James Maconochie (1850-1895) and Archibald Maconochie (1854-1926) were two of eight siblings born in England to Edinburgh-born Archibald Maconochie Sr. and Elizabeth Richardson from Stony Stratford, Buckinghamshire.
Contemporary depiction of the Maconochie Brothers
The brothers’ first business was a fish-curing factory in Lowestoft, started in 1873. The business was a great success and it expanded to include food processing, packaging and canning, and they were one of the largest employers in the town.
By the end of the 1890s, Maconochies was the largest producer of canned food in the world, and they had a number of premises throughout Britain. In 1896 (a year after the death of James Maconochie from pneumonia), Maconochie Brothers – a name the business would retain despite the death of James – took over the former Northumberland Wharf in Westferry Road on the Isle of Dogs. This was a couple of years before the company secured a lucrative contract to supply tinned meat and vegetable stew to British troops fighting in the Boer War (1899-1902).
Maconochie’s Wharf. Built on the former Northumberland Wharf, the launching site of HMS Northumberland, built by the Millwall Iron Works.
Survey of London:
From 1902 to 1920 Maconochies completely redeveloped the site, building a pickle factory, a jam, peel and candy factory, vegetable kitchens, riverside warehouses, stores, workshops, a large cooperage, and offices.
1910. Goad Insurance Map (Museum of London). Click for full-sized version
In 1907, Maconochies invented their very popular Pan Yan Pickle, made according to a secret recipe involving pickled fruit and vegetables in a sweet and sour sauce.
1930s
The redevelopment of the Island factory from 1902-1910 also coincided with the outbreak of World War I when Maconochies won a contract to supply meat and vegetable tinned rations to the British Army.
WWI canned army rations
The majority of troops appeared to have disliked the tinned food. Imperial War Museum website:
…a very familiar component of the British soldier’s daily life and diet. It was more blamed than praised and many considered it only edible if mixed with something else. Others (probably a minority) liked it . Brophy and Partridge describe it thus: ‘A tinned ration consisting of sliced vegetables, chiefly turnips and carrots, and a deal of thin soup or gravy. Warmed in the tin, ‘Maconochie’ was edible; cold, it was a man-killer. By some soldiers it was regarded as a welcome change from bully-beef.’ (‘The Long Trail. Soldiers’ Songs and Slang 1914-18′, Sphere Books, 1969, p.119)
Corporal R Derby Holmes:
It is my personal opinion that the inventor brought to his task an imperfect knowledge of cookery and a perverted imagination. Open a can of Maconochie and you find a gooey gob of grease, like rancid lard. Investigate and find chunks of carrot and other unidentifiable material, and now and then a piece of mysterious meat.
Still, Maconochies profited hugely from the contract to supply canned rations and their Millwall works competed with Morton’s to call itself the largest employer on the Island.
In 1926 Archibald Maconochie died and his son (another Archibald) took over. It was around this time that the business became a limited company instead of a family business.
From Westferry Road in about 1920. Maconochies main office building is visible on the right, just past The Ship pub, with the clock on the wall. Photo: Island History Trust
In 1926 the Island factory had over 1000 employees, 75% of whom were women.
Thomas Jeffrey Cole – Life & Labor* in the Isle of Dogs:
More than 40% of Island women who had paid jobs at the time worked in food processing plants. Of the two great Island firms in this field, Morton’s and Maconochies, the former was considered to be the better employer. Its wages were no higher than those of its rival, but working conditions were better and the management was thought to be fairer.
* Cole is an American.
1920s. Girls who worked at Maconochies. The two in the middle are Edie Lander, who lived at No. 1 Ferry Street, and Doris Burton, who lived at No. 16 Malabar Street. The other two are from Canning Town. Photo and Text: Island History Trust / Mrs Spotwood.
In the late 1930s, the most recent Archibald left the firm to join the army for the duration of WWII, before returning to the company. During the War the Millwall factory was so seriously damaged that production was impossible. Maconochies acquired a new site in Hadfield, Derbyshire and moved their production there in 1945 – the end of their 50 year presence on the Isle of Dogs. After the War Maconochie’s Wharf was used for wool storage.
In the following photo the lighter-coloured sheds indicate repairs to – or replacements for – sheds that were damaged or destroyed by WWII bombing. The lighter sections on the roofs of, for example, Burrell’s are also signs of bomb damage repairs.
c1950. By which time Maconochies had ceased production at the site.
A Maconochies lorry driving past the Tower
During the 1950s, Maconochies started to become a loss-making concern, and in 1965 it entered into receivership. Two years later it was acquired by Rowntree Mackintosh, who themselves were acquired in the 1980s by Nestlé, owner of Crosse & Blackwell (who made Branston Pickles, among many other brands).
Production of Pan Yan Pickle ceased in 2000 due to falling sales. Attempts in 2008 by DJ/celebrity Chris Evans to pressure Crosse & Blackwell into reviving the pickle led to the revelation that the secret recipe had already been lost in a 2004 factory fire.
The former Maconochies factory in Westferry Road was demolished in about 1980, leaving a large empty site that was overlooked by a community mural painted on the side of the adjacent Burrell’s building.
1980s. Peter Wright
In the late 1980s, the site was redeveloped by the Great Eastern Self-Build Housing Association.
Late 1980s
Early 1990s (estimate). Former Maconochies Wharf.
There is one little reminder of the area’s former use…..
Commercial Road (article here) was built to connect the City of London with the newly-built West and East India Docks at the start of the 19th century. At a junction just east of St. Anne’s Church, the new road was divided into two road, the southernmost of which was built in 1802 by the dock company’s engineer, Ralph Walker. This section was also named Commercial Road, and it was not until 1828 that it received the name, West India Dock Road.
The proposed new roads in c1800. (Name labels for the proposed roads are my own, and in the original version of this map, East India Dock Road was not shown at all.)
The following image shows the development in and around West India Dock Road in the following decades. In 1818 the north side of the road was still occupied by fields; urban East London hadn’t quite yet expanded this far east. Even in 1827 north of the road was not yet developed. By 1862, however, West India Dock Road was very much part of a thoroughly urban Limehouse.
Development of West India Dock Road area. Click for full-sized image.
Late 1940s. West India Dock Road in the post-WWII ruins of Poplar. Click for full-sized version. Photo: http://www.britainfromabove.org.uk.
Approaching the West India Dock Road from the east end of Commercial Road in the late 1800s the most striking building was the Eastern Hotel, built in c1860 at the corner of East India Dock Road and West India Dock Road. Although it occupied 1 West India Dock Road, its postal address was 2 East India Dock Road so I’ll be saving its history for a later article about that road, but I had to at least mention the iconic building at the entrance to the West India Dock Road here.
1990, by which time the Londoner (formerly named Eastern Hotel) had been demolished to widen the junction. Also, the construction of new buildings in and around Canary Wharf was in full swing. Photo: Mick Lemmerman
Recently. Much of the former site of the Londoner is surrounded by a huge hoarding meant to represent a building, complete with an advertising screen.
The Sailors’ Palace
Sailors from around the world visited the West India Docks, and many needed cheap, short-term accommodation. A large number of seamens’ hostels were built locally, often run by missionary societies who mostly wanted to provide a more wholesome alternative to other lodgings and tempations in the area.
Diagonally opposite the Eastern Hotel – on the corner of Beccles Street was the Sailor’s Palace, a hostel run by the British and Foreign Sailors’ Society (it was also their headquarters).
c1950 map (with an incorrectly spelled Pigott Arms)
The building, which still exists, was built in 1901 and was funded by newspaper owner and philanthropist John Passmore Edwards.
c1950 (estimate)
Recently
2-12 West India Dock Road
Left of the Sailor’s Palace were numbers 2-12 West India Dock Road, a row of shops (including in the 1960s one of the many Chinese restaurants in the area).
1970s. The dental surgery used to be a butcher’s shop.
14 West India Dock Road
To the left of the shops, and visible in the previous photo was 14 West India Dock Road, originally known as the German Sailors’ Home (this building also still exists). Opened in 1908, it was the successor of the ‘Deutsche Seemannsmission’ which was founded in the 1880s in East India Dock Road.
German Sailors’ Home.
The Sailor’s Home was an employment exchange for some time, but has since been converted into flats. The single-storey section on the right became an independent flat with its own entrance from the street. My sister Karen and her then very young daughter Karly lived in this flat for a period in the 1980s. It was small, dark and noisy, and I was relieved when they moved on.
2010s
3-9 West India Dock Road
A row of shops in buildings which were somewhat grander than those on the other side of West India Dock Road. Morris Senefft’s shop at Nos. 3-5 was one of many in the area that specialised in clothing for sailors and other nautical types. A family business, Isaac Senefft was registered at No. 5 as early as 1912.
Nos. 3-5 and 7 West India Dock Road.
1963. Outside 3-5 West India Dock Road. Jim Watts, husband of Queenie Watts, in a screenshot from the documentary, Portrait of Queenie.
In February 1956, the shop was the scene of a murder – West India Dock Road was no stranger to murders* but this one is still remembered by some – when Betty Senefft was stabbed to death by David Kemp. Also, the murder received national and international attention as the House of Commons had recently voted to abolish the death penalty, but the legislation had not yet been enacted. Kemp was automatically sentenced to hang, but this was later commuted to life imprisonment.
* In 1945, Lilian Hartney was found murdered literally across the road from Senefft’s in Rich Street, outside the former German Sailor’s Home. That murder was never solved.
Later (I am not sure in which year), Senefft’s shop was taken over by a local shopowner, S. Grant. Grant’s were also nautical outfitters in the past, but I think that that part of their business was very insignificant by the time the following photo was taken.
1970s
11 West India Dock Road
This building was built in 1860 by sail makers and ship chandlers, Coubro & Scrutton. Since their departure the building has seen a number of different occupants, including the Salvation Army for a period. It is now Grade II listed.
