| Whitechapel | |
|---|---|
 Entrance toWhitechapel station | |
  Whitechapel Location withinGreater London | |
| Population | 14,862 (Whitechapel ward 2011)[1] |
| OS grid reference | TQ335815 |
| London borough | |
| Ceremonial county | Greater London |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | LONDON |
| Postcode district | E1 |
| Dialling code | 020 |
| Police | Metropolitan |
| Fire | London |
| Ambulance | London |
| UK Parliament | |
| London Assembly | |
| 51°30′59″N0°4′9″W / 51.51639°N 0.06917°W /51.51639; -0.06917 | |
Whitechapel (/ˈwʌɪtˈtʃæpəl/) is an area in London, England, and is located in theLondon Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is ineast London and part of theEast End. It is the location ofTower Hamlets Town Hall and therefore the borough town centre. Whitechapel is located 3.4 miles (5.5 km) east ofCharing Cross.
The district is primarily built aroundWhitechapel High Street andWhitechapel Road, which extend from theCity of London boundary to just east ofWhitechapel station. These two streets together form a section of the originally Roman Road from theAldgate toColchester, a route that later became known as theGreat Essex Road. Population growth resulting from ribbon development along this route, led to the creation of the parish of Whitechapel, a daughter parish ofStepney, from which it was separated, in the 14th century.
Whitechapel has a long history of having a high proportion of immigrants within the community. From the late 19th century until the late 20th century the area had a very high Jewish population, and it subsequently became a significant settlement for theBritish Bangladeshi community. Whitechapel and neighbouringSpitalfields were the locations of the infamous 11Whitechapel murders (1888–91), some of which were attributed to the unidentifiedserial killer known asJack the Ripper. These factors and others have led to Whitechapel being seen by many as the embodiment of London's East End, and for that reason it is often used torepresent the East End in art and literature.[2]
Landmarks include Tower Hamlets Town Hall, theRoyal London Hospital and theEast London Mosque.
Whitechapel was originally part of theManor and Parish of Stepney, but population growth resulting from its position just outside theAldgate on the Roman Road toEssex resulted in significant population growth, so achapel of ease, dedicated toSt Mary was established so people did not have to make the longer journey to Stepney's parish churchSt Dunstans. The earliest known rector was Hugh de Fulbourne in 1329.
Whitechapel takes its name from that church,St Mary Matfelon, which like the nearbyWhite Tower of theTower of London was at one time whitewashed to give it a prominent and attractive appearance. The etymology of theMatfelon element is unclear and apparently unique.
Around 1338, Whitechapel became an independent parish, withSt Mary Matfelon, originally achapel of ease within Stepney, becoming the parish church.
Whitechapel's spine is the old Roman Road, that ran from theAldgate onLondon's Wall, toColchester inEssex (Roman Britannia's first capital), and beyond. This road, which was later named theGreat Essex Road, is now designated theA11. This historic route has the names Whitechapel High Street and Whitechapel Road as it passes through, or along the boundary, of Whitechapel.[3] For many centuries travellers to and from London on this route were accommodated at the manycoaching inns which lined Whitechapel High Street.[4]
The area of the parish extended around 1400 metres from the City of London boundary, originally marked byAldgate Bars around 180 metres east of theAldgate itself, to vicinity of the junction with Cambridge Heath Road where it met the boundaries ofMile End andBethnal Green.
The northern boundary included Wentworth Street and parts of Old Montague Street. The parish also included an area aroundGoodman's Fields, close to the City and south of St Mary's, the parish church.
The area became an independent parish around 1338. At that time parish areas only had an ecclesiastical (church) function, with parallel civil parishes being formed in the Tudor period. The original purpose of the civil parishes was poor relief. The area was part of thehistoric (or ancient) county ofMiddlesex, but military and most (or all) civil county functions were managed more locally, by theTower Division (also known as the Tower Hamlets).
