Preston's Road Area
The area discussed here comprises mainly the strip of
ground between Blackwall Way and Preston's Road,
which was bounded on the north by Ditchburn Street
and on the south by Yabsley Street (fig. 233). Much of
this area was laid out for house building early in the
nineteenth century, but nothing survives from that phase
of development, apart from the street pattern. A few
houses disappeared as early as 1839–40 to make way for
the London and Blackwall Railway, which effectively cut
the area in two, while others succumbed to redevelopments initiated by the North London and Midland
Railway Companies in the late 1860s and early 1880s.
But the largest batch of demolitions took place in the
1890s, in the wake of the decision to site part of the
route of the first Blackwall Tunnel under the area (see
fig. 243). The redevelopments which followed these
demolitions have themselves been mostly swept away,
and today the area presents a rather forlorn appearance
which recent landscaping and tree planting have yet to
mitigate.
The early pattern of development reflected the fact
that the ground was divided into two independent land
holdings, one having a road frontage to Brunswick Street
(as Blackwall Way was called until 1937), and the other
a frontage to Preston's Road. The eastern and larger of
the two properties, which had long been the site of a
ropeground, was the first to be developed, being laid out
for building in 1809. On the smaller, western, holding
development did not begin until 1830. Here the land
belonged to the West India Dock Company, whose rerouting of Preston's Road in 1827–9 had left this long
narrow strip of ground sandwiched between the new
roadway and the boundary with the former ropeground
to the east.
Blackwall Way and Gaslee Street
Area: The Former Ropeground
For nearly 200 years the land on the west side of Blackwall
Way was occupied by a large ropeground established in
the early seventeenth century following the opening of
the East India Company's new shipbuilding establishment
at Blackwall Yard, on the opposite side of the road. The
site, which covered an area of more than five acres, was
a long rectangular one, over 1,200ft in length, from north
to south, and with an average width of about 200ft.
Ropemaking continued here until the first decade of the
nineteenth century, when the then owner, the shipbuilder
John Wells, released the ground for speculative building.
In July 1809 a consortium of local builders entered into
an agreement with Wells to cover most of the area with
'good and substantially built brick dwelling houses'. (fn. p) The
builders involved were William Barker, Robert Watson,
Thomas Morris and William Constable, all of Limehouse,
and John Howkins of Poplar. Their agreement with Wells
included a plan showing the proposed layout of new
streets and sites for at least 180 houses, of which 20 had
to be completed by January 1810 and a further 80 by
July 1811. The house sites were grouped in short terraces
ranged along the west side of Brunswick Street, and
along the north and south sides of ten new roads opening
off Brunswick Street. Although the new roads extended
no further westwards than the ditch or common sewer
which formed the boundary with the West India Dock
Company's property, they were not culs-de-sac, being
linked together in pairs by short stretches of roadway
adjacent to the boundary ditch. (ref. 226)
Figure 233:
Preston's Road area. Plan based on the Ordnance Survey of 1867–70
In the event this rather complicated fret-like pattern
of streets was soon superseded by an altogether simpler
arrangement. A feature which had been present in the
original scheme in the form of a narrow alley behind the
terraces in Brunswick Street, was widened and shifted
westwards to become a long north-south spine road,
parallel to Brunswick Street, and the ten cross streets
were reduced to just four, all of them culs-de-sac, terminating at the dock company's boundary ditch. In the
course of development even this layout was slightly
modified. The long north-south street was originally
called Regent Street, and the four short cross streets
Bedford, Leicester, Essex and Norfolk Streets. After
being severed by the building of the London and Blackwall Railway in 1839–40, the northern end of Regent
Street was known as Regent Street North. Except for
Essex Street (which does not in any case survive), all
these streets were later renamed, their new names being
Gaselee (formerly Regent) Street, Ditchburn (formerly
Bedford) Street, Duthie (formerly Leicester) Street, St
Lawrence (formerly Norfolk) Street, and Lumsden Street
(formerly Regent Street North). At the southern end,
Yabsley (formerly Russell) Street was not laid out as part
of this development, but was cut through in the early
1840s.
Building work began in 1809–10 and by 1817 over 100
houses had been erected on the former ropeground, most
of them in Regent Street — in the central section between
Norfolk and Leicester Streets - and at the northern end
of Brunswick Street, north of Leicester Street. Two of
the builders in the consortium, Thomas Morris and
William Constable, themselves occupied new houses in
Regent Street. Not all the new buildings were houses.