1970s. Former Coubro & Scrutton premises at 11 West India Dock Road
3-11 West India Dock Road recently.
The Strangers’ Home
To the right of Coubro & Scrutton (and opened a couple of years earlier), this sailors’ hostel was opened in 1857 by Prince Albert. Sailors commonly referred to as ‘lascars‘ from the Indian subcontinent had been hired since the 17th century by the East India Company to carry out a range of (often menial) jobs on ships. Poorly paid and sometimes harshly treated, many lascars could also end up spending weeks and months idle in Britain while waiting for a return ship to India.
1925. Lascars in West India Dock Road
By the mid-1800s ‘lascar’ had become a generic term for almost all non-European sailors, and Christian missionary societies became concerned about their plight. This led to the establishment of the Strangers’ Home for Asiatics, Africans and South Sea Islanders (to give it its full name).
c1900
It was described by Count E. Armfelt in Living London (c. 1902) as having:
…reading and smoking and bagatelle rooms, bedrooms, baggage rooms, kitchens, and dining rooms, where every individual can cook and eat his meal with the ritual which his conscience commands him, undefiled by even the shadow of an infidel.
Wikipedia:
A Chinese community grew around the Home and the 1881 census recorded that of the 22 people who lived there, eleven were born in China, six in India or Sri Lanka, two in Arabia, two in Singapore and one in the Kru Coast of Africa. In 1886 the Home informed the India Office that they were evicting five Punjabi performers and a bear who could not pay their bills.
1902. The main hall of The Strangers’ Home
Despite the welcoming attitude of the Missionaries, there was much antagonism by locals towards the residents of the home. Tower Hamlets Archives:
From January to August 1919 mass riots broke out between white and black seamen in port cities across Britain. African, Caribbean, Chinese, Arab and South Asian sailors had kept the merchant navy running during the First World War but as peacetime began and competition for jobs increased, workers from Britain’s colonies living in port cities across Britain became the targets of racist attacks by gangs of white seamen.
In May 1919 the Strangers’ Home for African, Caribbean and Asiatic Seamen in West India Dock Road, was surrounded by a hostile crowd.
Daily Herald, April 1919
It is well known that Limehouse once had a large Chinese community, and that this was London’s ‘Chinatown’ before the post-War migration of Chinese families to Soho. In the middle of the 19th century there were people of several different nationalities recorded in and around West India Dock: Irish, Germans, Scandinavians, Indians, Chinese and others, but no large group of a particular ethnicity. Larger scale Chinese immigration started later in the century, espcially when the Blue Funnel Line established a route to Shanghai in 1865, with Chinese immigrants settling mainly around Limehouse Causeway and Pennyfields. Survey of London:
By 1918 the number of Chinese living in Pennyfields totalled 182; all were men, nine of them had English wives. At its maximum size during the 1930s, Chinatown (which included Limehouse Causeway) consisted of 5,000 persons, many of whom were sailors. A few Chinese remained in Pennyfields until the demolition of the street after 1960. As early as the 1920s, many of the houses occupied by the Chinese were described as ‘very old and in many cases extremely dilapidated externally’. Internally most were clean, uncrowded, vermin-free and less susceptible to infectious disease than their English neighbours.
Meanwhile, back at the Strangers’ Home, a lack of funds and the reduced numbers of sailors in need of help led to the closure of the home in 1937.
The Stranger’s Home was demolished and West India House was built on the site, the first post-War block of council flats to be built in what was then the Borough of Stepney.
1946 aerial photo of construction of West India House (www.britainfromabove.org.uk)
A British Pathé film of the opening by Clement Attlee is available on YouTube (odd to hear the commentary referring to the place as Stepney, as I know it as nothing other than Limehouse):
Late 1940s (estimated). West India House. The coat of arms on the side of the building is that of Stepney Borough Council.
An unusual view of West India House from below street level
Present-day image of the former Coubro & Scrutton’s building and West India House.
16-56 West India Dock Road
Across the road to The Strangers’ Home, from No. 16 to 52, was a row of shops and businesses.
1890 map
Various maps and websites show that there was a pub at No. 16 – The Alma. It appears to have survived WWII, but I’ve not been able to find a photo of it or any information.
The following photo shows a gentlemen’s outfitters at an unidentified location in West India Dock Road. However, a close look at the reflection in the window reveals the sail maker’s building and West India House on the other side of the road.
West India Dock Road
Is the shop just visible on the right of the following photo the same place?
40 West India Dock Road was a far more substantial building and stretched back as far as Rich Street and Grenade Street. Next door is Dunbar House – possibly named for Duncan Dunbar, a wealthy local brandy dealer whose son (also named Duncan) became a millionaire shipowner in the 1800s. It was for many decades a lodging house.
1925. The three men leaning against the fence outside Dunbar House look to me like the same Lascars as in the photo above in this article.
In 1871, 40 West India Dock Road was owned by the Kirkaldys – a father and sons business consisting of plumbers, painters and marine engineers.
1889
Later, the building was occupied by The Cunningham and De Fourier Company who boasted of selling “the choicest potted meats & fish in the universe”. They were succeeded by a series of ships chandlers.
58-70 West India Dock Road
c1950
The most memorable building for many in this row was at No. 70, on the corner of Manadarin Street, the address of the Old Friends Chinese restaurant.
1960s (estimated)
1970s (estimated)
17-43 West India Dock Road
In the 1880s, immediately to the right of The Stranger’s Home were three houses, which were eventually replaced by a telephone exchange (“London Telephone Service – East Exchange”). Neighbouring them was a Salvation Army Hostel and then Blundell’s London Copper and Brass Works.
Later, the Salvation Army Hostel was replaced by an engineering works, which itself was subsequently absorbed by the neighbours, Blundell’s. Blundell’s eventually became part of the partnership, Blundell & Crompton Ltd. which operated from West India Dock Road until well into the 1960s.
1962
At No. 27-29 is Limehouse Police Station, built in 1940 on the site of an earlier police station.
Original Limehouse Police Station (click for full-sized version)
1960s
1970s
To the right of the police station was originally a row of houses, a large shop (later a Chinese restaurant) and at the corner of Birchfield Street: the Oporto Tavern (renamed the Westferry Arms) at 43 West India Dock Road.
1920s (estimated) 41 West Ferry Road
1920s. The Oporto Tavern
1960s. The Oporto Tavern
c1980. The Oporto Tavern
Recently (and looking pretty good)
A Small Diversion
Westferry Road meets West India Dock here, but that was not always the case. In fact, it is relatively recent. Until the 1950s, West Ferry Road (as it was then spelled) terminated at Garford Street. Leaving the Isle of Dogs, drivers could turn left and head for Emmett Street, or turn right in the direction of West India Dock Road.
Neither route – due to narrow roads and tight corners – was suitable for the heavy traffic which included many lorries and buses. Westferry Road was eventually extended… past Windward House and past Jamaica House, to meet West India Dock Road opposite the Oporto Tavern.
1950, showing the planned extension to Westferry Road. The map also shows the extent of the bomb damage in the area.
1970s. Oporto Tavern viewed from Westferry Road. On the left, the offices of the building firm R.W. Bowman Ltd and the TGWU building (both demolished).
1983. West India Dock Road and its junction with Westferry Road are at the top of the photo.
72-86 West India Dock Road
1890
Much of this block was destroyed by bombing during WWII, and what remained was cleared on the creation of the junction with the newly-extended West Ferry Road in the 1950s.
45-55 West India Dock Road
1932. No. 45 West India Dock Road is on the left.
The whole block formed by 45-55 West India Dock Road and the houses to their rear was cleared in the mid-1960s to make room for new housing. The following photo shows the cleared area. Across West India Dock Road, the construction of the TGWU building can be seen.
The 1963 photo above shows a distinctive building at 88 West India Dock Road, the former premises of engineering firm, James Walker & Co.
1800s. James Walker’s premises on the right, the West India Docks on the left.
James Walker – nephew of Ralph Walker who was responsible for building West India Dock Road – was involved in a wide number of major projects during his career, including at Greenland Dock, the first Vauxhall Bridge, Needles Light House, Caledonian Canal, Bishops Rock Lighthouse and the construction of the Commercial Road (he devised the stone tramways) – as well as numerous jobs in the East and West India Docks. In 1835 he became president of the Institute of Civil Engineers. The firm James Walker & Co. still exists, but outgrew its Limehouse base more than a century ago.
1970s. West India Dock Road, Nos. 88 (right) and higher (left)
At No. 92 was another Chinese restaurant that will be remembered by many as ‘Up the Steps’. This building was once a Chinese Mission House, opened to bring Christianity to the Chinese community.
The restaurant featured in an epsiode of the 1980s TV series, Prospects, in which the main characters are tempted to take advantage when the staff bundle out of the building and into the street in order to chase a group of customers who had done a runner. This clip has some great scenes of the interior of the restaurant, West India Dock Road and Garford Street.
Further east, and visible in the following photo, was the Railway Tavern, more commonly referred to as Charlie Brown’s (which became its formal name later).
1970s
1980s. An old road sign is still in place directing drivers to Millwall by turning right into Garford Street. Photo: Tim Brown
Charlie Brown’s (The Railway Tavern)
The Railway Tavern opened in about 1840. The landlord Charles Brown took over in 1896, taking with him a collection of curios and objets d’art that he had started to amass at his former pub, the Duke of Cambridge in Whitechapel Road.
Survey of London:
Contrary to popular belief, Brown’s collection was not the product of casual deals with sailor patrons on shore leave, but was carefully built up through purchases from dealers or via a number of overseas agents. Brown, the origins of whose wealth are obscure, acted as unofficial banker to many customers, and was often supportive of their interests. He is said to have given away large sums in aid of the 1912 dockers’ strike, and he was made honorary treasurer of the Stevedores’ Union.