The role of theTower Division ended when Whitechapel became part of the newCounty of London in 1889, and most civil parish functions were removed when the area joined theMetropolitan Borough of Stepney in 1900.
In 1965 there was a further round of changes when theMetropolitan Borough of Stepney merged with theMetropolitan Borough of Bethnal Green and theMetropolitan Borough of Poplar to form the newLondon Borough of Tower Hamlets. The new borough of Tower Hamlets covered only part of the historic Tower Division (or Tower Hamlets). At the same time, the area became part of the newGreater London, which replaced the older, smallerCounty of London.
Whitechapel, along with areas such as neighbouringShoreditch,Holborn (west of the city) and Southwark (south of the Thames), was one of London's earlier extra-mural suburbs. Beyond controls of theCity of London Corporation, Whitechapel was used for more polluting and land-intensive industries the city market demanded, such as tanneries, builders' goods yards, laundries, clothes dyers,slaughterhouse-related work, soaperies, and breweries. Whitechapel was strongly notable for foundries, foremost of which was theWhitechapel Bell Foundry, which later castPhiladelphia'sLiberty Bell, Westminster'sBig Ben,Bow Bells and more recently the LondonOlympic Bell in 2012. Population shifts from rural areas to London from the 17th century to the mid-19th century resulted in great numbers of more or less destitute people taking up residence amidst the industries, businesses and services ancillary to theCity of London that had attracted them.
TheWhitechapel Mount was a large, probably artificial mound, of unknown origin, that stood on the south side of Whitechapel Road, about 1200 metres east of theAldgate, immediately west of the modern Royal London Hospital. The Mount is widely believed to have formed part of London's defences during theWars of the Three Kingdoms in the mid-17th century. This was either as part of a ring of fortifications known as theLines of Communication which were in operation from 1642 to 1647,[5] or additionally or alternatively, as one of the three forts which replaced that system of defence immediately afterwards.
The mount was removed to allow residential development in 1807–1808.
In 1680,Ralph Davenant (rector of the parish of Whitechapel), his wife and his sister-in-law bequeathed a large sum for a schoolmaster to teach literacy, numeracy and the "principles of the Church of England" to forty boys of the parish. In the same deed Henry and Sarah Gullifer undertook to provide for the education of thirty poor girls; namely a schoolmistress was to teach them the "catechism, reading, knitting, plain sewing, and any other useful work".[6] In 1701 an unknown donor gave the foundation £1,000 (equivalent to £190,000 in 2023) so the children might be suitably clothed as well as educated.[6] Between 1783 and 1830 the school received twenty gifts totalling over £5,000.[6] Typical income seems to have been about £500 per year, which was much more than most vicar's and rector's livings, net.[6] Supporting modern education, theDavenant Centre continues and theDavenant Foundation School has, since 1966, been based atLoughton inEssex.[6]
The London Infirmary was established as avoluntary hospital in 1740, and within a year soon moved fromFinsbury to Prescot Street, a very densely populated and deprived part of southern Whitechapel. Its aim was "The relief of all sick and diseased persons and, in particular, manufacturers, seamen in the merchant service and their wives and children".
The hospital moved to the then largely rural Whitechapel Road site in 1757, and was renamed the London Hospital. It became known as theRoyal London Hospital on its 250th anniversary in 1990. The new building, adjacent to the old building it replaced, was opened in 2012.[7]
In 2023 the old hospital building became the newTower Hamlets Town Hall, replacing theMulberry Place site inPoplar.
