Petticoat Lane in its heyday 1950

The Jewish East End

The East End of has always fasci- As each wave of immigrant arrived, they alleyways around what is commonly nated me. I consider myself a third-gener- brought new skills, trades and cultures that known as Petticoat Lane Market, the ation Jewish immigrant and, together with benefited society as a whole and helped to centre of the Jewish East End. the French , Irish and Asian establish assimilation, understanding and Life was difficult and challenging for communities, we have all started our jour- tolerance. many of the Jewish refugees who arrived ney into British society in the area known The roots to my heritage and forbearers from Eastern Europe in the late 1880s. as . can still be found in the narrow streets and Many had to turn to temporary shelters and soup kitchens to sustain life in an un- The soup kitchen on Brune Street certain future. One of these soup kitchens on Brune Street, just around the corner to Wentworth Street, was built in 1902. This beautiful period building provided a life- line between hunger and survival. Petticoat Lane Market is made up of several streets running off Middlesex and Wentworth streets. In the early 20th cen- tury, there were more than 15 kosher butcher shops in Wentworth Street alone. Although there has been a market in the area since the 17th century, selling mainly second-hand clothes and shoes, it wasn’t until the 1930s that it was recognised as an official market. Up until that time, the po- lice and authorities would try to disperse the sellers from the streets. The Jewish presence was growing in the late 19th century and the Jewish East End “Fifty thousand French Huguenots had fled from was becoming the centre of the clothing industry. Petticoat Lane was attracting religious persecution in the late 17th century to seek Jewish traders and customers. Sunday refuge in Britain and had turned Spitalfields into the trading laws at that time prohibited trad- ing on the Christian Sabbath, but the new centre of the fine silk weaving industry in London.” trading act of 1936 allowed the Jewish

www.focus-info.org FOCUS The Magazine 9 Jewish East End, circa 1900 traders dispensation to trade on a Sunday to become a London cabbie and tour 1971, which imposed restrictions on because Saturday was the Jewish Sabbath. guide. further immigrants coming from The first recollection I have of going to If truth be known, this was not entirely Bangladesh to Britain; only wives and Petticoat Lane Market was around 1960 as a recreational visit for my father. My father children under the age of 16 could join a young lad out for a Sunday morning ex- was a second-generation immigrant of their husbands and fathers already living pedition with my father. It felt almost like Jewish-Latvian heritage; his family had ar- here. a trip to the circus. There were crowds of rived in Britain and had found themselves There are still echoes that at one time people milling everywhere and I felt that I in the East End as refugees to escape the this street was as it is today: a thriving was at the centre of the circus ring and all brutalities of the Russian Pogroms of the street market. But instead of colourful saris around me were a variety of acts that were late 1880s. By 1960, he was successfully and silk fabric stalls serving the current vying for my attention. Each stallholder running his own bespoke tailoring busi- Bangladeshi community, it catered for the was either chatting with a potential cus- ness, so it was not unusual for him on a influx of Jewish refugees who lived and tomer or demonstrating the uniqueness of Sunday morning to visit one of the many worked in the overcrowded tenement their merchandise. cloth merchants that had premises in the blocks of flats and poorly unregulated I remember we joined a crowd around a Petticoat Lane and area. After apartments that could, at best, be de- stallholder’s pitch as he was eloquently all, it was cloth, in particular silk, that scribed as slums. demonstrating the powers of this new turned Spitalfields into the centre of the In keeping with the Jewish religion and magical household polish that could turn a fine silk weaving industry in the mid-17th customs, most of these refugees had to dirty old coin into a shiny new specimen. century. keep kosher and observe the fastidious “Amazing,” he said glibly. “Just think what One of the joys of my visits to Petticoat Kashrut laws of what you can eat and how this could do for the rest of your house.” Lane was the culinary delight of having a it is prepared. These centuries-old laws and Another stall that fascinated me and still salt-beef sandwich from Bloom’s in customs still exist today and are observed does to this day was the demonstration of a . Bloom’s originated from by practising Jewish people globally. So, it gyroscope spinning on a suspended piece humble beginnings initially as a kosher made perfect sense that Brick Lane became of string between two upright posts. To my butcher shop in 1920 on Brick Lane and the Jewish high street of the East End. mind there was no logical way on earth after expanding into the deli business, they There were kosher butchers, bakers, delica- that a piece of metal on a spinning axel opened the Whitechapel restaurant in tessen, grocery shops and restaurants all could possibly not fall off that piece of 1952. Frank Sinatra and Charlie Chaplin catering for the Jewish clientele. string. were among their first clientele. Bloom’s In between the shops and the stalls, Customers would be entertained by the was probably London’s first takeaway. where the pavements ran, were vendors of juggling skills and patter of stallholders Brick Lane is a super cool, shabby-chic kosher delicacies, that probably would not who would throw complete bone-china kind of place, with graffiti and street art on meet today’s high standards of food hy- dinner sets up in the air and catch them all any surface that an artist can create their giene, selling their wares from jute sacks intact, to demonstrate their robustness and work. There is a wonderful, eclectic range and wooden barrels, such as beigles, (this then pitch them out at a price that was a of shops and restaurants, and the aroma of is not a typo, in my opinion the correct once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. curry houses and Balti restaurants is an in- spelling as opposed to bagel), pickled her- Little did I realise that within a decade, dication that the Bangladeshi community rings (roll mops) and Polish pickled salt to enhance my entrepreneurial skills, I have found refuge in this area since the cucumbers. would be joining this troupe of fine enter- 1950s and 60s. The numbers increased There are still clues in Brick Lane of this tainers that would lead me onto a journey substantially after the Immigration Act past heritage. For instance, Christ Church