The Edwardian and 1920s fascination with the Limehouse Chinatown as a hotbed of gaming, white-slavery, drug-taking and subversion — fuelled by popular writers such as Thomas Burke and Sax Rohmer, and a few sensational criminal cases — put Charlie Brown’s at the centre of the tourist’s map of dockland. After the First World War, charabanc-parties of sensation-seekers regularly descended on the pub. Famous visitors included King Alphonso of Spain, the actress Anna May Wong, and local politician George Lansbury.
Brown died in 1932 and his daughter Ethel took over the running of the pub along with her husband. Charles Brown Jr. became landlord of the Blue Posts pub across the road (more about this pub below).
April 1944
No sound on this 1945 film, unfortunately:
The pub was demolished in 1989, having to make room for the Limehouse Link roadway.
57-77 West India Dock Road
57 West India Dock Road, on the corner with Pennyfields.
The following photo by William Whiffin shows the Poplar Training School Band marching in West India Dock Road in the 1920s. Recognizable on the left are Harry Jacobs’ outfitter’s shop, J. Downton & Co (pump makers), Blue Posts (surrounded by scaffolding) and the Fire Station.
1920s. William Whiffin
Year unknown. The same view as the previous photo.
The Toll Gate
As was the case with Commercial Road, West India Dock Road was operated as a toll road by the dock company who also recovered some of its road-construction costs by selling parcels of land along the road. The original toll gate was just south of Pennyfields, but later it was replaced by a toll house in the road close to King Street (later renamed Ming Street) which operated until the abolition of the tolls in 1871.
1868. The toll gate and houses are shown in the centre of the map.
The following photo shows the toll house. Some of the buildings in the background are identifiable in the William Whiffin photo above.
Just past the toll gate, at 73-75 West India Dock Road, was The Blue Posts pub, which is on the right in the following photograph, taken from King (later Ming) Street looking over West India Dock Road towards Charlie Brown’s and Garford Street. It became the Buccaneer shortly before its demolition in 1987–8.
1925. Charlie Brown’s and The Blue Posts
1970s. Charlie Brown’s and The Blue Posts
1987. Charlie Brown’s and The Blue Posts (which by this time had been renamed The Buccaneer). Photo: Tim Brown
Fire Station
The fire station was completed in 1868 The adoption of motorized fire engines led to a reduction in the number of stations required, and a report in 1920 recommended the closure of Poplar Fire Station. The building then had a number of owners before it was demolished in 1987-8 for road improvements:
1940s. A lorry which had crashed into a bomb crater. The former fire station is visible across the road.
West India Docks Station
This was opened in 1840 as part of the London and Blackwall Railway. The platforms were timber built onto the viaduct. It was partly rebuilt by the Great Eastern Railway in 1896. It closed in 1926 and was demolished in 1931. The DLR station is in the same vicinity. The station included some rudimentary goods handling equipment in the shape of a crane and some chutes.
1840s. West India Dock Railway Station left, and the warehouses of West India Docks in the background.
View from more or less the same place in 1990. You can see the warehouses if you look carefully. Photo: Mick Lemmerman
Today, West India Dock Road no longer goes under the railway viaduct to the main West India Dock entrance. For history and images of the other side of the railway line, you might want to take a look at this earlier article: A Small Corner of The West India Docks.
Many other changes have taken place along West India Dock Road since the late 1980s. Or, to put it another way, much has been demolished thanks to the creation of the Limehouse Link road and tunnel. There is little or nothing left to remind us of the colourful history of the road. You can go on to Google Street View and have a look around, but this ‘Then and Now’ image sums if up for me.
In the 1860s, the population of the Isle of Dogs was less than 9000 (which is approximately the number of people who work in 1 Canada Square in normal, non-Corona times). Some men were employed at the West India Docks, the Millwall Docks opened during the decade and were not significant employers at the time, and most of the others were employed at the various engineering firms along the river – including at one firm which was an order of magnitude greater than the others: the Millwall Iron Works.
According to the Survey of London, The Millwall Iron Works of the 1860s was the most ambitious industrial concern ever established in Millwall, employing between 4,000 and 5,000 men (the workers naturally did not all reside on the Island, so there must have been a good deal of coming and going at the shift changes, including by those who travelled by ferry from over the water).
Before talking about the history of the works, it is worth showing just how large it was at one stage (27 acres). The land owned by the firm was actually larger than shown here on this satellite photo – as it included the former Ferguson mastworks directly to the east – what is highlighted here is just the land in use for iron works and ship building.
The boundaries of the Millwall Iron Works on a satellite photo.
The works were mentioned and praised in many Victorian publications, often with a certain amount of nationalistic fervour, including in the 1863 book, ‘Dockyard Economy and Naval Power’, by author P. Barry:
Ships are not only built, but the iron entering into the construction of the ships is chiefly manufactured on the spot. The works are both ironworks and shipbuilding works. Nowhere else at home and abroad is the combination to be found. It is peculiar to the Millwall Company and to the Thames Company. They are establishments of infinitely greater national importance than all the seven dockyards, representing together a greater iron ship and armour-plate producing power than is at the present time possessed by the whole of France.
Literally hundreds of vessels and thousands of iron products were manufactured there, frequently using groundbreaking methods, yet the world-famous works were never a financial success and their ownership and size changed frequently over the years.
The reasons were many, including: over-extended credit, expensive start-up and operating costs, investment in experiments, and so on. Another reason, a generous reason: the first owners were at heart engineers with a specific interest in innovation and experimentation, which was not always compatible with making money. William Fairbairn, John Scott Russell and then C. J. Mare – they attempted to make either the best or the largest or the strongest, and none enjoyed profitable operations on the Island. Less than generous: the various owners after Fairbairn were guilty of cronyism, financial mismanagement and business ineptitude.
William Fairbairn
The Millwall Iron Works had their origin in the yard opened in 1836 by Scottish engineer, William Fairbairn (1789-1874) on a three-acre site purchased from mastmaker Charles Augustus Ferguson. This was the first iron shipbuilding yard on the Thames.
1840s. Fairbairn’s Iron Works shown at the bottom, left of centre. Also shown on the map is the Mast House and Pond owned by Ferguson.
William Fairbairn in 1838. Painting by B.R. Faulkner for The Royal Society
The iron paddle steamer Pottinger, built at Fairbairn’s works.
Speaking in 1859, fellow Scot, marine engineer David Napier, who built his engineering works adjacent to Fairbairn’s, said that:
…[Fairbairn] built ‘upwards of a hundred-and-twenty iron vessels’, of which nine were built in sections at Manchester and the rest at Millwall. Millwall got off to a good start. The Ludwig was the first iron steamer built for the Bodensee.
In 1837 the Sirius, built to ply the Rhone from Marseilles, was a triple first for Fairbairn – the longest iron steamer of her day, the first to be launched on the Thames, and the first to be classified by Lloyd’s Register. In 1838 Fairbairn’s twenty-one year old daughter, Anne, launched the first iron steam-yacht, for the Emperor of Russia, an occasion witnessed by ‘thousands of spectators’. By the end of 1840 nearly 600 were employed at the Millwall yard, by which time thirty-one iron vessels had been built.
– Richard Byroms, University of Huddersfield ‘William Fairbairn experimental engineer and millbuilder’
The works never made a profit however and its continuing operation was solely due to the income from Fairbairn’s Manchester works. It couldn’t last though and in 1845 the works were for sale.
In 1853, the northern section of Scott Russell’s yard – including the recently-acquired Napier’s Yard – all but burned down. Afterwards, William Cubitt & Co. were engaged by Scott Russell to build a new main works building, which is today known as ‘The Plate House’.
1853
Circa 1860. The extent of the works shortly after the launch of the Great Eastern
During the construction of the Great Eastern it became clear to many that Scott Russell was borrowing more and more to keep the business afloat (no pun intended). Wikipedia:
At the beginning of February 1856, Brunel advised the Eastern Company that they should take possession of the ship to avoid it being seized by Scott Russell’s creditors. This caused Scott Russell’s bankers to refuse to honour his cheques and foreclose on his assets and on 4 February Scott Russell suspended all payments to his creditors and dismissed all his workmen a week later.
Russell’s creditors met on 12 February and it was revealed that Russell had liabilities of £122,940 and assets of £100,353. It was decided that his existing contracts would be allowed to be completed and the business would be liquidated.
After Scott Russell’s bankruptcy, before even the launch of the Great Eastern, the bank which held the mortgage on the Millwall Iron Works yard and equipment took steps to lease everything to a new occupant.
Charles John Mare
In c1859, soon after the launch of the Great Eastern, the works were taken over by Charles John Mare, an engineer and MP with a ‘colourful past’.
Previously, Mare had been partner in a shipbuilding firm at Bow Creek listed as ‘Mare, Charles John and Co, iron and wood ship and steamboat builders. Orchard Yard, Blackwall’. However….
Mare became the subject of further public disgrace in October 1855 when he declared voluntary bankruptcy with unsecured debts of £160,000 and total liabilities of £400,000. The news was greeted with ‘universal surprise’ as his dockyard now employed upwards of 4,000 men. In public he blamed his bankruptcy on the delayed payments of clients, but it appears that Mare’s underestimation of costs on a range of contracts, and his profligate investments in property, the GSSSC and his Newmarket racehorse stud all contributed to his perilous finances.
Source: https://victoriancommons.wordpress.com/2018/12/13/innovation-corruption-and-bankruptcy-charles-john-mare-1814-1898/
On its liquidation, the firm was taken over by Mare’s father-in-law, Peter Rolt, who renamed it the Thames Ironworks and Shipbuilding Co.