In common with many other parts of theEast End of London, Whitechapel gained a reputation for severe poverty, overcrowding, and the social problems that came with it.[8][9]
William Booth began hisChristian Revival Society, preaching the gospel in a tent, erected in theFriends Burial Ground, Thomas Street, Whitechapel, in 1865. Others joined hisChristian Mission, and on 7 August 1878 theSalvation Army was formed at a meeting held at 272 Whitechapel Road.[10] A statue commemorates both his mission and his work in helping the poor.[11]
The population grew quickly with migrants from the English countryside and further afield. Many of these incomers were Irish or Jewish. Western Whitechapel, and neighbouring areas of Wapping, became known asLittle Germany due to the large numbers of German people who came to the area; many of these people, and their descendants, worked in the sugar industry. TheSt George's German Lutheran Church onAlie Street is a legacy of that part of the community.[12]
Writing of the period 1883–1884,Yiddish theatre actorJacob Adler wrote, "The further we penetrated into this Whitechapel, the more our hearts sank. Was this London? Never in Russia, never later in the worst slums of New York, were we to see such poverty as in the London of the 1880s."[13]
This endemic poverty drove many women to prostitution. In October 1888 theMetropolitan Police estimated that there were 1,200 prostitutes "of very low class" resident in Whitechapel and about 62 brothels.[14] Reference is specifically made to them inCharles Booth'sLife and Labour of the People in London, especially to dwellings calledBlackwall Buildings belonging to Blackwall Railway. Such prostitutes were numbered amongst the 11Whitechapel murders (1888–91), some of which were committed by the legendary serial killer known as "Jack the Ripper". These attacks caused widespread terror in the district and throughout the country and drew the attention of social reformers to the squalor and vice of the area, even though these crimes remain unsolved today.[15]
London County Council, founded 1889, helped deliver investment in new housing andslum clearance; objectives which were a popular cause at the time.
The "Elephant Man"Joseph Merrick (1862–1890) became well known in Whitechapel – he was exhibited in a shop on the Whitechapel Road before being helped byFrederick Treves (1853–1923) at theRoyal London Hospital, opposite the actual shop. There is a museum in the hospital about his life.[16]
In 1902, American authorJack London, looking to write a counterpart toJacob Riis's seminal bookHow the Other Half Lives, donned ragged clothes and boarded in Whitechapel, detailing his experiences inThe People of the Abyss.
TheSiege of Sidney Street (also known as theBattle of Stepney, after theMetropolitan Borough of Stepney of which Whitechapel was part) in January 1911 was a gunfight between police and military forces, and Latvian revolutionaries. Then Home SecretaryWinston Churchill took over the operation, and his presence caused a political row over the level of his involvement during the time. His biographers disagreed and claimed that he gave no operational commands to the police,[17][18] but a Metropolitan Police account states that the events of Sidney Street were "a very rare case of a Home Secretary taking police operational command decisions".[a]
TheFreedom Press, a socialist publishing house, thought it worthwhile to explore conditions in the leading city of the nation that had invented modern capitalism. He[who?] concluded that English poverty was far rougher than the American variety. The juxtaposition of the poverty, homelessness, exploitative work conditions, prostitution, and infant mortality of Whitechapel and other East End locales with some of the greatest personal wealth the world has ever seen made it a focal point for leftist reformers and revolutionaries of all kinds, fromGeorge Bernard Shaw, whoseFabian Society met regularly in Whitechapel, toVladimir Lenin, led rallies in Whitechapel during his exile from Russia.[20] The area is still home to Freedom Press, the anarchist publishing house founded byCharlotte Wilson.
On Sunday 4 October 1936, theBritish Union of Fascists led byOswald Mosley, intended to march through the East End, an area with a large Jewish population. The BUF mustered on and aroundTower Hill and hundreds of thousands of local people turned out to block the march. There were violent clashes with the BUF around Tower Hill, but most of the violence occurred as police tried to clear a route through the crowds for the BUF to follow.