Constable's premises in Regent Street included
carpenter's shops and a counting-house, while in Bedford
Street, where ten houses had been built, five on each
side, some ground on the north side was used to erect a
cooperage which was let to William Emery. At this point,
with about half the area still awaiting development, the
members of the consortium got into financial difficulties
and the work was interrupted. According to Howkins's
clerk the partners had been in 'embarrassed Circumstances' since the beginning of 1817. Harassed by
creditors, like the bricklayer who turned up at the counting-house in Regent Street declaring that 'he wanted
money very bad and money he must have', the three
surviving partners. Howkins, Morris and Constable, (fn. q)
went into hiding in February 1818, and before the end
of the month they were formally declared bankrupt.
Among their many creditors - some of whom, it may be
surmised, must have participated in the development —
were a surveyor in Everett Street, Russell Square (Samuel
Ainger), brickmakers from Bonner Hall, Middlesex, and
Iver in Buckinghamshire, and various local building
tradesmen and suppliers. (ref. 228)
When building work resumed in the 1820s, Howkins
was no longer involved, and the development was carried
on mainly by William Constable and Thomas Morris,
working independently, having apparently divided up the
remaining parcels of ground between themselves. In
January 1823 the sites, mostly in Regent Street, for
which Constable was responsible were included in a
new agreement between the builder and the ground
landlords. (ref. 229) Some of Morris's sites were leased to his
son John, also a builder, who was presumably helping
his father. (ref. 230) The development was largely completed by
the 1830s, though not every plot had been covered with
buildings. At the north end of Regent Street some land
on the west side was let to the adjoining infants' school
in Bedford Terrace for a playground, while another plot
opposite the main entrance to Blackwall Yard, with
frontages to both Brunswick Street and Regent Street,
appears from the Ordnance Survey of 1868–70, to have
been laid out as a walled garden. This site, immediately
to the north of the present Brunswick Arms public house,
finally succumbed to development pressure in 1873–4,
when William Harris, a builder from Limehouse, erected
fifteen two-storey houses there, eight in Regent Street
(latterly Nos 32–46, even, Gaselee Street) and seven in
Brunswick Street (latterly Nos 1–7 Landseer Terrace,
Blackwall Way). (ref. 231)
At the south end the short cul-de-sac of Warrington
Place, opening northwards off Russell (later Yabsley)
Street, was not formed until 1857, and the name not
approved until 1861, although the foundations for the
five houses on the east side had been laid down early in
1844. These houses were completed in the late 1850s by
Morris & Son, who also built another six houses on the
west side. (ref. 232)
Little is known about either the appearance or planning
of the houses built on the ropeground site. They were
all originally terraced houses, and the great majority
lacked front gardens, abutting directly on to the streets.
A house in Brunswick Street, sold at auction in 1821,
was probably fairly typical in having only two storeys
and a basement. In this particular case the ground floor
was occupied by a shop and a parlour, the basement by
a kitchen and a cellar, and the first floor by three
bedchambers. (ref. 233) Some houses with back extensions built
on the west side of Regent Street in the 1820s had spiral
staircases, fitted into small semicircular compartments
opening off the entrance passage. (ref. 234) The reason for adopting this inconvenient arrangement seems to have been to
save space in what were quite small houses, with frontages
of under 15ft. (fn. r)
In 1821 the auctioneers had described Brunswick Street
as 'a very Eligible Spot for Business', and by 1850 ten
houses on the west side between Bedford Street and
Russell Street were occupied as shops or commercial
premises. By the early 1880s this number had risen to
fifteen, which included three coffee rooms, and four beer
shops — the Vulcan (at No. 20), the Eastern Star (at No.
40), the Brunswick Arms (at No. 78) and the White
Swan (at No. 130). (ref. 235) The White Swan and the Brunswick
Arms eventually became fully fledged public houses. The
latter is still in business, but its premises were completely
rebuilt on an enlarged site in the late 1930s: W. Stewart,
FRIBA, designed the new building. (ref. 236)
Former Hydraulic Pumping Station, Duthie
Street and Blackwall Way
In the early 1880s the area between the London and
Blackwall Railway and Duthie Street was redeveloped by
the Midland Railway Company, which built branch lines
and a hydraulic pumping station there, serving the company's new collier dock and coal-handling depot at Blackwall Yard. Erected in 1881–2, the pumping station is the
only substantial relic of this entire enterprise, although
the stretch of brick wall along the east side of Blackwall
Way is another survival. (ref. 237) Like all the other new buildings
and structures at the coal depot it was designed by John
Underwood, the Midland Railway's engineer, who also
supervised its construction. (ref. 238) The builders were Messrs
Merritt & Ashby of London Wall, the principal contractors for the new works, whose tender price was
£5,022. (ref. 239)
The pumping station is a single-storey structure with,
at the east end, an integral oblong accumulator tower,
45ft high: the west end is gabled (Plate 108a, 108b; fig.
234). It is built of reddish-brown stock brick with some
Staffordshire blue brick dressings. The brick corbelling
and the distinctive iron tracery in the upper windows of
the accumulator tower are both typical features of the
Midland Railway's 'house style' at this period. The
interior is divided into two equal-sized compartments.
