CHAPTER X - Brick Lane
This street existed under its modern name
as early as 1550 when a survey of the
Manor of Stepney mentions two tile
garths on its eastern side. (ref. 1) These were places
either where clay was dug to make tiles or perhaps
where brick-earth was dug. In Agas's map of
c. 1560–70 Brick Lane is shown, apparently
quite without buildings. Faithorne and New
court's map, published in 1658 but probably surveyed in the 1640's, shows building on its east
side approximately as far north as Hanbury
Street.
The first extensive building on its west side
probably began in the 1650's, associated with the
estate developments carried out by the Fossans
between Wentworth Street and Fashion Street,
and by Sir William Wheler and his lessees further
north, between Black Eagle Street and Bethnal
Green (see Chapters VI and XVII). In 1658
Samuel Twinn, a bricklayer, built six houses, probably in the neighbourhood of Fashion Street, (ref. 2) and
in 1663 or soon after eight brick houses were
built by William Russell, a homer, immediately
north of Wentworth Street. (ref. 3)
Part of the street between Truman, Hanbury,
Buxton and Company's premises and the railway
line was built up by John Stott, mariner, under a
lease from Sir William Wheler, between 1660 and
1670. (ref. 4)
Building was proceeding on the east side in the
late 1660's. In May 1671 John Carter submitted
a petition to the Privy Council, in which he asked
for permission to continue building development
in Haresmarsh, on the east side of Brick Lane,
which he had partially built up in the previous
year: this was probably between Carter's Rents
and Buxton Street. Hitherto Brick Lane had
been ’altogether unpassable for Carriages, and
travelling on horseback in the winter Season’,
but Carter promised that if the completion of the
building was permitted ’a Spatious High way will
be set out for passage of Carriages and Horsemen'. (ref. 5)
In June Sir Christopher Wren reported that he
had viewed the site on foot, ’the place being unpassable for Coach, adjoyning to Durty lands of
meane habitations, & farr from any Church’.
Building having been begun, Wren thought it
would be best to finish it ’by which the wayes
may be paved … which should otherwaies have
been mended and made passable by Gravell, not
by buildings …’. (ref. 6) In the following month the
issue of letters patent was ordered, ’In which letters
Patents are to be inserted such Conditions and
provisions for building regularly and with Brick,
according to Direction, and the Designe to which
his Pattent is to referre with Party Walls, sufficient Scantlings, good paving in the streets and
sufficient Conveighances for the water, with such
other Clauses as are usual in Grants of like nature,
and enjoyned to other builders’. (ref. 7) In August the
letters patent were issued, (ref. 8) although ’the designe
of the building’ which was required to be enrolled
in Chancery has not survived. (ref. 7)
In the same year Wren recommended that
Edward Sleymaker should be allowed to complete
other buildings on the east side of the street in
’Gurle's Garden’, (ref. 9) probably just north of the
later line of Chicksand Street, (ref. 10) ’the greatest part
being upon an Old Foundation, and adjoining to
old buildings’. (ref. 9)
The degree of development of Brick Lane in
1677–82 is shown in Ogilby and Morgan's maps,
which record more or less complete lines of building as far north as the vicinity of Fournier Street,
and more irregular development beyond that. In
the years 1681–84 Booth Street (now Princelet
Street east of Brick Lane) and Montague Street
(now Hanbury Street east of Brick Lane), and
Brick Lane in this area, were developed by sublessees from Nicholas Booth, a carpenter, and
others. Among the builders were Robert Hart, a
plasterer, Robert Martin, a bricklayer, and
Thomas Dellar, John Goodman and Richard
Janeway, all carpenters. (ref. 11)
An inhabitant of this side of the street, just
south of Booth Street, in the mid-1680's was
Ralph Alexander, (ref. 12) a brewer who was suspected
of secretly arming opponents of Charles II's
government. (ref. 13)
An ephemeral project in the street in 1694
indicates its suburban character at that time. A Robert Diggs of the City of London, Doctor of
Physic, being possessed of a piece of ground in the
Lane whose position is not known, decided to
erect on it ’two little shedds or places called Ban-quetting houses’, doubtless for the accommodation
of Cockney junketings. Henry Smith of Chancery Lane, joiner, was employed to erect the
evidently all-wooden buildings. The work
appears never to have been completed, Diggs
accusing Smith of failing to fulfil his contract and
Smith accusing Diggs of failing to pay his wages. (ref. 14)
At one stage the dispute was referred to the
arbitration of workmen including a ’Mr. William Chapman’, perhaps the Whitechapel carpenter
who worked in the Old Artillery Ground.
Gascoine's map of 1703 suggests that all the
part of the street in Spitalfields was then built-up,
except for small stretches on the east side of
Joyce's Garden and the tenter ground. Rocque
shows it all built-up except where the eastern end
of the churchyard abutted on the street.