The police fought protesters at nearbyCable Street – the series of clashes becoming known as theBattle of Cable Street – and Tower Hill, but the largest confrontations took place atAldgate and Whitechapel, notably atGardiner's Corner, at the junction ofLeman Street,Commercial Street andWhitechapel High Street.[21]
The Halal restaurant on the junction of St Mark Street andAlie Street opened in 1939 to serve the many Indian seamen living in the area.[citation needed] It is now the oldest Indian restaurant in East London.[22]
Whitechapel remained poor through the first half of the 20th century, though somewhat less desperately so. It suffered great damage from enemy bombers duringthe Blitz, and from the subsequentGermanV-weapon attacks. The parish church,St Mary Matfelon, was badly damaged in a raid on 29 December 1940, a raid so damaging that it caused theSecond Great Fire of London.
The remains were demolished in 1952. St Mary's traced stone footprint and former graveyard remain, as part ofAltab Ali Park.[4][23]
On 4 May 1978, three teenagers murderedAltab Ali, a 24 year old Bangladesh-born clothing worker, in a racially motivated attack, as he walked home after work. The attack took place on Adler Street, by St Mary's Churchyard, where St Mary Matfelon had previously stood. The reaction to his murder provoked the mass mobilisation of the local Bengali community. The gardens of the former churchyard were later renamedAltab Ali Park in his memory.[24][25]
TheMetropolitan line between Hammersmith and Whitechapel was withdrawn in 1990 and shown separately as a new line called theHammersmith & City line.[26][27]
Crossrail calls at Whitechapel station[28] on theElizabeth line. Eastbound services will be split into two branches after leaving the historic station which underwent a massive redevelopment that started in 2010.[29]
In order to prepare for Crossrail, in January 2016, the old Whitechapel station was closed for refurbishment and modernisation work in order to improve services and increase capacity in the station.[30]
The Royal London Hospital was closed and re-opened behind the original site in 2012 in a brand new building costing £650m.[31] The old site was then repurchased by the local council to open a new town hall,[32] replacing the existing Town Hall at Mulberry Place.
In March 2022,Whitechapel station signs had "হোয়াইটচ্যাপেল" inBengali installed.[33] TheBritish-PakistaniMayor of LondonSadiq Khan was "delighted" that the signage was installed ahead ofBangladesh Independence Day on 26 March.[33] The installation was attended byBangladeshi diplomats andMamata Banerjee, theChief Minister ofWest Bengal.[34]
Also in 2022 a historical marker was placed in Whitechapel, on the site of the former Adler House at the junction of Adler and Coke Streets by theJewish American Society for Historic Preservation UK Branch. Adler House was named in honour of the Chief Rabbi of the British Empire, Herman Adler, 1891–1911. The marker recognises the significance of Whitechapel as the centre of British Jewish refugee life in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.[35]
Local council facilities will be grouped within the oldRoyal London Hospital building as a civic centre. The locallibrary, now called anIdea Store is located onWhitechapel Road.
Whitechapel Road was the location of two 19th-century theatres: The Effingham (1834–1897) andThe Pavilion Theatre (1828–1935; building demolished in 1962).Charles Dickens Jr. (eldest child ofCharles Dickens), in his 1879 bookDickens's Dictionary of London, described the Pavilion this way: "A large East-end theatre capable of holding considerably over 3,000 persons. Melodrama of a rough type, farce, pantomime,&c."[37] In the early 20th century it became the home of Yiddish theatre, catering to the large Jewish population of the area, and gave birth to the Anglo-Jewish 'Whitechapel Boys' avant-garde literary and artistic movement.
Since at least the 1970s, Whitechapel and other nearby parts of East London have figured prominently in London's art scene. Probably the area's most prominent art venue is theWhitechapel Art Gallery, founded in 1901 and long an outpost of high culture in a poor neighbourhood. As the neighbourhood has gentrified, it has gained citywide, and even international, visibility and support. From 2005 the gallery underwent a major expansion, with the support of £3.26 million from the Heritage Lottery Fund. The expanded facility opened in 2009.
Whitechapel in the early 21st century has figured prominently in London's punk rock and skuzz rock scenes, with the main focal point for this scene being Whitechapel Factory and Rhythm Factory bar, restaurant, and nightclub. This scene includes the likes of The Libertines, Zap!,Nova,The Others, Razorlight, and The Rakes, all of whom have had some commercial success in the music charts.