The western compartment is the former boiler-room,
and the white-tiled eastern compartment the former
machinery-room. Underground flues connected the boiler
to a free-standing chimney, now demolished, which stood
to the west of the building. The hydraulic machinery for
the station, which included two accumulators of 1½ft
diameter by 20ft stroke, was supplied by the experienced
firm of Sir W. G. Armstrong & Company. Though not
the cheapest, Armstrong's tender, at £15,327, was still
well under the engineer's estimate of £20,630. (ref. 240)
Figure 234:
Former Midland Railway Hydraulic Pumping Station, north corner of Duthie Street and Blackwall Way, south and west elevations and plan in 1986. John Underwood, engineer, 1881–2
As part of the same development, the Midland Railway
Company also bought some ground on the south side of
Duthie Street on which it erected a two-storey goods
office facing Blackwall Way (see fig. 243). Designed by
Underwood, it was built in 1882 by Oliver Fawkes of
Somers Town at a cost of £2,362, including the fittings.
This brick building, with concrete floors, survived into
the 1960s. (ref. 241)
Preston's Road, West Side
The three developments described here were all connected in some way with the West India Docks: an anchor
and chain-cable testing station, accommodation for dock
employees, and a dockmaster's house.
Lloyd's Register Proving House and Chain-Testing Shed
From 1862 to 1875 there was an anchor and chain-cable
proving house on the west side of Preston's (late New)
Road, north of the South West India Dock (see fig. 226a).
A Select Committee of the House of Commons enquired
into the manufacture of anchors and cables in 1860,
following complaints about the quality of equipment
supplied for merchant shipping. It found that the proving
(that is, testing) of anchors and cables was unreliable,
and was generally carried out on machines controlled by
the manufacturers, and recommended that this should be
done by an independent authority. The Committee of
Lloyd's Register of British and Foreign Shipping had,
since 1846, insisted on the testing of chain cables, so it
was the appropriate body to undertake the public proving
of chain cables and anchors. (ref. 242) Lloyd's Register anticipated that Parliament would institute the testing of all
anchors and chain cables on public machines and, in
January 1862, decided to erect and manage a public
testing machine in London. Thomas M. Gladstone,
engineer, was employed to oversee this. (ref. 243)
A site at the West India Docks was leased from the
East and West India Dock Company. It was a 55ft-wide
strip of ground along the west side of Preston's Road
between the South Dock east entrance and Longley Place.
George James Watts built a two-storey five-bay proving
house and office at the south end of the site and, to its
north, a 600ft-long testing shed, of timber and galvanized
corrugated-iron sheeting, over a trough in which chain
cable could be stretched. The chain-testing machinery
was supplied by Thomas Dunn & Company of Manchester. It comprised an 11ft-long cylinder within which
hydraulic pressure moved a piston to tighten 450ft lengths
of chain. The proving house opened in November 1862
with Gladstone as Superintendent. Another testing
machine was acquired from William Mitcheson in 1863,
for which additional shedding was erected. Water access
was initially by a jetty in the Blackwall Basin, but in
1864 the dock company granted a wharf on the north
bank of the South Dock. Rails were laid to a jetty
equipped with a 5-ton travelling-crane, known as the
'Dromedary' and thus perhaps a Fairbairn 'swan-neck'
crane. (ref. 244)
After proving houses were made subject to Board of
Trade licensing in 1864, (ref. 245) inspectors found the South
Dock machinery to be inaccurate. To meet the criticisms,
in 1865 the chain-testing machine was altered and its
testing length reduced to 90ft. (ref. 246) The whole shed was no
longer needed and the northern half of the site reverted
to the dock company in 1869.
The licensing system permitted ironmasters to set up
proving houses at the points of anchor and chain cable
manufacture, in Staffordshire, Glamorgan, and on the
Tyne. Wear and Clyde. The West India Docks establishment, remote from these areas, came to be little used.
It became a drain on the finances of Lloyd's Register,
particularly after the financial crash of 1866, which
reduced shipbuilding in London, and the simultaneous
closing of the South Dock for rebuilding. Closure of the
proving house was discussed from 1869. (ref. 247) and by 1872
Lloyd's Register had made it clear to the Board of Trade
that it intended to close it, without arranging for testing
elsewhere in London. Trinity House was persuaded to
take on the testing, agreeing to manage the proving house
until new premises could be built at Blackwall (see page
681). but the establishment was closed in 1875. even
before the Blackwall building was ready. The dock
company dismantled the shed and used the former
proving house, which had been cement rendered in 1870–1,
to accommodate its Deputy Superintendent of Police. (ref. 248)
From 1887 the house was occupied by the London and
Tilbury Lighterage Company Limited, reverting to being
a police house before its demolition was begun c1930. (ref. 249)
Longley Place
A group of five cottages, identical to those surviving in
Garford Street (see page 402), stood on the west side of
Preston's Road, just south of the West India Docks
Blackwall entrance lock (see fig. 226a). Known as Longley
Place, they were built in 1821 for West India Dock
Company policemen, to plans by John Rennie. The
builders were Thomas Johnson & Son and James Broomfield & Company. (ref. 250) The larger central superintendingconstable's cottage was divided in 1856 to form two
dwellings. In 1890 the central and southern pairs of
cottages were let to the London Graving Dock Company.