In Millwall, Mare fitted up his new yard and engineering shops, and added rolling mills for iron plates and armour, investing about £100,000 in the mill. One large, early contract for the firm (in 1861) was the production of armour plating for HMS Warrior, Britain’s first ironclad warship which was contructed by the Thames Ironworks and Shipbuilding Co.
Financially, though, things were not going well for Mare (they never did – and he died destitute in Stepney in 1898) and he was again declared bankrupt. His firm was taken over in 1862 by his creditors, the bank Overend Gurney & Company who created a joint stock company (the bank’s directors also became directors of the new company). Within a few weeks this company was liquidated, and another company created, again with a share issue.
1864 share certificate. I just ordered one of these from a collector of such things and am eagerly awaiting its arrival.
The works that had been much enlarged by Scott-Russell were at their largest. Survey of London:
The works were on either side of Westferry Road, linked by a horse-tramway. On the riverside were building slips, landing wharves, sawmills, joiners’ shops, an engine factory, foundries, pattern-, mould- and sail-lofts and a mast factory.
c1870
On the landside was concentrated the heavy plant for iron forgings, including hammered armour-plate, rolling mills for turning out bar-iron and angle-iron, armour plate and the rough bars used in the forge and the rolling mills. The scale of the armour-plate mill was vast, with a flywheel 36 ft in diameter, weighing more than 100 tons.
The armour-plate mill
Continuing his praise of the company and its products in ‘Dockyard Economy and Naval Power’, P. Barry wrote:
They possess a fine launching front of 1,500 feet on the River Thames, and in a time of pressure would no doubt turn out a very large amount of tonnage. At present the works are in course of development under the safe guidance of one of those self-made successful men of which England has so much reason to be proud. The Millwall Company have attained a high reputation for the production of rolled armour-plates. …they have quietly improved and perfected the mixtures for rolled armour-plates, until it may be said there is nothing left to be desired.
1863. Photograph from ‘Dockyard Economy and Naval Power’
Crossing the street from the building yard, the gateway opens on the extensive ironworks. The forge consists of six steam-hammers of the largest and most approved descriptions, furnished with steam and other cranes capable of turning out all descriptions of wrought-iron forgings up to 60 tons each piece.
1863. Photograph from ‘Dockyard Economy and Naval Power’
Mr. George Harrison, the managing director of the company, probably possesses as great experience in the organisation of large bodies of workmen as any man in England. He has supervised and is identified with the completion of some of the most considerable public works at home and abroad. For years past it has been his occupation to set to work and keep at work several thousand workmen, so as always to be within contract time, and so that from every contract a profit may be realised. Higher qualifications for the discharge of the onerous duties of managing director of the Millwall Company could not be thought of.
1863. Photograph from ‘Dockyard Economy and Naval Power’
1863. Photograph from ‘Dockyard Economy and Naval Power’
P. Barry also made note of some employment practices at the works which were quite novel for the time.
There is another noteworthy difference between the labour system of the dockyards and that of the Millwall Company. The half-holiday has been established, the bell ringing at one o’clock on Saturday afternoon. For the convenience and comfort of those workmen who do not reside in the neighbourhood, a spacious dining-hall with a large stove has been provided.
There is also a dining and reading room for the clerks, and before long there will be a library. Mr. Harrison is the patron of a workmen’s rowing club, attends the matches, and bestows medals. A cricket club is encouraged in the same manner. So is a band. Such are the relations subsisting between employer and employed at the Millwall Works.
That workers no longer had to work on a Saturday afternoon was very significant to the development of football and other team sports in Britain. In the following years, teams (often works teams) started to appear in Millwall and further afield. West Ham United, for example, started as the works team of the Thames Iron Works, who had close links with the Millwall Iron Works.
Workers at the Millwall Iron Works
In his book, P. Barry described at length the construction of the ironclad frigate, HMS Northumberland, which at a length of 400 feet and weight of 6,621 tons was a major construction job for the firm.
At the bow of this noble ship the erections for the convenience of the workmen are commensurate with the magnitude of their task. These are the plate-bending rolls, capable of bending plates 16 feet in breadth ; and these are the punching and shearing machines, and they are of great power. A steam-capstan hoists the beams into their places with a rapidity that is surprising. The Northumberland is building in an excavated slip, so as to allow the whole of the armour being fastened before the ship is launched.
Construction of HMS Northumberland
Ordered and laid down in 1861, construction of HMS Northumberland took five years to complete, in part due to frequent changes in design of the ship. On 17th March 1866, large crowds, including the Prince of Wales ‘and other distinguished personages’, assembled on the riverside and in boats to watch the launch. At 14:00 the shores were knocked away, the ship started moving towards the river, but…..
The Newcastle Weekly Courant, 23rd March 1866
The ship was stuck with its stern in the air, and there was a real risk that its back would break under its own weight. During the rest of the day, and throughout the night, workers fixed supports under the vessel in order to protect it. At high tide on Sunday another attempt was made to launch the Northumberland, but to no avail. A few weeks later, on 17th April and during high spring tides, pontoons were used to assist the launch, and this time it was successful.
Successful launch of HMS Northumberland
Less than a month later, however, the bank Overend, Gurney and Company – to whom the Millwall Iron Works were heavily in debt – collapsed, leading to an international financial crisis. Many Island firms were bankrupted as a consequence, including the Millwall Iron Works, Shipbuilding & Graving Dock Company. The liquidators seized Northumberland – which had been towed to Victoria Docks for fitting out – as a company asset and eight months passed before the Admiralty were able to take posssession.
HMS Northumberland
After the collapse of the company, its machinery and inventory were put up for sale by auction….
As for the premises of the Millwall Iron Works, these were fragmented and taken over by various companies, most of which had some connection with metal working or ship building. 1900 insurance maps of the area once covered by Millwall Iron works reveal the names of companies that operated afterwards for decades on the Isle of Dogs – some of which names will be familiar to older Islanders.
Guelph Patent Cask Co. Ltd, Joseph Westwood & Co., Edwards & Co, Millwall Metal Co. Ltd
1900. The boundary of the former Millwall Iron Works is marked in blue. (Goad Insurance Map, Museum of London)
1900. The boundary of the former Millwall Iron Works is marked in blue. (Goad Insurance Map, Museum of London)
1900. The boundary of the former Millwall Iron Works is marked in blue. Maconochie’s succeeded Northumberland Works, which was the site of the construction of HMS Northumberland. (Goad Insurance Map, Museum of London)
The following aerial photo shows the extent of the former Millwall Iron Works around 50 years after the works were last operated by a single business. At the time of the photo, quite a few of the buildings could be traced back to pre-Great Eastern times, and even as far back as William Fairbairn’s first works.
World War II, 1950s/60s redevelopment and LDDC activities obliterated most old Island buildings, but a few remnants of the Millwall Iron Works and its successors still survive.
The building now known as the Plate House at Burrell’s Wharf was built for John Scott Russell by William Cubitt & Co. in 1853 after the fire which destroyed William Fairbairn’s 1837 fitting and turning shop. The octagonal chimney is the stump of a chimney which was part of Fairbairn’s works (it’s original height and shape can be seen in the aerial photo above).
Burrell’s Wharf
In Westferry Road are the former houses and offices built by John Scott Russell and partners in the the early 1850s.
Burrell’s Wharf
Diagonally across Westferry Road is a former forge building (it’s marked on the previous map, if you look closely enough), now in use as workshops and gallery space.
The Forge
On the wall of The Forge is an iron plaque dating from 1860 when the building was a workshop belonging to C. J. Mare & Co.
The Forge
When I was young, I went to Harbinger Primary School. The view on two sides of the school – in Harbinger Road and in Westferry Road – was dominated by Westwood’s. Walking home, I would walk first past the building now known as The Forge, which I remember to be a dark, dirty and unwelcoming place (like all Island factories), before passing Burrell’s Wharf on the right.
Even as I kid I knew that the Great Eastern was launched here, but it’s only recently that I have really come to appreciate that my walk home from school was through an industrial site of huge significance to the history of iron-working and iron shipbuilding. And it’s only since researching this article that I have realised just how dodgy the businesses and their owners were.
In the 1920s, Albert Gravely Linney (1873-1936) was the first editor of The P.L.A. Monthly, the magazine of the Port of London Authority.
A keen and talented photographer, Linney took thousands of photos of the river, docks, wharves and bridges during his travels along the length of the Thames – all of which are now held by the Museum of London.
In addition to magazine and newspaper journalism, Linney also wrote books about Dockland, including Peepshow of the Port London (Sampson Low, c1930), a guide to the sites and sights of the Port of London, at the time the largest port in the world.
Not only is the book generously accommodated with some of Linney’s photos, one chapter is dedicated to the history of the Isle of Dogs and another details the origins of the West India Docks – all in Linney’s own quirky, anecdotal style. Some photos and sections from the book are reproduced here along with images from other sources.
The extent of the insularity of the Isle of Dogs has varied much with the passage of years and it is exact to say that to-day the “island” is smaller than ever before and more curiously shaped than ever before. In the early days I doubt not that the tide came and went over most of it and that rivulets at the northern end probably provided a boundary of more or less significant nature. With the construction of the West India Dock at the outset of the nineteenth century the Isle of Dogs had a very distinct boundary to the north … a clearly tracebable limit which separated it from the mainland.
1800 plan of the proposed West India Docks showing the extant fields, streams, ditches and the inland lake, Poplar Gut. Click for full-sized version
Three years after the West India Docks were opened (1802), the City Canal was constructed. … This City Canal never looked like being a financial success, and (1829) it was sold to the West India Dock Company and for a while was used for floated timber. That the making of the Canal was at that time useful is shown by a glance at the river charts of the day. They mark shoals at each end of Limehouse Reach. It is to be remembered, too, that navigation round the Isle of Dogs by sailing vessels before stream tugs existed was a risky and awkward matter.