10 FOCUS The Magazine March/April 2021 www.focus-info.org Bloom’s in the early 1960s “Sunday trading laws at that time prohibited trading on the Christian Sabbath, but the new trading act of 1936 allowed the Jewish traders dispensation to trade on a Sunday because Saturday was the Jewish Sabbath.”

Primary School in Brick Lane has a decor- shelter to many communities, religions, The typical layout of the houses would ative Star of David on the guttering of its faiths and beliefs that have sought a safe cover five floors, including the basement building and the two outstanding beigel refuge from persecution, racism and abuse and attic, allowing sunlight to flood shops that have a constant flow of cus- since it was built in 1743. through its large, glazed windows. This tomers throughout the day. As you walk north of , up layout would be ideal for the Huguenot On the junction of Brick Lane and Brick Lane you will come to Princelet master weavers – the attic was perfect for Fournier Street, named after George Street. On both sides of the street are fine the silk weaving looms and the ground Fournier, a former Huguenot refugee, is examples of Georgian terraces that formed floor for showrooms. Fifty thousand the Brick Lane Jamme Masjid mosque. part of the Wood-Michell housing estate, a French Huguenots had fled from religious This building, with a magnificent sundial development that also included Fournier persecution in the late 17th century to high above its wall with the inscription and Wilkes streets. The estate was de- seek refuge in Britain and turned “Umbra Sumus”, meaning we are shadows, signed by two entrepreneurial lawyers, Spitalfields into the centre of the fine silk is a beacon to all that is good and positive Charles Wood and Simon Michell, who weaving industry in London. in our multicultural society. In its illus- had a good eye for property development Number 19 Princelet Street is classified trious past, it has been a synagogue and a in the 18th century. as a building at risk because of its struc- tural condition. However, it is the home Battle of the ‘beigels’, Brick Lane to the Museum of Immigration and Diversity. Unfortunately, it is not open to the public without prior appointment, which now is severely restricted. Behind those austere brown doors hides a true and telling account of immigration, poverty, struggles and diversity in London. Built in 1709, one of the first residents was the Ogier family. Peter Ogier was a Huguenot merchant of fine silks. After his death, other Huguenot families resided and worked from number 19. By the mid- 1800s, Irish people, who were facing a cri- sis in Ireland from famine caused by the potato blight, found themselves in the Spitalfields area and found lodgings at number 19, which by that time had been divided into small apartments and was starting to become dilapidated and

