilbury Docks. By 22 August the entire Port of London was at a standstill.

The dockers rallied support among the public for their cause by daily marches through the city. Commercial Road was the main route for taking goods from the docks to the city of London and was a convenient route for these marches.

The processions had a huge impact. They included model ships being hauled through the street and loud brass bands. Flags, banners and effigies of bosses were carried. Uniforms identifying the different trades of the men and carnival-like costumes of Father Neptune and Brittania were worn. A young civil servant described it as a sight “the citizens of London will not forget soon”. The processions even encouraged other workers to take strike action and join in.

The employers finally offered a deal that was acceptable to the dockers, ending the strike on 14 September. A mass victory march took place through the East End, rallying in Hyde Park.

Gladstone Statue, Bow, August 1882

In 1882 a statue to the prime minister, William Gladstone was unveiled at Bow Road. The statue was raised by Theodore Bryant, an industrialist and prominent Liberal. Bryant was Director of the Bryant and May Factory at nearby Fairfield Road whose employees went on strike for three weeks during the “Match Girl” strike of 1888.

Although many of the East End’s Irish population were fond of Gladstone because of his Irish policies and attended the unveiling in support, employees of Bryant and May were angered at the statue’s unveiling.

They claimed that the statue had been paid for by deductions from their wages. The women workers, some as young as 13 were low paid and worked long hours. Some of the workers, “went to the unveiling with stones and bricks in their pockets… later on they surrounded the statue – ‘we paid for it’, they cried savagely – shouting and yelling, and a gruesome story is told that some cut their arms and let their blood trickle on the marble, paid for, in truth, by their blood.”

This account was told to Annie Besant at the time of the Match Girl strike six years later. The women who took part in the protest in 1882 were possibly older sisters, mothers or friends of the young women who went on strike later. The story formed part of their collective memory.

At an unknown date since the hands of the Gladstone statue have been painted red.

Newby Place, Poplar, September 1921

Severe poverty affected the people of Poplar in the 1920s. The first Labour mayor of the borough George Lansbury, along with 39 newly elected Labour councillors, sought to relieve poverty by campaigning for the equalisation of the rates. Rates were set by central government and Poplar was paying more than double the amount being paid by richer boroughs like Westminster.

The decision was made by the councillors to “break a bad law”. From March 1921 they refused to collect and pay the rates so that money could be concentrated on poor relief. The London County Council took the councillors to court over the “rates strike” and eventually they were arrested.

Between 1 and 8 September 30 councillors were jailed. Some were arrested at home, but the five women councillors – Julia Scurr, Nellie Cressall, Minnie Lansbury, Jenny Mackay and Susan Lawrence – gathered together outside Poplar Town Hall on Newby Place. A large crowd of supporters tried to prevent their arrest. But Susan Lawrence spoke to the crowd saying, “We are here representing a principle which we have the right to defend as well as the men. If you prevent us from going, you do us the worst turn you can.” The women were given flowers and then driven slowly down the East India Dock Road surrounded by 10,000 supporters before being taken to Holloway Prison.

Conditions in prison were bad, food was terrible and the prisoners were subject to humiliation from the warders. Many of the councillors became ill. After six weeks in prison all the councillors were released without having to make any guarantees to collect the high rates the authorities were demanding. They had won. However, Minnie Lansbury never recovered her health after her time in prison and died six weeks later.

Poplar Town Hall was later demolished and housing stands on the site now.

Crown Gates, Victoria Park, 24 May 1914

In 1884 a new Reform Bill meant that 60 percent of adult males were able to vote in British elections. But it was not until 1918, after many years of militant action by campaigners, that women won the vote. The Suffragettes had to fight hard for this right.

Sylvia Pankhurst built support for the campaign among the working women of East London. She campaigned for women’s rights at work as well as the vote. From 1912 the group in East London held street meetings in Bow and organised marches through the area and to Trafalgar Square and Parliament.