Construction of the City Canal. The West India Docks are behind the wall on the left. The foreground of this image is approximately the location of the future City Arms.
On November 30th, 1857, a large company of onlookers assembled to see the Great Eastern enter the Thames, but when the dog shores were knocked off, no movement followed. …
I have seen a photograph taken at the launch of the Great Eastern. It must have been taken at the time of the crucial moment, for it shows, standing on one of the platforms erected for spectators, a number of hard-faced Victorians gazing steadfastly at the efforts to release the monster. In the foreground are some of those vitally interested; not only Scott Russell himself, but Isambard Brunel, Henry Wakefield and Lord Derby. The uniformity of their clothes is remarkable, for each one wears a wide-brimmed tall hat, oddly-shaped coat, and trousers marked by more folds and dents than creases. Wellingtons adorn the feet of all, but as it happens – though Victorians revelled in flowing beards – all save Scott are clean shaven.
Photo from Peepshow of Port of London.
At the close of the 1860’s reconstruction was begun and the old City Canal became merged into the South West India Dock as it now exists. This preserved, of course, the same degree of insularity for the “island” until after the War [WWI], when the Limehouse Entrance to the South Dock was closed – and so remains. … The total disappearance of that connected waterway from the Blackwall Reach Entrance to the Limehouse Entrance of the Import Dock arose because of the filling of Limehouse Basin, a step which also drove yet another witness to the reality of the Sailing Ship Era in London River into Limbo.
I was fortunate enough to obtain a photograph down by Limehouse Basin which is tangible evidence of how things were done in the not-so-long ago when steam had not proved all-powerful.
1928. The filling of Limehouse Basin, looking east from the dock side of “The Walls” with a checking post in foreground. Photo: A.G. Linney, Peepshow of Port of London.
The picture shows an old checking post near the junction of the closed Entrance and the Basin. Such checking posts were used in order to swing or steady a sailer during her progress inward or outward. A turn would be taken round the post and as the pull of the ship was so tremendous, the taut rope would literally eat its way into the wood and even into the hardwood battens screwed to the post to take the wear. Faintly showing can be seen the grooves which the straining rope made. In cases when the rope was very new it sometimes happened that the friction was sufficient to set the post alight.
View of the same post, looking west this time, towards “The Walls” (actually, not a wall but a wooden fence here, where an iron swing bridge crossed the dock entrance). Photo: A.G. Linney / Museum of London
[The West India Dock Company] determined not only that it should be a good wet dock with definite sections for Import and for Export, but also that the warehouses (belonging to the former) should be of the strongest description and that the protection afforded to everything should be of a solidity and nature calculated to exclude even the most desperate marauder.
Parallel with the formidable inner walls ran another, topped by a wrought-iron railing, outside of which was a twenty-foot broad ditch filled with water to a depth of six feet.
Still to be seen, testifying to the fortress-like quality of the “West India” is one of the guardhouses, the sole survivor of several built to accommodate the troops which protected these docks in their earliest days.
Photos: A.G. Linney, Peepshow of Port of London.
I have shown a picture of the checking-post, all rope-scored, and capstan beside the Limehouse Basin; these have just disappeared, but there are still several relics which point clearly back to the times when “West India” was crowded with sail, literally crowded. Two massive iron-cased pillars stand on either side of the cut from the Import Dock which gave access to the Limehouse Basin. These plated pillars forming the ends of the stout protecting walls rise sheer from the water’s edge and serve to make the dock even more impregnable. Their real use, however, was to deflect the jib booms of windships and prevent them from damaging the adjacent warehouse or walls, and saved the vessels from severe jolts.
Photo: A.G. Linney, Peepshow of Port of London.
Just behind No. 12 Warehouse, Rum Quay, in the Import Dock, stands a tall iron post over forty feet high, surmounted by a bell. Both post and bell have a history attaching to them. The post is an iron mast from a sailing-ship and was seized by the Dock Company because charges had not been paid. The bell sounds directly back into a past when wind-jammers abounded in these Docks, and when fire-fighting methods were of the crudest description. Every morning and every evening for a space of ten minutes this bell and others within the dock area were rung as a signal that all fires, lamps and candles, were to be extinguished.
Photo: A.G. Linney, Peepshow of Port of London.
Here and there on the base of the U of the Isle of Dogs still remain a number of dry docks, of which the Regent’s Dry Dock, Britannia Dry Dock, and Canal Dry Dock may be named.
1926. Looking from Byng Street towards Regent’s Dry Dock in Westferry Road. Photo: A.G. Linney / Museum of London
1928. Deptford Ferry Road (which went from Westferry Road – next to the Vulcan – to the river ). Behind the houses, the mast of the ship, Killoran, in Britannia Dry Dock. Photo: A.G. Linney / Museum of London
And what of the “Island” to-day? …. many industries, mostly of a rather smelly sort (oil refining, chemical manufacture, candle making) are carried on; there are some timber yards and foundries. Poverty is not discernible on any wide scale, but it has to be admitted that the streets are sombrely depressing, though to my view the small streets of Millwall and Cubitt Town are boulevards when compared with the utterly drear, blank depression of those rows of houses such as one finds in pit villages in South Yorkshire and Durham.
c1930. Rear of houses in Cahir Street (L) and Harbinger Road (R). Photo: Island History Trust / Isle of Dogs Housing Society
HOW TO SEE THE PORT OF LONDON. For a visitor with limited leisure …. and for just a sight of the docks from a bus top he might pick up the 56 L.G.O. bus near North Island Gardens [sic] and travel on it on the rim of the Isle of Dogs to the entrance to West India Dock; by so doing he will get a peep into Millwall Dock and passing glimpses into South West India Dock and into West India Dock. From West India Dock Road he can pick up a bus which will bring him right up to the Strand or Trafalgar Square.
1926. A bridger in Westferry Road looking south at Kingsbridge. On the left is a glimpse of the sailors’ home outside the main road entrance to Millwall Dock. Photo: A.G. Linney / Museum of London
I doubt if this route offers much attraction to the walker except when he may slip down to the various stairs which give a peep at the River here and there, and beyond North Island Gardens he we will not find much worth looking at.
The view from Island Gardens. Photo: A.G. Linney, Peepshow of Port of London.
The book is a good read, and a good-quality, inexpensive copy is not difficult to find online. A recommendation to anyone interested in the history of London’s docks in general, and on the Isle of Dogs in particular.
Commercial Road is a busy, polluted – and in places ugly – traffic artery which is very significant to me and my family history. From the mid-1800s, when my ancestor Cord Lemmermann arrived from Germany, and until the late 1900s, the Lemmermans always lived in its vicinity (the last ‘n’ in the family name was dropped during WWI). Me? I was even born there, at the East End Maternity Hospital.
Cord – he anglicized his name to Conrad – came from a farming family just south of Hamburg and, like many of his compatriots in the East End at the time, he ended up working at a sugar baker’s, “a notoriously labour intensive, hot, exhausting, and dangerous place to work” (see this website for a description of the industry).
For more than a century, male Lemmermans worked locally in the docks or on the wharves, or had other labouring jobs. After WWII, some migrated to far off places like Dagenham, Basildon, Aveley and …. the Isle of Dogs. I made a map of where everyone lived over the years, and here is the Shadwell area, with Commercial Road at the top:
Commercial Road is also, literally, connected to the Isle of Dogs (the usual subject-matter of this blog). When plans for the construction of the East India Docks and West India Docks were announced close to 1800, thoughts also turned to how to accommodate the dock traffic between them and the City. The dock owners were keen to ensure swift and reliable transport of their goods; after all, one of the main reasons for building the docks in the first place was to circumvent the delays – and thefts – caused when ships had to wait in the crowded Thames for their turn to be unloaded.
At the time, the main thoroughfares between the City of London and Limehouse were Cable Street and Ratcliff Highway (sections of both roads had various names over the years), but these were already very congested, being the main roads between the City and south Essex. It was proposed instead to build a new road.
The following image, a section of a 1753 image of London Hospital viewed from Whitechapel Road shows how rural the area was. In the background are ships and buildings along the Thames, and St. George in the East, but other than that, just fields.
Section of ‘View of the London Hospital in Whitechapel Road’, 1753. Artist: Jean Baptiste Claude Chatelain
Travellers can be seen passing through the fields, possibly following White Horse Lane. It was proposed to build the new Commercial Road based on sections of this old country path. The following is an extract from the “Plan of a road intended to be made from the West India Docks in the Isle of Dogs to communicate with Aldgate High Street in the City of London; to be called the Commercial Road.”
Thanks to an Act of Parliament, the Commercial Road Company (a business set up by the dock owners, its first chairman was George Hibbert) were awarded construction of the new road.
Section of the Act to allow construction of Commercial Road
After the Act was passed, the company set about raising funds, announcing the availability of subscriptions in national newspapers.
Money was also earned selling building plots along the road.
The opening of the Commercial Road in 1806 was quickly followed by the construction of new streets and buildings on both sides.
1812. Western half of Commercial Road
1812. Eastern half of Commercial Road
By the 1840s the road was completely lined with buildings, and the former fields at their rears had disappeared (the population of London grew from 1 million to 6.7 million between 1800 and 1900). The urbanisation of Stepney was complete.
1843
In the 1860s Commercial Road became a public road, with ownership transferring to the Metropolitan Board of Works, and road tolls were abolished. In 1870, the road was extended at its western end to remove the need for the tight turn into Church Lane.
1860s. Proposed Commercial Road extension
A Journey East along the Commercial Road
The new corner with Whitechapel High Street was known as Gardiner’s Corner after the department store that was built on the location.
c1900. Gardiner’s Corner
In 1972, Gardiner’s, which had closed a year earlier, was enveloped in a huge fire. The damage was so great – the clock tower collapsed at the height of the conflagration – that the famous landmark had to be demolished. The junction has been remodelled at least twice since then, and the corner no longer exists; the area has been reinvented by property developers as Aldgate Place.
