chapter 1. whitechapel road by day | chapter 2. aldgate at night
chapter 1. whitechapel road by day
IF a foreigner were now to visit this great metropolis with the object of studying it as a vast social problem, he would find it, broadly speaking, divided into three parts—the abode of wealth, the world’s mart, and the abode of poverty.
Further, he would discover that the abode of wealth knows nothing of the abode of poverty, scarcely recognises its existence, and even tries to take from it the common name of London; that the West would if it could ignore the East, and succeeds in suppressing all knowledge of the appearance, conditions of life, and difficulties of its unfortunate brother.
If he hunted up old books, and was interested in archaeology, he would see that this used not to be. That wealth and poverty once built together, that the poor man could approach the rich, and that benefit resulted to the former from the contact. That the rich, if unselfish, gave money to the poor to improve their dwellings, and if selfish tried to remove the eyesores, filth and crime, which existed so near to their own doors.
He would discover that gradually, but more particularly lately, the rich divorced themselves from their poorer brethren, whose needs became neglected because unseen; that the two went their separate ways, and drifted farther and farther apart, until at present they had almost forgotten one another’s existence.
Then, probably, he would seek the rich, and discover to his surprise that they were not uncharitable, and were the most enterprising people in the world. He would remember to have seen them everywhere in all the poor streets and back slums of foreign cities. He would be told of their mighty grants to the poor of other countries, and their untold exertions to better the condition of the savage. He would hear them describe such and such a foreign city as poor and miserable, though they would not mention the far greater poverty and squalor of the East of London.
If he went into society, he would be led to believe that the City bounded London in the East, that no one had ever been further in that direction than the Tower, that the vast outlying districts were never mentioned; and if he stated that he had travelled in the unknown region, he would be frowned at as though guilty of a social fault. Did he force the subject of the East upon the denizens of the West, and remind them of their starving London brother, they would refuse to recognise the latter, and speak of him as if he were a bastard.
Then probably he would go and seek the people of the East, and try to find what they had done to deserve such wholesale neglect. He would find a people of good natural character, but hampered by their wretched dwellings, who found it hard to escape from their hideous surroundings; who had waited long for the help that never was forthcoming, and paid too highly for the little which they got; who did not know what pleasure meant, and had sunk into a deep despair.
The ward of Aldgate has perhaps seen more changes than any other portion of the old metropolitan area. The site of the glorious church and monastic buildings of Holy Trinity, it was, in the time of the first narrative, distinguished for its architectural interest. Few, on gazing at the monastery in the earlier part of the sixteenth century, could have thought it possible that so important and splendid a pile of buildings would in so short a time have almost wholly disappeared. Had it not been for the foul crimes which took place on the most sacred spot in the church of Holy Trinity, probably some part of that building would now exist and be used for the purposes of worship, as is the case with St. Bartholomew the Great, Smithfield, a church contemporaneous with Holy Trinity, though only about a fourth its size. But this was not to be; Monk Martin stamped the once hallowed edifice with the curse of Cain, and a revenging power decreed that it should be destroyed, and its site become the scene of other fearful crimes.
Good men there always are, however, who carry on an unceasing struggle against evil, and in the reign of James I. an old Lord Mayor of London remembered with sorrow the destruction of Holy Trinity, and erected on a portion of its site the little church of St. James, Duke’s Place. St. James’s was indeed a poor affair in comparison with the former stately building, but we praise the spirit of the mayor who erected it, “as a Phoenix rising out of the old church,” and as the quaint old epitaph has it—
“He never ceased in industrie and care,
From Ruins to redeem the house of Praier.”
St. James’s was destroyed in the eighteenth century; it was, however, rebuilt, but finally disappeared about twenty years ago.
The sketch shown on the opposite page was made when the rebuilt church had been destroyed. A small portion of the tower was still standing, surrounded by gravestones torn up and flung about in wild disorder. The church door was lying flat upon the ground, and bits of the pews were seen mixed up with fragments of window glass and brickbats. St. James’s Church stood over a part of the site of the nave of Holy Trinity.
It is interesting to note that the whole neighbourhood of the Tower to Aldgate once presented a succession of religious houses established by our kings and queens.
There was the great Hospital of St. Katherine, founded by Matilda, Queen of Stephen, and rebuilt by the good Philippa; Eastminster Abbey, founded by Edward III.; the Abbey of the Minnies, or Minories, founded by Richard, King of the Romans; the Friary of the Holy Cross, Crutched Friars; Millman’s Almshouses; the Hermitage, in Aldgate; the Papey for Aged Priests, close to Holy Trinity Priory; and others. Where are all these now? A dock covers the site of one—St. Katharine’s. A writer in the Gentleman’s Magazine in 1829, when this change was effected, pointed out that “The worship of God was sacrificed to that of Mammon.” A huge railway runs over the site of another. A third is covered by giant warehouses, and the rest are built over with squalid tenements, where the poor are huddled together like beasts in a pen.
There are a few—though very few—small institutions where religion is taught, and from which charity is spread, but
“What are they among so many?”
The Whitechapel Road, in the “year of grace”1888, is a sort of portal to the filth and squalor of the East. Here begins that dreary region from which healthful and legitimate pleasures seem banished, and hard and ill-paid toil to be the lifelong fate of the inhabitants. Stand in the one broad thoroughfare, Whitechapel Road, and watch the constant stream of passers-by, and try and find a happy-looking face! How dismal they all look; what a weight of care they seem to carry!