To clamp down on this militancy police arrested Suffragettes. Harsh prison sentences were imposed. The women went on hunger strikes increasing their public support, so the government began to release the Suffragettes but they were threatened with arrest if they attended demonstrations. Sylvia Pankhurst and other women were frequently arrested as they refused to stop organising, attending and speaking out at demonstrations. Protests often ended in violent confrontations and injury as the police broke them up. Many women had their bones broken.

On one such occasion on 24 May 1914, the Suffragettes attempted to hold a rally in Victoria Park. Around 20 women attempted to protect Sylvia Pankhurst by chaining themselves to her and each other. At the entrance to the park the women were surrounded by police who pushed them into the boating enclosure. They then smashed the padlocks and chains. Pankhurst described, “Any woman who attempted to hinder the work had her face pinched, her hair pulled, arms twisted and thumbs bent back.”

Bow Quarter, Fairfield Road, Bow, June 1888

In the summer of 1888, Bryant and May’s match factory in the East End of London announced large profits. Shortly afterwards a reporter visited the factory to investigate working conditions. Annie Besant waited at the factory gates to talk to the employees, who were mostly teenage women.

Besant reported in her article ‘White Slavery in London’ that the women worked an 11 1/2 hour day in winter and a 13 1/2 day in summer, standing all day. For this they would be paid 4/- a week. Their pay was subject to fines for petty rule breaking. Many of the “Match Girls” were debilitated and disfigured from “phossy jaw” an illness caused by having to eat at their workbenches. Their hands and food were in contact with phosphorous. “They eat disease as seasoning to their bread”,
wrote Besant.

After talking to Besant, three women were sacked and called liars by Frederick Bryant, the managing director. 200 angry women marched from the factory gates to Annie Besant’s Fleet Street office. From there they organised a strike that would involve 1,000 workers. They took their case to parliament and met with MPs. They struck for three weeks without pay, surviving due to donations from supporters. Eventually they won union recognition, the first group of unskilled women workers in Britain to do so.

The former factory has now been converted into residential apartments known as “Bow Quarter”.

Altab Ali Park, Whitechapel, 4 May 1978

St Mary’s Matfelon Church stood on this site, but was badly damaged during the Second World War and was demolished shortly afterwards. The park continued to be known as St Mary’s Church yard but has now been renamed and acts as a memorial to Altab Ali.

Altab Ali was a young Bengali textile worker from Cannon Street Road who was stabbed to death by racists in nearby Adler Street on 4 May 1978. During the 1970s the area had become dominated by the fascist National Front organisation.

The murder sparked outrage in the community and a strong campaign against racism in the area. The renaming of the park was an important symbolic act against racism and the park also serves as a memorial to all victims of racist violence.

The name and character of the park is part of the establishment of the Bengali community of this area of East London, also containing a memorial to the Bengali Martyrs. Lettering on the paving spells out the words of Rabindranath Tagore, a Bengali poet and Nobel Peace Prize winner:

“The shade of my tree is offered to those who come and go fleetingly.
Its fruit matures for somebody whose coming I wait for constantly.”

Bibliography

Charlton, John, ‘It just went like tinder’: The mass movement & New Unionism in Britain 1889, London, Redwords, 1999.

Foot, Paul, The Vote: How it was won and how it was undermined, London, Viking, 2005.

Lavalette, Michael, George Lansbury and the Rebel Councillors of Poplar, London, Bookmarks Publications, 2006.

Palmer, Alan, The East End: four centuries of London Life, London, Murray, 1989.

Piratin, Phil, Our flag stays red, London, Lawrence and Wishart Ltd, 1948.

Taylor, Rosemary, Walks through history: Exploring the East End, Derby, Breedon Books, 2001.

Text and images ©Angela Stapleford.

This project was shown in the form of a book and wall prints at The University of Westminster BA Photographic Arts Degree Show, Truman Brewery, Brick Lane, London in June 2007.

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