1972. Photo: London Fire Brigade
Just round the corner in Commercial Road a fire station was built in 1875. Its engine house was rebuilt in 1900, and the set of buildings was replaced with a new fire station in 1929.
The Gunmaker’s Proof House, largely obscured by the van in the following photo, was built in the 1820s. The building to its right, 46 Commercial Road, is the former Hall of the Gunmaker’s Company. In the background, the huge Commercial Road Goods Depot.
Severn, King & Co. had a grocer’s shop in Church Lane and a sugarhouse around the corner, between Union Street and Mulberry Street. It burned down in 1819, and the remains became a bit of a sightseeing attraction for a while.
Looking back towards Gardiner’s Corner. The garage on the right is approximately on the site of the sugarhouse. Across the road are Morrison Buildings, demolished in the 1970s (a smaller block still exists on the other side of the road).
The following photo was taken at the corner with Berner Street (now named Henriques Street) in about 1890, two years after Jack the Ripper committed one of his murders in the street. From 1871 to at least 1881, Cord Lemmerman lived at 29 Berner Street with his wife Sophia Elizabeth, three children, and fourteen other people.
c1890. Commercial Road
A few yards east, and still looking east, in circa 1895. The Duke of Clarence pub on the left was at 71 Commercial Road, on the corner of Greenfield Road.
The sites of a few of the previous old images are all on this modern-day photo.
Looking east from Settles Street. In the background the construction of the tower blocks near Watney Street is visible. After years of living in a tiny flat above a clothes maker in Cannon Street Road, my uncle, aunt and cousins – Tommy, Margie, Danny and Katheryn – moved into one of these, Winterton House.
Approximately the same view as the previous photo.
At 226 Commercial Road was the Palaseum Cinema. Ken Roe (cinematreasures.org)
Located … between Anthony Street and Fenton Street. Designed in a Moorish style, when built it had two domes on each end of the facade, with a central dome over the entrance. This central dome had a decorative minaret located on each side. The 1,000 seat Fienman’s Yiddish Theatre, opened in March 1912 with productions of “King Ahab” and “Rigoletto”. It was soon also screening films, and in 1913, it was re-named Palaseum Cinema.
The Palaseum Cinema was closed on 19th June 1960 with Dorothy Dandridge in “Tamingo” and Randolph Scott in “Commanche Station”.
It was re-opened by Essoldo and re-named Essoldo on 18th October 1961 with Orson Welles in “David and Goliath” and the documentary “Blitz on Britain”. The Essoldo closed on 1st September 1966 with Elvis Presley in “Girls, Girls, Girls” and Jerry Lewis in “The Bellboy”.
It then re-opened as the Palaseum Cinema, screening Indian ‘Bollywood’ films. The Palaseum Cinema finally closed in October 1985, and was later demolished. In 2008, a recently erected building on the site contains a Tesco Express supermarket, with flats above.
The previous photo was taken from the corner with Philpot Street. The following was taken from the same place, but looking in the opposite direction. At No. 240a was the former Baptist Chapel with its grand, columned facade.
Slightly further, before Watney Street and just visible in the previous photo, was the Great Synagogue, founded in 1920 and closed in 1968.
1970
To the rear of the synagogue, and running parallel with Watney Street between Watney Passage and Chapman Road is Morris Street, where my dad grew up. The Lemmermans moved here from Tarling Street, just the other side of Watney Street.
c1959. Grandmother Mary (nee Coakley), neighbour, neighbour, Dad John, Uncle Connie (Conrad).
My Grandfather Thomas getting ready to go to work. I never met him or my Grandmother, I am sorry to say, they both died just before my birth.
Watney Street hosted a smallish market which was a bit run-down and was missing many buildings after WWII. Still, it was much missed when it and the area around it was demolished and redeveloped in c1970.
To the left of this terrace – across Sutton Street – is St. Michael and Mary church and school, which was attended by my dad and some of his brothers. Across Commercial Road at this location is The George Tavern, built in 1820 on the site of the ‘Halfway House’ tavern which is shown on the old maps above and which had been there since at least 1654.
1600s. The Halfway House.
The George Tavern in 2010. Photo: Mick Lemmerman
A few yards further east was where I entered the world, in the early 1960s, The East End Maternity Hospital.
The hospital became some sort of benefits office in the late 1970s, but is these days known as the Steel’s Lane Health Centre. I’d never heard of Steel’s Lane, and had to look it up – it is the narrow road behind the former hospital.
Travelling east again, past Arbour Square, the following is a photo taken in about 1890 from close to Stepney Causeway. London Metropolitan Archive:
On the right the protruding building was the Commercial Brewery Co., now the Grade II listed Troxy Theatre, with Dorset Street, now Pitsea Street to the right. On the left the Greco-Roman style building is Stepney Temple, Wesleyan East End Mission.
c1890. Commercial Road
A century later and my sister Angie, along with boyfriend Gary and son John, lived here on the right. A noisy place with the constant sound and smell of traffic.
The same view as the previous photo in 2015
Angie and John on the top floor balcony
Wikipedia:
Opened in 1933 on the site of an old brewery, Troxy cost £250,000 to build and when it first showed films had a capacity of 3,520, making it the largest cinema in England at that time. Inside the building the cinema had luxurious seating, a revolving stage, mirror-lined restaurants and customers were served by staff wearing evening dress. To add to the sense of luxury, Troxy staff sprayed perfume during film showings. The cinema showed all the latest major releases and had a floodlit organ which rose from the orchestra pit during the interval, playing popular tunes.
c1948
Between 1960 and 1963 Troxy stood empty until the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, took over and created the London Opera Centre School for the training of opera singers and professionals, which was based there from 1963 to 1977.
In the 1980s Top Rank (later named Mecca) Bingo took over the venue and bingo sessions were held twice a day, seven days a week until 2005 when the rise of online gambling led to Mecca taking the decision to stop using the building.
The venue was reborn as a live events space in 2006, and has continued to be used for concerts and other events ever since, hosting prestigious awards ceremonies, gigs, film screenings including Secret Cinema screenings and sporting events.
Diagonally opposite the Troxy was one of the best looking shops around as far as I was concerned – the Zenith dealership. There was something very un-English about it, almost American.
We’re close to the junction of Commercial Road, White Horse Road and Butcher Row (the present-day names), once the corner of White Horse Lane and White Horse Street, the northernmost extent of the 1794 Ratcliff Fire.
I spent many Saturday afternoons in this area; my dad and his brothers (and mate Sid) would religiously meet at Uncle Reg’s flat in John Scurr House to play cards, while my cousin Paul and I would hang around the streets or watch the telly. There was a baker’s at the start of White Horse Road which sold the best bread and rolls in the world – we’d always buy some of the still-warm bread before heading home. This photo shows the baker’s shortly before demolition – I don’t know it was called Wall’s when I visited the shop around 1970.
2012
1851. Looking east. St. Anne’s is in the distance, and Regent’s Canal Dock and the Thames are on the right.
2019. Similar view to previous image.
The other side of the railway bridge was dominated on one side by George Cohen’s scrap firm whose head office address was 600 Commercial Road, a number used as a logo.
1970s. Dad, Sid, Uncle Harry
The other side of the road had various shops and houses that were looking forlorn in the 1970s.
They’re looking better these days (but…..Tequila Wharf?).
We already entered E14 when we crossed the junction with White Horse Road and Butcher Row, but I never had the feeling that that area was Limehouse – it felt more like Stepney to me (if something can feel like Stepney). After the following rail bridge, though, we are clearly in Limehouse, with the Public Library visible in the near distance. Wikipedia:
The library was first proposed for construction in 1888, but the required finances could not be raised until 1900 when John Passmore Edwards was approached for assistance. He subscribed a sum of £5,000 and he subsequently laid the foundation stone on October 19 of that year. The library was opened to the public in November 1901 by the mayor of Stepney. More recently usage of the Grade II listed building fell, and it eventually closed in 2003.
That we are getting closer to the docks is apparent from the large building diagonally opposite the library: the Seamen’s Mission on the corner of Salmon Lane (whose name is a corruption of Sermon Lane due to its connection with St Dunstan’s Church in Stepney). This Grade II Listed building was originally known as the Empire Memorial Sailors’ Hostel. Its foundation stone was laid on the 13th of March 1923.
1920s (estimate)
2017
The mission (or hostel) is close to Britannia Bridge, which crosses Limehouse Cut. Diagonally opposite, on the other side of the canal, is Limehouse Town Hall, which opened in 1881.
Circa 1910. Limehouse Town Hall, with St Anne’s in the background.
Wikipedia:
After the civil parish became a part of the Metropolitan Borough of Stepney in 1900, the town hall ceased to be the seat of local government and was used as an events venue and administrative centre.
On 30 July 1909 the Chancellor of the Exchequer David Lloyd George made a polemical speech in the assembly room, attacking the House of Lords for its opposition to his “People’s Budget”. This speech was the origin of the phrase “To Limehouse”, or “Limehousing”, which meant an incendiary political speech. The building was badly damaged in the Blitz during the Second World War but was subsequently restored and re-opened by the Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, in November 1950.
About a decade after the re-opening, my parents married in the Town Hall. My dad was 18 and my mum 17.
My parent’s wedding. On the steps of Limehouse Town Hall.
Next to the town hall, and dominating the area is St. Anne’s Church, designed by Hawksmoor and consecrated in 1730.The following image is believed to show Limehouse Cut being widened a couple of years after the opening of Commercial Road (which goes from left to right, lined by a fence, in this image). On the left is the Britannia Tavern, which gave its name to the bridge. It is a very rural scene.
1809
The view from St. Anne’s churchyard across Commercial Road, with outfitters Grant’s on the other side.