The southern pair was demolished and the central pair
was reunited to form an office. The northern pair was
subsequently let to the London Graving Dock Company
and was demolished in 1942. (ref. 251)
Bridge House
Bridge House was built in 1819–20 for the West India
Dock Company's Principal Dockmaster, or Superintendent. John Rennie advised the dock company to
build a new house in preference to enlarging an old one,
preparing plans with an estimate of £3.712. A strategic
site on the north side of the bridge over the Blackwall entrance was chosen to give the Superintendent
uninterrupted views of the river and the docks (see figs
91, 92 on pages 256, 258). Thomas Johnson & Son were
the builders. (ref. 252)
To make the most of the vantage points afforded by
the site, Rennie designed Bridge House with its principal
rooms on a raised ground floor with large full-height
bows facing the docks and the river (Plate 106b, 106c; fig.
235). In these arrangements, and in its form as a threestorey box symmetrically arranged under a pyramidal
roof, Bridge House follows eighteenth-century Thamesside villas in type. However, the stuccoed
distyle-in-antis Greek Doric porch is unmistakably early
nineteenth-century. The north-east corner of the house
accommodated a large cantilevered open-well staircase.
Much original internal and window joinery survives,
including fret-patterned window shutters. Heavily
moulded reeded architraves on the ground floor may date
to 1838, and the more ornate cornice mouldings are
1987 replacements of Victorian work. The basement was
entirely devoted to services. (ref. 253)
As a part of the re-routing of Preston's Road to the
east of Bridge House in 1827–9, 8ft-high boundary walls
and piers were built on the east side of the garden, and
westwards from the west pier of the entrance gate to link
up with the Blackwall Basin boundary wall. (ref. 254) In 1878 a
new Superintendent observed of his house that 'the
rooms [are] so large and numerous as to be quite beyond
the requirements and means of one holding his position'.
Plans for dividing the house were prepared, but abandoned. and the Superintendent was granted an extra
£100 annual salary to cover the expense of occupying
the large house. The road south-east of the house was
diverted in 1881 to improve the approach to the bridge,
so the garden wall was rebuilt by the Poplar District
Board of Works. The south end of the wall was again
rebuilt in 1893–5 as part of the work associated with the
replacement of the Prestons's Road bridge by the LCC. (ref. 255)
Figure 235:
Bridge House, Preston's Road, south elevation as built, and plans in 1878. John Rennie, architect, 1819–20
The conversion of Bridge House to two dwellings, for
a dockmaster and his assistant, was carried out in 1894–5
to plans prepared under H. F. Donaldson. The house
was divided into east and west halves. with new northeast entrances and a new staircase in the spine corridor. (ref. 256)
A north-east block was added in 1899–1900. providing
an extra room on each storey. (ref. 257) By 1938 the house
was regarded as old and expensive to maintain and its
demolition was proposed. but this had not been done by
the outbreak of the Second World War. when it was
requisitioned by the War Department for the National
Fire Service. (ref. 258)
Bridge House was converted in 1954–5 as the PLA's
Chief Police Office and Police Training School. Blind
windows in the basement were opened and a garage was
built, all by John Mowlem & Company. (ref. 259) The Customs
tool tenancy of the building in 1965. The roof was
destroyed by fire in 1972: it was replaced with a flat
one. (ref. 260)
The PLA sold Bridge House to Whittam, Cox, Ellis &
Clayton, architects, in 1981. This firm used it as offices
and designed its conversion to six luxury flats, carried
out in 1987 for Birse Homes (London) Limited. The
principal staircase was removed and the secondary corridor stair was rebuilt. The north entrance was blocked
and an external iron fire-escape stair erected. A hipped
roof was reconstructed along the original lines. The flats,
offered for a total of almost £1.5 million, were not sold,
and in 1990 the house was let as offices for the London
Federation of Boys' Clubs. (ref. 261)
Preston's Road, East Side: The West India Dock Company's Estate
The stretch of Preston's Road between Poplar High
Street and the bridge over the Blackwall entrance to the
West India Docks was laid out in 1827–9 by the West
India Dock Company, replacing the existing road whose
route lay some 300ft to the west. This former road was
built for the West India Dock Company in 1808 and was
an extension of an old trackway leading south out of
Poplar High Street called Clifton Lane (see figs 139. 91
and 921 In 1809–10 the dock company widened and
improved the road, but a plan to replace it with a new,
straighter, one, first mentioned in 1811, remained in
abeyance until 1827, when the company decided to
construct the reservoirs that later became Poplar Dock,
to the north-east of the dock basin, obliging it to find a
new route for Preston's Road further to the east. Planned
by (Sir) John Rennie, the company's Surveyor, the new
road was built by Daniel Pritchard and William Hoof,
the contractors responsible for excavating the reservoirs,
and early in 1829 was handed over to the parish Trustees,
in exchange for the old road. On the east side, a number
of short turnings-off linked up with existing roads on the
old ropeground site, but Rennie's plan for a cross-road
at the southern end connecting Preston's Road with
Brunswick Street was not carried into effect until the
early 1840s when Russell (from 1887 Yabsley) Street was
laid out.