In 1769 the Spitalfields Vestry decided to
oppose a clause in a Bill then before Parliament
for paving part of Whitechapel parish, which provided for the erection of a toll-gate across Whitechapel and a side gate across ’Dirty Lane’, the
narrow continuation of Brick Lane south of Old
Montague Street in Whitechapel parish. (ref. 15) The
Act of 1770 for paving Whitechapel High Street (ref. 16)
makes no provision for these gates.
Two years later, in 1772, Commissioners were
appointed with power to pave certain streets in
Spitalfields and all of Brick Lane within and without the parish. (ref. 17) It was described as ’a great
Thoroughfare for Carriages, and the only convenient one from the Water-side, through Whitechapel, to Spital Fields, Mile End New Town,
Bethnal Green, Shoreditch and Parts adjacent’,
but as being ’much out of Repair and incommodious’.
When the construction of Union Street was
being considered, the widening of ’Dirty Lane’ to
give better communication from Brick Lane to
Whitechapel High Street was also urged. (ref. 18) In
1778 an Act was accordingly passed (ref. 19) appointing
Commissioners to widen Dirty Lane; they were
also empowered to widen Brick Lane south of
Fournier Street to a uniform width of from thirty
five to thirty-eight feet on the expiry of the house-leases on both sides of the street. In consideration
of the fact that the widening of Dirty Lane would’contribute to making a commodious and useful
Line of Communication between Whitechapel
Road and Moorfields’ the City of London was to
pay £67 10s. per annum towards its cost, as it was
similarly associated with the financing of Union
Street to form another link in this line. A substantial widening of Dirty Lane, to become Osborn Street, was carried out, but Horwood's map
of 1799 suggests that any widening of Brick Lane
in Spitalfields was inconsiderable.
The narrowness of the Lane continues to recall
its origin as a sixteenth-century field path.
No. 57 Brick Lane
See page 215.
No. 59 Brick Lane
See page 221.
No. 63 Brick Lane
Rebuilt
See page 186.
Nos. 65–79 (odd) Brick Lane
Formerly Nos. 187–180 (consec.) Brick Lane
These houses were built by Joseph Truman in 1705–6 (see page 189).
Nos. 81–85 (odd) Brick Lane
Formerly Nos. 179 and 178 Brick Lane
These were perhaps built in consequence of a
lease made in 1691 to an Andrew Mayer,
probably by Sir George Wheler (see page 193).
Nos. 87 and 89 Brick Lane
Formerly Nos. 177 and 176 Brick Lane
Nothing is known of the early history of these
two houses. They are similar in appearance to
Nos. 81–85,and may date from the same period.
Christ Church C.E. Primary School,
Brick Lane
Christ Church Schools had their origin in a
charity school which was founded in the parish in
1708. (ref. 20) By 1732 there were thirty children in
attendance, (ref. 21) and in 1782 the number had risen
to seventy. (ref. 22) The boys were taught in a room in a
house in Brick Lane and the girls in a house in
Booth Street (now Princelet Street east of Brick Lane). (ref. 22) A fund of £700 had accrued by 1782
(including a legacy of £200 from John Cob, a hair
merchant of the parish) and in that year a faculty
was obtained permitting a school to be built on the
edge of the churchyard. (ref. 22) This site, which
measured eighty-six feet from east to west and
twenty-eight feet from north to south, (ref. 22) abutted
on Red Lion Street in front of the west end of the
church (ref. 23) and had formerly been occupied by the
parish engine-house. (ref. 24) (fn. a) The school (Plate 46b)
was erected in 1782 (ref. 26) and faced north. It is illustrated by a plaque on the present school building
in Brick Lane. It had a charming brick and stone
front of late eighteenth-century Classical design,
with a central feature slightly recessed between
two triangular-pedimented wings. In the centre
were two doorways, set in a colonnade, and in the
wall face above were two niches, containing
statues of a boy and a girl. Each wing had two
ground-floor and attic windows, all with flat
arches of gauged brickwork, and the first-floor
windows were underlined by a pedestal-course,
carried across the central colonnade.
All children from eight to ten years of age
whose parents resided within half a mile of the
school were admitted, and no fees were charged.
Living accommodation for the master and mistress were provided. (ref. 26)
On 16 September 1817, a National School was
established by Joseph Wilson, of Milk Street, in
temporary premises in Wheler Street. The
following year the Duke of York laid the foundation stone of a permanent school building on the
south side of Quaker Street (see pages 105–6). The
architect was James Beck and the builders, whose
contract was for £2,596, were James Benson and
Son. (ref. 27) The site was leased for sixty-one years
from G. H. Wheler in 1819, (ref. 28) and the new
school opened on 2 July 1820 (ref. 27) as the ’Spital
fields National School for the education of the
poor in the principles of the Established Church’.