Just out of view of the previous photos is The Star of the East pub, opened in the 1840s and still going strong.
The Star of the East pub.
Looking east from the pub, and the view was dominated by the Eastern Hotel, later renamed the Londoner (now closed and demolished)
The pub’s address was 2 East India Dock Road, and right of the pub from this angle is West India Dock Road – two more roads built by the docks company at the start of the 1800s. The Commercial Road ends here, 1.9 miles from Gardiner’s Corner.
Also here is a firm that had much business from the Lemmermans and other East End families over the decades, including when my grandparents, dad and sister died. The firm’s gone now.
1968. Express Wharf, with St Luke’s school in the background (and Lenanton’s beyond that). Photo: Hugo Wilhare
Survey of London:
In 1973 Freight Express merged with the shipping and freight-forwarding agency Seacon* to form Freight Express-Seacon Ltd. Express Wharf was redeveloped as the London Steel Terminal to handle steel cargoes from the EEC.
* Founded in 1955 as Sea & Continental Waterways Transport Ltd
Freight Express – Seacon ship
The terminal consisted of two sheds, the first of which was completed in 1976.
Circa 1980. Photo: Gary O’Keefe
Survey of London:
[The shed was…] equipped with high-speed gantry cranes for unloading from ships and loading on to lorries. Canopies project beyond the quay to give cover to vessels at berth.
Late 1970s.
Seacon shed interior in 1981
A few years later, work started on the construction of a second shed which – according to Survey of London – was four metres lower than the other, taking account of the introduction of hydraulically lowered wheelhouses on ships. I get to learn the most obscure facts researching these articles, but never quite what I need to improve my chances in a pub quiz.
1985. Demolition in preparation for construction of second shed. Stuck-together screenshots from the Prospects TV series.
1986. Construction of second shed. Photo: Peter Wright
Completed second shed. The crane in the far background is involved in the construction of the Cascades apartment block.
1990s. Photo: Peter Wright
Photos taken from the river in the following years show what had become one of the last working industrial wharves left on the Island (along with neighbours Lenanton’s) being steadily dwarfed by the surrounding construction of apartment and office blocks.
Lenanton’s and Seacon
1988. Photo: Ken Lynn
1989
Early 1990s
Inevitably, Seacon closed their Isle of Dogs terminal (the company is still going strong, operating at other places in the UK and around the World), and demolition started.
Photo: Paul Albon
Photo: Paul Albon
Photo: Paul Albon
Photo: David Jones
Ken Lynn captured an image of one local opinion about the demise of Seacon…..
Photo: Ken Lynn
In 2002, Tower Hamlets Borough Council received an application to build a 16-storey apartment block on the site which would go by the name of Seacon Tower. Approval was given, but the developers revised their application and requested that the building be increased to 23 storeys (this kind of thing seems to happen a lot on the Island). Final approval for a 21-storey version was granted in April 2003, and the building was completed in 2004.
2019. Seacon Wharf development from Hutchings Street.
Seacon Tower from the river
At the base of the tower, on the river side, is a low wall with a plaque dedicated to those who died in the WWII Bullivant’s tragedy.
See this article for more about the unveiling of the plaque and the story of the incident.
A familiar sight at the end of the Walls (or their start, depending on the direction you were travelling) was the firm, Jack Summers, on the corner of West Ferry Road and Emmett Street.
1970s. From left to right: Jack Summers, Emmett Street, former newsagents and tobacconists, George Baker & Sons, Providence House. All these buildings have been demolished (even this section of Emmett Street has disappeared) and West Ferry Circus is now on the site.
Recently, Harold Summers, whose father owned the firm, got in touch with me. He wrote:
My family used to have a Timber Yard and Kiln Drying business in the 1960s until the redevelopment, called Jack Summers (Kilning) Ltd. … I have some pictures taken at the Wharf when I worked there from 1967 through 1973. Would be happy to share if you ever need pictures from that era.
Of course I wanted to see the photos! There are probably thousands of photos out there, sitting in boxes, which haven’t seen the light of day for years and it’s fantastic when somebody makes them available for everyone to see. My thanks to Harold – the following photos and text are all his.
I went back for a visit in 1978 and drove down to the Wharf for a visit, taking my camera. It was late in the day so there were long shadows. There are a few pictures amongst them from an earlier day pre ’73 which were taken on a misty day when we were unloading a barge. Round about ’71 or 2 I remember we took over the Wharf next door (East side) to give us more outdoor storage space. There was a disused house on that site by West Ferry Road which we never utilized.
The older guy in the trilby hat is my dad, the guv, Jack Summers.
We ended up with two gantry cranes running up and down the shed.
… it was Bridge Wharf that was incorporated into Emmett St Wharf, and my pictures of the Coles mobile crane unloading the barges were on Bridge Wharf. Before that, we had to use the Gantry Crane in the shed on ESW that extended over the river. But it had other duties, Loading, and unloading lorries, as well as feeding the “Stickers”: who were constructing the stacks to be winched into the kilns.
Heavy work, lifting (by hand) to make the stacks of “sticked” timber, that was then winched on wheeled boggies into the Kilns. I’m sure today they have come up with a less back-breaking method.
The office we had on the corner of Emmett Street was pretty basic. Too often at weekends, the local kids would smash the windows and then jump inside and trash the place. The picture of the guy in the office in the sports-jacket is my late brother Simon.
When my father decided to close the business, we sold off Bridge Wharf to a bus or trucking company. Otherwise, I think the bank took the rest and owned it until the redevelopment.
Recently, friend and fellow Island historian, Con Maloney, pointed out to me a photo for sale on eBay, which I promptly purchased. It shows the Millwall Docks and much of the surrounding area in approximately 1965. Scarily, this photo was taken more than half a century ago, but the views are so familiar it feels just like yesterday.
Millwall Docks and area, c1965 (low-res version)
Mind you, some things I don’t recognise. For example, I never got to see the old houses in Glengall Grove, which were demolished a few years after this photo to make room for new flats. In 1965, the Mudchute was still PLA-land and the Transporter Yard and adjacent sheds were occupied by various firms at the time. Opposite Glengall School, just out of sight, there were still a few prefabs.
And what about these box-shaped things over the Mudchute? Allotment sheds? I am doubtful because the land doesn’t look like it was being cultivated, and all the ‘sheds’ seem to have windows pointing in the same direction. Perhaps preparation for new allotments?
Left of the possible allotments was the PLA football ground, close to the Pier Street entrance to the Mudchute.
Plenty to see over East Ferry Road to the right in the photo. The shed under construction was one of the first of a few to be built along this side of Millwall Inner Dock by Fred Olsen & Co. (see here for article). Below it in the photo, the Glass Bridge – its construction was completed in 1964, but the machinery to raise and lower the bridge was not installed until the year of the photo. There are no ships waiting to pass through, so it looks like the machinery was not yet installed at the time.
Further to the right, the area around the newly renamed Tiller Road (formerly Glengall Grove). No sign of the Island Baths, though, as they were being rebuilt at the time.
North of Tiller Road, on the other side of the Millwall Outer Dock was McDougall’s with its iconic 1930s-built silo building Beyond the flour firm, a yard full of timber which was in use by Montague Meyer’s. In the background are – from letft to right – Hesperus Crescent, Harbinger Road and Cahir Street.
Left of McDougall’s in the photo was the Millwall Dock Graving Dock (aka Dry Dock) where ships (including the Cutty Sark) were repaired or refurbished. By the time of the photo, the dry dock was rarely used and was losing money. In 1968 it was permanently flooded and was later redeveloped as Clippers Quay.
Back to Mellish Street, and then a little lower in the photo, a large area with demarcated lanes for waiting lorries. It’s by no means full, and I don’t know what the lorries are waiting for. This area of the docks was occupied mostly by the Central Granary and the Western Granaries (right in the photo), so I expect it had something to do with grain transport.
Here is the aforementioned Central Granary, at the time the main store of grain for London, but which would a few years later be replaced by a new granary at Tilbury Docks. The Central Granary was closed in 1969 and demolished a year later.
Finally in this little journey around a photograph, Millwall Cutting, which connected the Millwall Docks to West India Docks. South Quay DLR Station is today on the site.
The construction of Alpha Road started in the 1850s in the north of Millwall – forming a corner with the east end of Cuba Street and following a short section of the ancient winding path from Poplar High Street to the Greenwich Ferry, Dolphin Lane (part of which still exists off Poplar High Street). At this corner, some time after 1870, according to the Survey of London:
Edward Beach, a builder from Chelsea, [constructed] an intended public house, built on a 99-year lease… The “Dock House” had three floors and cellars, with bars, kitchen and parlour on the ground floor and three rooms on each of the upper floors, including accommodation for lodgers.
Circa 1890
1920s
The ‘intended public house’ doesn’t appear to have ever been licensed as such, and was variously described as a beer house or off-license in later records. For a while in the late 1800s it was owned by the licensee of the City Arms.
Circa 1920. The Dock House, 36 Cuba Street (Cuba Street is on the right of the photo). Photo: Island History Trust
Further along Cuba Street were Escott’s Cottages, tiny houses built in an alley off the street by local waterman and (later) publican, William Escott in 1840.
1920s. Survey of London
Left of the Dock House were some of the first houses to be built in Alpha Road.
2 Alpha Road. The side wall of the Dock House is visible on the right. Photo: Island History Trust
A few yards further south was the corner with Manilla Street, dominated by the North Pole pub.
The North Pole. Estimated 1920s
To the right of the North Pole is No. 72 Manilla Street, the family home of the Newman family where they for many years ran a chandler’s shop (grocer’s).
1910s (estimate). Photo: Alice Appelton (nee Newman)
On the other side of the North Pole was (and still is) a cul-de-sac, where the Newman family took a few photos over the years. I am extremely grateful to Astrid and Brian Appelton for allowing me to reproduce these photos, which belonged to Brian’s mother. They show views of Millwall which I have never seen before, and which were the inspiration for this article.
