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quippeThe Blurb On The Back:
Medieval burial ground, Victorian hell hole, Blitz bombing target, modern artists’ playground: the East End has always been London’s strange alter ego, with an identity unlike anywhere else.
Here Ed Glinert tells the dark, unusual and arcane stories of its streets and people – from the mystics of Wellclose Square to the gory Radcliffe Highway murders, from Huguenot silk weavers to the horrors of the Black Death, from the heyday of the great docks to the gentrification of Spitalfields – revealing the underbelly of the city as never before.
Glinert’s book gives a solid overview of the last 300 years of the history of the East End (defined as the 4 mile wide territory east of the City of London marked by the boundaries of the Lea river to the east, Thames to the south and Victoria Park to the north).
Attention is given to all of the usual suspects - the arrival of the Huguenots and impact of immigration generally on the East End’s population (including the Jewish Ghetto), the docks, their workers and the slums and the Blitz. There is a particular focus on some of the more horrific crimes in the East End’s history – Jack the Ripper, the Radcliffe Highway Murders and the crimes and riots from the anarchists and communists.
Glinert has clearly done a great deal of research and there’s a long bibliography of sources at the back, together with a comprehensive index. There are lots of fascinating nuggets and small details that help bring events to life – e.g. the cuts and grazes suffered by dockers unloading salt.
Surprisingly the weakest section is that given to Jack the Ripper, where Glinert spends a lot of time recounting the theory that Masons were involved in the killing owing to the fact that certain Masonic rituals appeared to be referenced by the killer and later devotes time to the theory that the artist Walter Sickert was involved in the murders. Neither of these theories seem to carry much weight with Ripperologists.
There’s also a certain amount of editorialising by Glinert when it comes to more recent planning history and he is particularly contemptuous of the decision by planners to tear down the old terraces houses and squares in favour of modern office blocks and council housing blocks. While some of the criticism is understandable with the benefit of hindsight, little consideration is given to the attitudes of the time, which has a distorting effect.
Nevertheless, this is an interesting book with a lot that enthusiasts of social history can enjoy and learn from. Definitely worth a flick through.
The Verdict:
It’s a solid book with a lot of interesting pieces of information that help to give a solid overview of the history of the East End. Glinert is clearly passionate about his subject, which leads to some editorialising and preference for certain crime theories over others. However that doesn’t detract from the quality of the read.
Medieval burial ground, Victorian hell hole, Blitz bombing target, modern artists’ playground: the East End has always been London’s strange alter ego, with an identity unlike anywhere else.
Here Ed Glinert tells the dark, unusual and arcane stories of its streets and people – from the mystics of Wellclose Square to the gory Radcliffe Highway murders, from Huguenot silk weavers to the horrors of the Black Death, from the heyday of the great docks to the gentrification of Spitalfields – revealing the underbelly of the city as never before.
Glinert’s book gives a solid overview of the last 300 years of the history of the East End (defined as the 4 mile wide territory east of the City of London marked by the boundaries of the Lea river to the east, Thames to the south and Victoria Park to the north).
Attention is given to all of the usual suspects - the arrival of the Huguenots and impact of immigration generally on the East End’s population (including the Jewish Ghetto), the docks, their workers and the slums and the Blitz. There is a particular focus on some of the more horrific crimes in the East End’s history – Jack the Ripper, the Radcliffe Highway Murders and the crimes and riots from the anarchists and communists.
Glinert has clearly done a great deal of research and there’s a long bibliography of sources at the back, together with a comprehensive index. There are lots of fascinating nuggets and small details that help bring events to life – e.g. the cuts and grazes suffered by dockers unloading salt.
Surprisingly the weakest section is that given to Jack the Ripper, where Glinert spends a lot of time recounting the theory that Masons were involved in the killing owing to the fact that certain Masonic rituals appeared to be referenced by the killer and later devotes time to the theory that the artist Walter Sickert was involved in the murders. Neither of these theories seem to carry much weight with Ripperologists.
There’s also a certain amount of editorialising by Glinert when it comes to more recent planning history and he is particularly contemptuous of the decision by planners to tear down the old terraces houses and squares in favour of modern office blocks and council housing blocks. While some of the criticism is understandable with the benefit of hindsight, little consideration is given to the attitudes of the time, which has a distorting effect.
Nevertheless, this is an interesting book with a lot that enthusiasts of social history can enjoy and learn from. Definitely worth a flick through.
The Verdict:
It’s a solid book with a lot of interesting pieces of information that help to give a solid overview of the history of the East End. Glinert is clearly passionate about his subject, which leads to some editorialising and preference for certain crime theories over others. However that doesn’t detract from the quality of the read.