It was declared that ’no poverty however extreme
and no difference in religious sentiments in the
parents shall be deemed a sufficient cause of
exclusion to the children provided they conform
to the regulations of the school’. (ref. 29)
The line of Commercial Street cut through
Red Lion Street and made it necessary for the
Commissioners of Woods and Forests to purchase
and clear the Charity School site. The sale was
effected in 1845, (ref. 30) but the purchase price of
£1,566 was not agreed until 1850. (ref. 31) It appears
that owing to a decline of income the Charity
School and National School were united in 1842
for instruction only. (ref. 20) The Charity School was
occupied until April 1851 and was pulled down
between that date and April 1852. (ref. 26) The pupils
were moved to the National School and both were
conducted by a joint committee, though the funds
of each were kept separately. (ref. 32) In 1869 a faculty
was obtained to erect a new school with houses for
a master and mistress at the east end of the churchyard, facing Brick Lane. (ref. 33) The funds of both the
Charity and National Schools were applied to the
costs of the building (ref. 32) which amounted to
£5,953. (ref. 27)
The new building (Plate 47a), which was to be
constructed on arches in order to avoid disturbing
the graves, (ref. 33) was begun in 1873 from the designs
of James Tolley and Daniel Robert Dale of
13 Angel Court, Throgmorton Street. The
builder was Christopher Forrest of Victoria Park
Square, Bethnal Green. (ref. 34) When the new schools
were completed in 1874, the trustees of the
Quaker Street National School surrendered their
lease. (ref. 27) The building still stands(see pages 105–6).
The present building is set back from the west
line of Brick Lane and consists of a single storey
of class-rooms raised over covered playgrounds,
one for boys and the other for girls and infants,
both now closed in and converted for other uses.
The class-rooms are reached by four staircases,
two rising from the playgrounds and two from
Brick Lane. The north staircase is contained in a
bay-fronted lobby, and the south staircase rises
alongside a wing originally the headmaster's
house, containing two storeys and a roof garret.
The shallow front court is screened by an elaborate
cast-iron railing, with a centrally placed drinking
fountain of stone. The group is picturesque in its
spiky Victorian Gothic way, with red brick walls,
crudely diapered with black, and heavy stone
dressings to the angles and openings. The flat
two-centred arches of the playground arcade are
of stone, with keystones merging into a band
course, and the four windows above are gabled.
The steep roofs are slated, with bands of shaped
slates, and are finished with ornamental ridge
tiles. A dummy window in the flank wall of the
headmaster's house contains a relief representation
of the old school building above an inscribed cartouche.
The Soup Kitchen, Brick Lane
Formerly between Nos. 114 and 116 Brick Lane
In 1797 an organization known as the ’Spitalfields Soup Society’ (ref. 36) or the ’Ladling Society’ (ref. 36)
was formed in an attempt to save the unemployed
weavers of Spitalfields and their families from
starvation. Among the founders was the chemist,
William Allen of Plough Court, at whose home
the first meeting is said to have been held. (ref. 36) Like
several early members of the committee, he was a
Quaker, (ref. 35) but the charity was also supported by
other well-known reformers, among them William Wilberforce, Bishop of Durham. (ref. 37) Later
members included Peter Bedford and Thomas
Fowell Buxton. (ref. 38) At the same time, similar
soup societies were operating in Clerkenwell and
St. George's Fields, apparently closely connected
with the organization in Spitalfields. (ref. 37) A soup
kitchen was opened at No. 53 (now Nos. 114 and
116) Brick Lane, from which soup was sold at Id.
per quart and potatoes at 2d. for 15 lb. to families
whose need had been established. The members
of the committee visited homes in the Spitalfields
district to discover such cases, as well as personally
supervising the making and distribution of the
soup. (ref. 37) Members were fined for any failure to
carry out their part of the work or to attend the
monthly meetings of the committee. (ref. 38)
The soup kitchen was found to be so necessary
that it was again opened in succeeding winters.
In the early months of 1812 the amount of soup
sold monthly averaged nearly 80,000 quarts and it
was estimated that about 6,000 people were being
fed daily. At this time the daily requirements of
the Brick Lane soup kitchen were 856 lb. of beef,
426 lb. of barley, 317 lb. of split peas, 40 lb. of
onions, 62 lb. of salt, and 3 lb. 14 oz. of pepper. (ref. 38)
In 1812 the charity was aided by the formation
of the Spitalfields Association for the Relief of the
Industrious Poor whose members operated a
depot to supply cod, herrings and rice at a low
cost, and distributed money in cases of need. Both
the societies co-operated closely with the Spitalfields Benevolent Society, which was founded in
1811 at the Wheler Chapel (ref. 39) (see page 103).
The committee of the Soup Society continued
to run the soup kitchen in Brick Lane until 1883,
when the work was handed over to the rector of
Christ Church, who continued it for some time
with a staff of regular workers. (ref. 36)