1932. Joyce Newman. Photo: Alice Appelton (nee Newman).
1932. Joyce Newman in her toy car. Looking north up the cul-de-sac towards No. 1 Alpha Road. The North Pole is just out of sight on the left. Photo: Alice Appelton (nee Newman).
Photo: Alice Appelton (nee Newman).
1930s. Leonard Newman with a glimpse of the North Pole behind him in a photo which was hand-coloured by his mother. Photo: Alice Appelton (nee Newman).
As mentioned, the cul-de-sac in the previous photos still exists. Here it is viewed from Manilla Street – in the opposite direction. The wall on the left in the new photo is visible on the right in the old photos.
April 2019
The view in the opposite direction, however, has changed completely since the Newmans took their photos.
Actually, the view started to change not long after Mrs Newman coloured in the photo of her son, Leonard. The corner of Alpha Road and Cuba Street was very close to the water of the West India South Dock – making the dock land a bit of a bottleneck here as far as the PLA was concerned. In the years following WWI, the PLA acquired land and properties at the end of Cuba Street and Manilla Street (including the Dock House) for an extension to their land.
1916. The corner of Cuba Street and Alpha Road, and the land acquired by the PLA in the following years.
Although acquired by the PLA in 1918, the Dock House remained open for many years, operating as some kind of night-club or social-club, but by 1937 it and the other properties at the corner had been demolished.
1937. The North Pole and the Newman’s home standing alone.
1937 was also the year that Leonard Newman turned 21, and a photo was taken of him standing in what are almost certainly the remains of Nos. 68-70 Manilla Street. The shed to the left and houses across the road are visible in the previous photo.
1937. Leonard Newman with a symbolic key to the door on his 21st birthday, standing on the site of demolished Manilla Street houses. Later loction of Solray Works. Photo: Alice Appelton (nee Newman).
The PLA then moved its boundary fences, and the corner was gone. One of the most famous photos of the Island was taken a year or two later: kids playing cricket at the new north end of Alpha Grove (recently renamed). Apparently this photo was completely staged by the photographer who got the kids to turn a box into a wicket, and pretend to be playing the game. Two years earlier, the road continued north here, following the path of the old Dolphin Lane, but now it made a sharp left turn into Manilla Street.
1-13 Alpha Road, c1939
Although No. 72 Manilla Street survived the demolition, it did not survive WWII – nor did all but one of the row of houses in the background of the ‘cricket photo’.
1949
1980s. The gap to the right of the North Pole is the site of 72 Manilla Street, which to this day has not been built upon. Photo: Tim Brown.
1962, 21-29 Alpha Grove on the right, the junction with Byng Street in the middle distance. Screenshot from the film, Postscript to Empire
It was all change again in the 1960s when virtually the whole area was cleared due to the construction of the Barkantine Estate. Alpha Grove lost more of its north end, and now terminated at the corner with Strafford Street. The ‘orphaned’ section of Alpha Grove – scene of the ‘cricket photo’ – became part of Manilla Street.
Circa 1980
1980s. The shorter-than-originally Cuba Street. Photo: Tim Brown
1980s. Compare to the 1932 photo of Joyce Newman in her toy car.
Since the closure of the docks, the area has changed repeatedly – and is still doing so. Here is a recent view of that little corner of Millwall, dominated now by the Novotel Hotel, which replaced a building that wasn’t even very old. The North Pole closed some years ago, but – remarkably – the building is still there.
Even this image is already out-of-date – at the end of 2019 demolition commenced on some of the sheds shown here. Undoubtedly, another tall building will rise on its site.
In 1861, the Metropolitan Board of Works gave permission to W. Cubitt & Co. to construct three roads off Manchester Road: Barque Street, Ship Street and Brig Street (spot the nautical theme).
1890. Wharf Road was later renamed Saunders Ness Road, and Newcastle Street became Glengarnock Avenue. Johnson Street, just in view on the left, is now part of Ferry Street.
Circa 1930. Looking from Saunders Ness Road down Ship Street, across Manchester Road, and as far as the bend in the street just before it met Stebondale Street. Photo: Island History Trust
This section of Manchester Road was occupied by many shops.
1913. Manchester Road at its corner with Stebondale Street on the left and Barque Street on the right.
Compare the previous photo with a modern view – only Christ Church still survives.
On the left is the Schooner Estate, built in the 1960s on a triangle of land bounded by Manchester Road, Glengarnock Avenue and Stebondale Street. On the right, George Green’s School. The houses and shops here got off lightly during WWII, which can’t be said for other buildings in the area.
Circa 1949
Circa 1949. Ship Street was renamed Schooner Street in the late 1930s. The detached buildings are prefabs.
The buildings on the south side of Manchester Road were all demolished in the 1970s to make room for George Green’s School. Those north of the road had been cleared a couple of decades earlier to make room for the Schooner Estate
1960s. A montage of two photos taken from Coleman’s shop in Manchester Road (next to the police station). It shows the demolition and clearance taking place. The prefabs in the background are in Glengarnock Avenue. Photo courtesy of Christine Coleman.
Present-day equivalent of previous view.
Survey of London:
[The Schooner Estate] was designed by the LCC Architect’s department and erected by Rush & Tompkins, of Sidcup, at a total estimated cost of £517,000. The first part was completed in 1963 and consisted of Galleon House, Capstan House and Nos 19–41 (odd) Glengarnock Avenue/Nos 139–149 (odd) Manchester Road. The remaining part, completed in 1965, comprised Carvel, Clipper and Frigate Houses.
Architectural model of the Schooner Estate
Photo of estate plan taken decades later by Con Maloney.
Also according to the Survey of London:
The layout of the new development was designed to relate to the Royal Naval College at Greenwich, on the opposite side of the river, and special attention was allegedly given to the colour and architectural treatment of Galleon House.
Do I detect a hint of scepticism there?
1963. Queenie Watts walking up Schooner Street. Behind her can be seen the rears of shops and houses in Manchester Road and the construction of Galleon House. Image is a screenshot from the documentary film, Portrait of Queenie.
The previous and following image are the only ones I have of the construction of the Schooner Estate (and the following is very blurred). Actually, there seem to be very few photos of the construction of any of the 1960s housing estates on the Island. I am sure there are some buried away in council archives, but clearly Islanders didn’t think it worth taking photos of these new estates.
1963. The construction of Capstan House seen from Millwall Park. This L-shaped building was originally a block of old people’s flats.
Once the estate was finished, however, the LCC took some photos of the results. The following few photos – unless the caption says otherwise – are from the London Metropolitan Archives.
There’s a ghostly figure in this photo – a double exposure?
Photo: Rosina Smith
The fence on the left was constructed when the prefabs along Stebondale Street were demolished in the 1970s. Source of photo unknown
I lived close by and was quite young when these photos were taken. The estate was a great place to play: it had grass, fences and walls to jump over, flat roofs to climb up on to, and there was the little playground under Galleon House (which is just in view on the right in the following photo).
The noise of kids playing football in there, or running up and down the stairs and messing about in the lifts and cages must have driven the residents up the wall (the cages were lock-ups situated on every other floor, where residents could store belongings which didn’t belong or fit in their flat).
See the end of this article for a list of some of the first residents of the estate, by the way.
1970s. Photo: Pat Jarvis
Circa 1974. Schooner Estate on the left, and construction of George Green’s School on the right.
1970s
1977. Silver Jubilee party. Photo: Pat Jarvis.
Circa 1978. Photo Mick Lemmerman
Estimated approx. 1990. Source unknown.
Circa 1990. Angie Lemmerman and Margaret Hook in Millwall Park. In the background is Capstan House, and beyond that, Galleon House, which was being refurbished at the time. Photo: Mick Lemmerman
2006. Photo: Peter Wright
2010
2010
Around 2011 construction started on new housing on the Schooner Estate New blocks were built on the site of the garages and all other open space along Glengarnock Avenue. Capstan House was also demolished so that the development could continue along Stebondale Street. It is known as ‘Parkside Quarter’, which presumably is more marketable a name than ‘Schooner Estate’.
The development of Parkside Quarter
Screenshot of Telford Homes’ website
Early Residents
Anyway, back to the mid-1960s, here is a list of some of the earliest residents. It is far from complete because the information comes from electoral registers, and not everyone bothered to register to vote or keep their address up to date in the register. I also don’t have the names of early occupants of the flats above the shops. I am happy to fix the shortcomings if you have any additions or corrections (you can comment on this article).
Capstan House 8 Lerpiniere
13 Jones
17 Towler
18 Pritchard
19 Frost
22 Tand
24 Baily
Carvel House 4 Payne
5 Mitchell
7 Griggs
10 Griffiths
Clipper House
1 Williams
5 Coleman
8 Bennett
10 Hoskins
11 Bridges
12 Soper
14 Blashka
16 Roberts
Frigate House
1 Hill
2 Blackall
5 Liddell
6 Duggan
8 Middleton
9 Hodder
12 Thake
Galleon House 1 Moss
12 Thornton
13 Marlborough
15 Knowles
18 Everingham
21 Griffin
23 Hale
25 Lowe
27 Rolfe
27 Starling
32 Ryan
33 Sampson
35 Errington
38 Thackray
40 Roberts
40 Viney
42 Degaris
42 Higgs
46 Scott
48 Rickhuss
49 Burnett
50 Bartlett
51 Miller
52 Watkinson
53 Sidonie
54 Nicoli
57 Wright
58 Robinson
59 Emms
63 Rampersad
63 Wright
64 Brookes
69 Fairweather
70 Pine
72 Gillard
73 Stephens
74 Mingay
75 Gleeson
77 Webb
78 Lee
80 Lee