At its northern end the new Preston's Road originally
followed a more serpentine route which included two
sharpish bends. Probably for this reason it was soon bypassed, being replaced by a short stretch of straight
roadway laid out further to the west. The superseded
section survived as Bedford Terrace and the north-west
arm of Bedford Street. Until the building of the London
and Blackwall Railway in 1839–40 turned it into a culde-sac, Bedford Terrace presumably had a southern
opening into Preston's Road. In 1890 Bedford Terrace
lost its own name and became part of Bedford Street,
which was itself renamed Ditchburn Street in 1939.
After the re-routing of Preston's Road in 1827–9 the
West India Dock Company was left with a narrow strip
of land on the east side which it proposed to let for
development. This began in 1830 with the construction
of three pairs of semi-detached houses along the north
side of Bedford Street, whose north-western arm was at
that time still part of Preston's Road. Later known as
Crober's Cottages, these houses were built by John Crober
of Poplar High Street, victualler, the site being leased to
him for 61 years at an annual rent of £21. (ref. 262) Joseph Gwilt
(1784–1863), the West India Dock Company's Acting
Surveyor, provided the designs, Crober undertaking to
erect 'two houses agreeably to Mr. Gwylt's Plan No.1
and four others of the same elevation, but of less depth,
on either side of them'. (ref. 263) After taking possession of the
site, Crober objected to Gwilt's specifications, and told
the dock company that he intended to build small houses.
Gwilt nevertheless insisted on adherence to certain
minimum standards, and the houses were completed by
October 1830. (ref. 264) The company had earlier expressed the
hope that in selecting tenants for the houses and premises
built on its property beyond the dock walls, preference
would be given to 'persons whose business may be
essentially connected with the Ships which frequent the
Docks'. (ref. 265)
Photographs of Crober's Cottages show that the
development was architecturally a quite stylish one (Plate
106a). All three pairs of houses had identical fronts, but
the larger central pair, which had a deeper site, contained
four bedrooms each instead of three. (ref. 266) Built of brick, the
houses were villa-like in appearance, with two full storeys,
plus an attic storey contained within a slated mansard
roof. The street elevation was plain but carefully composed, with only one centrally positioned windowopening in each storey, that on the ground floor being
dressed with a small pediment. The front was finished
with a cornice and parapet, the latter balustraded where
it passed in front of the attic window. In 1880 the East
and West India Dock Company bought these houses
from Crober's trustees with the intention of using them
for the accommodation of officers who wished to be near
the docks. But it seems that the dock staff were none too
keen to live there and in 1884 the dock company sold
the freehold. (ref. 267) Renumbered 1–11 (odd) Bedford Street
in 1890, Crober's Cottages were still standing in the
1950s.
Apart from Crober's Cottages, the only other developments along Preston's Road in the early 1830s were an
infants' school, built on the bypassed section which
became Bedford Terrace, and a house erected in 1831–2
by William Cook, the plans for which were altered by
Gwilt. (ref. 268) Cook's house occupied a site, since redeveloped
for industrial use, towards the southern end of Preston's
Road, at what is now the north corner with Yabsley
(formerly Russell) Street.