www.focus-info.org FOCUS The Magazine 11 Typical master weaver’s house run down. their voices to be heard above the din of 8 Princelet Street there is a decorative coal The next wave of immigrants in the late anti-feminism, discrimination and bigotry. hole cover with a viola embedded in it 1880s to find refuge at this once handsome Moses was a voice to be reckoned with, which commemorates London’s first but quickly deteriorating Georgian home like her Victorian contemporaries Sylvia Yiddish theatre built in 1886. Yiddish is a was a group of Polish Jews that were fleeing Pankhurst, Annie Besant and Henrietta combination of German and Hebrew and the pogroms of Eastern Europe. They Barnett. All of these women had either was used extensively in Eastern Europe be- formed the Loyal United Friends Friendly lived or worked in the East End in a fight fore the Holocaust. Public funds were Society. There were many families living for social reforms for improved housing raised to build the theatre by a local kosher here in very cramped conditions. conditions, women’s equality and equal butcher and Samuel Montagu, a Liberal Amazingly, such was the imagination and rights for all. MP for Whitechapel, and all the produc- ingenuity of this collective community that Moses, who was also known as the tions were in Yiddish. During a perform- they built a full-size synagogue in the back ‘Angel of the East End’, was the daughter ance of Gypsy Girl, the fire alarm was garden. This was probably one of the first of German immigrant Mark Moses, who raised in error and 17 people were killed in purpose-built synagogues and it consisted had arrived in London in 1884. He be- the rush to escape. of a ground floor and a ladies’ gallery sup- came a tailor at 21 Princelet Street, where Towards the corner of Princelet Street ported by columns. he and his wife raised their family of and Wilkes Street is probably the most The story does not end there for this his- Miriam and her eight siblings. Mark be- Instagrammable property in the East End torical home. In 1936, the basement of the came active in the local community and of London. Number 4 Princelet Street was synagogue was used by a group of anti-fas- was a justice of the peace. After he died, built for the owner of the Truman cists to deliver a plan to stop the fascist Miriam followed in her father’s footsteps Brewery. It has beautiful yellow brickwork Oswald Mosley and his followers from and became active in community work and has been used many times as a loca- marching through the heart of the East and tirelessly championed women’s suf- tion for photo shoots and movies and has End of London. frage and their rights and for the provision remained untouched and open to the el- To this day, there remains an unsolved of contraception. ements since it was first built. mystery that emerged from number 19: the Miriam was pivotal in establishing the A blue plaque can be found at 2 disappearance of a Jewish scholar David Brady Girls’ Club in 1925 as a parallel to Princelet Street that commemorates Anna Rodinsky, who took lodgings in the attic in the Brady Boys’ Club, which provided Maria Garthwaite, who lived and worked the 1960s and led a reclusive life as the educational and leisure opportunities for at the address as a talented silk designer. caretaker of the synagogue. Rodinsky’s dis- young Jewish people. In 1931, Miriam be- An inheritance enabled Garthwaite and appearance was discovered when builders came the first female mayor of her sister to move to Spitalfields in the found the vacated attic full of dusty books and the first Jewish female mayor in the early 1700s and she became an accom- and writings in the late 1970s. No one can UK. Miriam was awarded an OBE in plished artist and spent her time painting account for seeing him in that period and 1945 and passed away in 1965. flowers and floral designs. Garthwaite the mystery is even more clouded by the Everywhere you look there are clues to would get her agent to show her work to discovery of his death certificate dated Princelet Street’s heritage and to some of the Huguenot weavers of Spitalfields, but March 1969, aged 44, in Epsom, Surrey. the industries that supported families in to hide her identity and gender she would Number 21 Princelet Street is home to the East End. Large bobbins can be seen initial her designs A.M Garthwaite. Her the inspirational story of Miriam Moses. hanging outside the properties that once silk designs brought her great wealth and The East End has always had a reputation were occupied by the master weavers. recognition in both Great Britain and the of strong women that have had to raise Even on the pavements outside number United States. The Victoria and Albert

12 FOCUS The Magazine March/April 2021 www.focus-info.org Umbra Sumus sun dial Yiddish theatre — aftermath of the crush (right) and the new Pavilion The- atre, Whitechapel (left) now demolished

Museum holds more than 800 samples of Memory map of the Jewish East End her works and designs. Just like the gyroscope that I first saw in Petticoat Lane, against all odds it has pro- vided the opportunity to defy gravity and offer support to thousands of immigrant and refugee families that have come and turned to the East End when life was intol- erable and spinning out of control. In re- turn, I believe the capital has benefited from the rich culture and diversity of its multicul- tural society and that makes London the ideal place to live, work and visit.

Princelet Street

David Burnetts is a London black taxi driver and accredited tour guide. He offers private guided tours from the comfort of his iconic London taxi. His website capitalcabbietours.com offers full tour information. You can follow him on Facebook and Instagram at @capitalcabbie. www.focus-info.org FOCUS The Magazine 13