Early in the morning thousands pass along, to earn their daily bread. Half-starved clerks, with shiny coats, shabby hats, and pinched-in faces, presenting an appearance of beggarly gentility, that most pathetic sight of modern civilisation. Could we look into the tail-pockets of many of their black coats we should see, carefully ensconced with all privacy and care, a slice of bread which, with the addition of an apple, and eaten in some sly corner of the streets, frequently constitutes the dinner of these respected and worthy souls.
And such as these, with successful tradesmen, form the aristocracy of a population as large as many a stately city!
Then, lower in the scale, we see the skilled mechanics, the most useful men of all; but these look gloomy now the foreigners are stepping in and making rotten goods, getting employment by working longer hours for shorter pay.
And then the factory hands, the lowest class, limping to the badly-ventilated rooms to work, perhaps for fifteen hours for a wretched little pittance. Look at their wan faces, and thin, ill-fed bodies; what a tale could they tell of misery and over-work!
And the vast army of the unemployed who loaf about the streets, stand outside public-houses, and level curses and obscene language at innocent passers-by!
Lastly, the girls. “What are they like? Are they the types of purity and sweetness that poets love to talk of?—made by the Creator to guide the rougher natures of men unto the realm of light and love? Is this group of factory girls dressed up in ribbons and feathers of garish, screaming colours, shouting foul words, and laughing loud at every man they pass, likely to refine a home?
Is this other group of shabbily-dressed girls, with care and labour stamped upon their injured faces, likely to do more than provide bare crusts for the little ones at home?
Yes, the Whitechapel Road is not a tempting place for a refined Londoner or foreigner, for it is a place where innocence no longer dwells; where the young in years are old in knowledge, though, alas! not of good, but of evil.
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A SATURDAY evening in the East-end of London! Who that has seen this sight can ever forget it? Crowds upon crowds of dissolute men and women jog and jostle each other upon the pavements, and the roads are nearly impassable from the costers’ carts, containing every conceivable article of diet, apparel, and mechanical contrivance. The men shout out the rare value of their goods in exultant tones, as if to defy comparison with their rivals further on.
How depressing is the scene! But what is that singing we hear? Two big young girls with dishevelled hair, arm in arm, brush past us—excited by drink, screaming from lungs of iron the song last heard at the ‘Cambridge’ hard by.
As we walk on we pass a church with two huge lamps, vieing with the public-house lights in importance and attractiveness—and these reveal a picture by one of our greatest allegorical painters. See that dear young child awe-inspired, wonderingly staring at the mosaic which he cannot understand, but vaguely feels is telling of a life widely different from that of his own debased surroundings.
But as the commemoration of the Resurrection dawns upon us, the streets suddenly become dark, for the bright lights are extinguished and the duped ones are ejected from the glittering palaces, some to stumble and totter through innumerable alleys to what is called home, and others to lounge about with apparently no object in life. Life itself seems dead in them as they live. Half-starved many of them, and homeless; without wishing it or wanting it, falling into sin—apparently unintentionally. How can we blame them? Should we be better?
But let us hurry out of this pandemonium into purer air. We breathe once more as we approach Aldgate’s comparative quiet, and proceed westward. But why that whistle and hurrying of men to Mitre Square? Let us join them, and find out for ourselves.
There with the aid of the policeman’s bulls-eye we see a sight so horrible that full particulars cannot be printed, but it is a counterpart of that which the monks of Holy Trinity saw when they arrived at that identical spot in the year 1530.
Measure this spot as carefully as you will, and you will find that the piece of ground on which Catherine Eddowes lies is the exact point where the steps of the high altar of Holy Trinity existed, and where the catastrophe to the ten foolish gallants occurred two centuries later.
Oh, what can we do that these horrors may be stayed? What CAN we do? This is now the cry of public lamentation and woe!
Is the ghost of Monk Martin still hovering over the scene of his crime? Is the power of the Evil One still active? or is it the vengeance of the Almighty that has cursed this spot with a curse so awful in its results that no age can with certainty evade punishment?
Who is there so bold as to say that the one bit of ground that has sustained the weight of countless lifeless bodies, during more than three centuries, is not accursed— that there is no Curse upon Mitre Square?
* * * * *
As the pen drops from the hand cramped with writing this fearful historical narrative of crime and retribution—the brain in very sympathy and overwrought with recounting the ghastly tragedies of present and bygone times, seeks ease and rest in slumber, and in sleep the veil of the future is unfolded.
What is that white-robed procession bearing tapers and singing the Miserere? O blessed sight, behold a stream of Magdalens, with, flowing hair and downcast eyes, winding their way, as did the forty monks of old, to the accursed spot.
And as they approach it, carrying their precious ointment, behold a radiant light is in the air, reflecting a benediction on the spot below; and I see aloft the choir of Holy Trinity as it was before the curse fell upon it, restored by the Divine Architect to its old beauty and splendour, the rounded arches and the carved stalls on either side the altar. Instead of monks, I see, through the wreath of incense, a choir of angels waving their palm branches to the rhythm of the heavenly antiphon—so full of favoured
romise to all wanderers in this troublesome world:—
V: “THOUGH YOUR SINS BE AS SCARLET,
THEY SHALL BE AS WHITE AS SNOW!”
R:“THOUGH THEY BE RED LIKE CRIMSON,
THEY SHALL BE AS WOOL!”
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Intro | Book I | Book II| Book III | Images of Mitre Square