The infants' schools, one of several local schools paid
for by George Green, the Blackwall shipbuilder, was
built in 1831–2 on a 58–year lease. (ref. 269) To erect the school
Green employed the services of a local contractor, William
Constable, who received £800 for the work between
September 1831 and January 1832, and further payments
totalling £240 in 1834–5. (ref. 270) It was a single-storey building
containing one schoolroom and two classrooms: (ref. 271) at the
back, but mostly on land not belonging to the West India
Dock Company, was a large playground with an entrance
from Regent Street North. The original school, latterly
known as the Regent Street British Infants' School,
closed in 1885, and in 1887 the premises were bought by
the Rector of Poplar (for the Trustees of the Bishop of
London's Fund). (ref. 272) Under the name All Saints' Mission
Hall, the old building continued in use as a school and
mission hall until the mid-1920s, when Poplar Borough
Council bought the site and erected a block of flats there,
later named Ditchburn House (see below). The Council's
purchase did not include the old playground, whose site
had been sold to the MBW in 1891 for the Blackwall
Tunnel. (ref. 273)
Northwards of the school, the ground on the east side
of Bedford Terrace remained undeveloped until the mid1840s, when a row of six two-storey houses with paired
rear-projections and small front gardens was erected there
under leases granted in 1846 to a number of different
building lessees. (ref. 274) These houses, latterly Nos 4–14 (even)
Ditchburn Street, survived into the 1950s.
The re-alignment of the northern end of Preston's
Road left a triangular plot of land between the former
route and the new one which was not built on until 1865,
when the East and West India Dock Company used the
site for a row of eight dock constables' residences (later
Nos 11–25, odd, Preston's Road). Erected by a local
builder, John Atherton of Chrisp Street, at a cost of
£2,420, these were two-storey, six-room houses, with
gardens stretching back to Bedford Terrace and Bedford
Street. (ref. 275) They were demolished in the 1960s.
Ditchburn House (demolished)
Built on the site of the old school in Bedford Street, this
was a block of nine two-bedroom flats erected in 1926–7
by Poplar Borough Council. It was designed by Harley
Heckford, the Borough Engineer and Surveyor, and was
in the simple neo-Georgian style favoured by the Borough
Council in the 1920s, with sash windows incorporating
glazing-bars. The builder was R. A. Reader of Hackney,
and the final cost, including the purchase of the site, was
£5,897. (ref. 276)
The building comprised a three-storey block whose
southern third was set back. On the main part there was
a hipped roof, and on the set-back part a pitched roof.
Entry was from the rear (east side), where a projecting
staircase tower was treated as a 'feature', and given a
circular window with glazing-bars similar to those on the
Chapel House Street Estate. Short balconies opening off
the tower gave access to the upper flats. The accommodation was fairly tight, and in the three central flats
the smaller bedroom was only 6ft 9in. wide.
The name Ditchburn House was adopted only in
1939, the block having previously been known (at least
informally) as Bedford Street Buildings. (ref. 277) It had ceased
to be occupied by October 1978, and was demolished in
1982. (ref. 278)
Southwards of the London and Blackwall Railway the
east side of Preston's Road was not built up until the
early 1840s. Here the frontage between the railway tracks
and William Cook's house was developed by Francis
Mills, esquire, of Middle Scotland Yard. (ref. 279) Mills used
the plot between the railway and Leicester (now Duthie)
Street to build a public house called the Marshal Keate
(see below), and along the frontage between Duthie Street
and Cook's house he erected a terrace of 37 houses known
as Bisterne Place, for which he was granted a 63-year
building lease by the East and West India Dock Company
in January 1842. (ref. 280) These were mostly two-storey houses,
almost certainly raised over semi-basements, with steps
up to their front doors and small gardens at both front
and back. At least four houses were occupied as shops,
but were reconverted to private residences in the mid1850s. (ref. 281) The development also included a baker's shop
and premises at the corner with Leicester (now Duthie)
Street, opposite the Marshal Keate public house, which
are listed in the Post Office Directory from 1845. (ref. 282) In
the late 1860s the North London Railway Company
purchased, and subsequently demolished, Nos 24–37
Bisterne Place for an intended (but unexecuted) entrance
lock into the company's coal dock at Poplar Dock (see
page 340). (ref. 283) Nos 1–23 Bisterne Place and the old baker's
premises were pulled down by the LCC in the 1890s in
order to clear the site for the building of the Blackwall
Tunnel.
Mills had originally intended to include the stretch of
Preston's Road to the south of Yabsley Street in his
development, but withdrew after the dock company
insisted that only 'superior' houses should be erected
there, 'as the site interferes with the prospect from the
Superintendent's House' (now Bridge House). (ref. 284) The
northern part of this frontage, which was not directly
opposite the Superintendent's House, was subsequently
used for the construction of Russell Place, a terrace of
14 two-storey houses erected in 1846 (see fig. 243). (ref. 285)
Shorn of its southernmost house, and renumbered
43–67 (odd) Preston's Road, this terrace survived into
the 1950s.
The Marshal Keate Public House (demolished)
Built in 1840–1, and leased to the developer Francis
Mills, the Marshal Keate occupied a prominent site at
the north corner of Preston's Road and Duthie Street. (ref. 286)
Though unmistakably a public house, it was a fairly lowkey two-storey building with stuccoed street elevations,
linked in typical fashion by a rounded corner, and roundheaded windows along the first floor, including a tripartite
window on the corner (Plate 105b; fig. 236). The designer
may have been Samuel Beazley, who witnessed the lease
of the property to Francis Mills, in October 1841. (ref. 287)
Behind the building was a large garden extending up to
the railway, with a sequence of 'grottoes' ranged along
the west side, adjacent to Preston's Road. (ref. 288) In the
early 1880s this garden was drastically shortened by the
Midland Railway Company, which wanted the northern
part of the site for railway sidings to be used in connection
with its new collier dock at Blackwall Yard, and in order
to obtain the land it needed the company bought both
the lease and the freehold of the premises in 1881. (ref. 289)
Even in its shortened state, the garden was considered
worthy of mention by Philip Norman of the London
Survey Committee in his East London notebook of
1900–3; by then, however, it had ceased to be used
by the public. (ref. 290)
A comparison between the little elevational drawing
attached to the original lease and the building in its last
days shows how little the external appearance of the
Marshal Keate had changed over the years. The main
difference was that on the ground floor the original stucco
had given way to ceramic tiles, probably in the 1950s,
which were subsequently painted over. The building was
demolished in the late 1980s.
Figure 236:
Marshall Keate Public House, Preston's Road, sketchelevation and ground-floor plan of 1841. Demolished
The Effect of the Blackwall Tunnel on Housing
The preparations for the building of the Blackwall Tunnel
and its approach roads in 1892–7 necessitated the acquisition, by the Metropolitan Board of Works and its
successor the London County Council, of land on the
north side of the Thames (see page 640). This included
the area between the east side of Preston's Road and
the west side of Gaselee Street, which contained much
working-class housing, all of which was demolished.
Following the completion of the tunnel, blocks of public
housing were erected on the site.
The Metropolitan Board of Works had planned to
accommodate displaced artisans locally in empty houses
or rooms, (ref. 291) but by 1892 the LCC had decided to rehouse
500 workers in Poplar and 761 in Greenwich, in dwellings
to be erected on surplus clearance sites offered at public
auction. (ref. 292) However, when the sites failed to sell, the
LCC's Architect's Department under Thomas Blashill
(1830–1905), produced its own plans for a new housing
block at Yabsley Street (in fact, in Raleana Road) and
invited tenders for its construction. These were considered unreasonable, and the LCC, dissatisfied at the
manner in which contractors tendered for such works,
resolved to retain the vacant sites and to undertake the
erection of the new artisans' dwellings themselves,
without the use of contractors (fig. 243). (ref. 293) This contributed directly towards the LCC's important decision
later that year to create its own Works Department.
Council Buildings, Raleana Road, Yabsley Street (demolished).
Despite the determination to proceed
without contractors, the difficult subsoil at Blackwall
demanded special concrete foundations. These were provided by Reed, Blight & Company of Westminster. (ref. 294)
Council Buildings comprised a five-storey block of 31
three-room and 19 two-room self-contained tenements
providing accommodation for 240 people. Each livingroom had cupboards, a cooking-range and a coal bunker,
and each bedroom contained a corner fireplace (fig. 237).
The closet was approached from an open lobby. In general
the design was a development of that used for the
contemporary LCC housing at Beacheroft Buildings,
Limehouse; however, the addition of a fifth storey (to
squeeze in more people), the use of coloured brick and
projecting bays, and an attempt to introduce a more
domestic style of roofing all gave the elevation a little more
character (Plate 123a). The buildings were completed and
opened in April 1894 and remained in use as public
housing until 1974, when the GLC's Housing Division
approved their demolition. (ref. 295) (fn. s)
Figure 237:
Council Buildings, Raleana Road, ground-floor plan (part) showing arrangement of two- and three-room tenements. Built by the LCC. 1893—4 Demolished
Toronto Buildings and Montreal Buildings, Cotton
Street (demolished). Between 1891 and 1899 two more
housing blocks, Montreal and Toronto Buildings, were
designed by Blashill for surplus LCC land at the
corner of Cotton and Manisty Streets, and were erected
by Perry & Company between 1899 and 1901 (fig.
243). These two five-storey blocks of stock-brick
balcony-dwellings comprised a combined total of 40
three-room and 30 two-room tenements, providing
accommodation for up to 360 people. (ref. 297) Each tenement
was self-contained, with a scullery and w.c. The style
of the Cotton Street housing was much plainer than
that of the earlier block at Yabsley Street, and Blashill
admitted that the architectural appearance of the
buildings had 'not been considered' in an attempt to
produce the cheapest possible dwellings. (ref. 298)
During the Second World War major structural repairs
were required at Cotton Street as a result of heavy
bombing. (ref. 299) By the early 1960s the LCC had decided to
adapt the buildings as temporary accommodation for
homeless families, (ref. 300) but they were demolished to make
way for the Smithsons' Robin Hood Gardens development (see page 196).
The Preston's Road Estate (demolished) and St Lawrence Cottages.
In June 1899 W. E. Riley (1852–1937),
the new LCC Architect, presented sketch plans for two
housing blocks to be erected on vacant LCC land between
Preston's Road and Gaselee Street (directly above the
tunnel), to rehouse working-class people about to be
displaced by improvement schemes in Poplar. (ref. 301) Riley
later revised his designs to comprise one large and one
small dwelling block of five-storey balcony-dwellings with
accommodation for 360 people, the initial stage of a larger
plan for six such housing blocks on the Preston's Road
site. (ref. 302)
Late in 1900 the LCC was asked by the School Board
for London to provide accommodation for 1,030 persons
displaced by new school buildings in south-east London,
offering for the purpose three empty sites at Old Ford,
Shadwell and Peckham. The Council, reluctant to build
on the three sites offered, eventually agreed to use the
four blocks planned for the remainder of the Preston's
Road site in conjunction with 14 new three-room cottages
to be built on a narrow strip of vacant ground opposite,
fronting Norfolk Street. (ref. 303)
The six blocks were named Ottawa, Baffin, Ontario,
Hudson, Quebec and Winnipeg Buildings (often referred
to as the 'Canadian Estate') and were built by F. & T.
Thorne of Manchester Road between 1902 and 1904
(Plate 123b). (ref. 304) In plan they were very similar to the
Raleana Road and Cotton Street housing, with a combination of two- and three-room tenements, each with
its own w.c., scullery and ventilated lobby (fig. 238), but
in this instance access to the buildings was via a staircase
entered from the yard on the ground floor, with balconies
running along the top four storeys facing the yard.
Figure 238:
Baffin Buildings, Preston's Road, first-floor plan. Built for the LCC, 1902–4. Demolished
Winnipeg Buildings were damaged during the Second
World War, and during the 1950s and early 1960s the
estate was modernized by the LCC. (ref. 305) In 1972 the
GLC declared Preston's Road a clearance area, and the
buildings were demolished in 1980, despite a 'Mum's
Army' campaign and visits by deputations of tenants to
the local authorities. (ref. 306)
St Lawrence Cottages were completed by F. & T.
Thorne in 1904 (Plate 123c). (ref. 307) Along with the earlier
Blackwall Tunnel cottages at East Greenwich, they reflect,
on a small scale, the LCC's gradual adoption of cottage
estates to house the working classes, rather than the often
unpopular block dwellings (see page 23). Each brickbuilt cottage had two floors, with a living-room, scullery,
w.c. and lobby on the ground floor, and two bedrooms
above. Food-cupboards, shelves, coppers and coal
bunkers were provided, and each cottage had its own
back garden. (ref. 308)
In 1963 a scheme was approved by the LCC to
modernize the cottages, and the 14 original units
(considered to be 'sub-standard') were repaired, and
converted into eight modern cottages. (ref. 309) Although extant,
in 1994 they were threatened with demolition to make
way for the London Docklands Development Corporation's new road scheme for the Isle of Dogs.
St Nicholas's Church, Yabsley Street (demolished)
The church of St Nicholas, Yabsley Street, was built as
a chapel of ease to All Saints', Poplar, to provide a
mission church for a population which was expanding as
a result of the new housing created by the tunnel scheme.
In 1898 the Rev. Arthur Chandler of All Saints' purchased
from the LCC a vacant site adjoining Council Buildings
(fig. 243). and the church was built in 1899–1900 by
J. W. Faulkner & Sons to the designs of J. & S. F.
Clarkson of Bloomsbury and Poplar. (ref. 310)
The building was a basic rectangle of six bays with a
semi-circular apse at the east end. It was of red brick,
with narrow round-headed windows and strong buttresses
running from ground to eaves. The apse was separated
from the main church by a large arch, and was covered
by a plastered semi-dome. The high-pitched roof was
covered with grey-green Westmorland slates, and a small
wooden bell-turret was added at the western end as a
special gift of Miss Trevor, a local benefactress. (ref. 311) The
interior was considered plain and uninspiring; later photographs show additions described as 'cheap statues, bits
of brocade, potted palms and candles by the dozen', (ref. 312)
Adjoining the church to the south was a group of parish
buildings which differed architecturally from the church,
being built of Kentish yellow stock bricks and ordinary
purple slates, with flat-arched openings. All the buildings
were provided with hot-water heating, and were the first
buildings in the area to be lit by electricity. (ref. 313)
St Nicholas's, described in 1924 as a 'struggling mission
church with very few keen communicants', (ref. 314) was badly
damaged during air raids in 1940 and 1941. It was
officially closed in 1952 and was later demolished. (ref. 315)