The total population of Whitechapel in 2021 was 18,841.[38]Bangladeshis are the largest ethnic group in the area, making up 40% of the Whitechapel ward total population.[39] TheEast London Mosque at the end of Whitechapel Road is one of the largest mosques in Europe. The mosque group was established as early as 1910, and the demand for a mosque grew as theSylheti community grew rapidly over the years.
In 1985 this large, purpose built mosque with a dome and minaret was built in the heart of Whitechapel, attracting thousands of worshippers every week, and it was further expanded with theLondon Muslim Centre in 2004.[40]
A library, the WhitechapelIdea Store, constructed in 2005 at a cost of £12 million byWilliam Verry to a design byDavid Adjaye, was nominated for the 2006Stirling Prize.[41][42]
| Whitechapel compared 2021[43] | White British orOther White | Asian | Black |
|---|---|---|---|
| Whitechapel Population 18,841 | 34.6% | 51.3% | 4.9% |
| London Borough of Tower Hamlets | 39.4% | 44.4% | 7.3% |
Whitechapel features inCharles Dickens'sPickwick Papers (chapter 22) as the location of the Bull Inn, where the Pickwickians take a coach toIpswich. En route, driving along Whitechapel Road,Sam Weller opines that it is "not a wery nice neighbourhood" and notes the correlation between poverty and the abundance of oyster stalls here.[44] One ofFagin's dens in Dickens'sOliver Twist was located in Whitechapel, and Fagin himself was possibly based on a notorious local'fence' namedIkey Solomon (1785–1850).
Whitechapel is also the setting of several novels by Jewish authors such asChildren of the Ghetto andThe King of Schnorrers byIsrael Zangwill andJew Boy bySimon Blumenfeld. Several chapters ofSholem Aleichem's classicYiddish novelAdventures of Mottel the Cantor's Son take place in early 20th-century Whitechapel, depicted from the point of view of an impoverished East European Jewish family fleeing the pogroms. The novelJourney Through a Small Planet byEmanuel Litvinoff vividly describes Whitechapel and its Jewish inhabitants in the 1920s and 1930s.
The prostitute and daughter of aLuddite leader Sybil Gerard, main character ofWilliam Gibson andBruce Sterling's novelThe Difference Engine comes from Whitechapel. The novel's plot begins there.
One of the episodes inMichael Moorcock's novelBreakfast in the Ruins takes place in 1905 Whitechapel, described from the point of view of an eleven year oldJewish refugee from Poland, working with his parents at asweatshop, who is caught up in the deadly confrontation between Russian revolutionaries and agents of theCzar's Secret Police.
Brick Lane, the 2003 novel byMonica Ali is based in Whitechapel and documents the life of a young Bangladeshi woman's experience of living inTower Hamlets in the 1990s and early 2000s.
Whitechapel is used as a location in mostJack the Ripper fiction. One such example is the bizarreWhite Chappel Scarlet Tracings (1987) byIain Sinclair.[45] It also features as the setting for the science fictionWebcomicFreakAngels, written by popular comics writerWarren Ellis.
Whitechapel is one of the worldwide locations referenced inEdith Piaf's songC'est à Hambourg[2], describing the harsh life of prostitutes.
In 2002, Whitechapel was used as the setting for aSherlock Holmes film,The Case of the Whitechapel Vampire, based on theArthur Conan Doyle storyThe Adventure of the Sussex Vampire.
Whitechapel serves as the setting for the television seriesRipper Street, which aired 2013–2016.
Whitechapel has two underground stations:Aldgate East andWhitechapel. Aldgate East is served by theDistrict line and theHammersmith & City. Whitechapel is also served by these lines, as well by theElizabeth line and the East and South London lines of theLondon Overground, soon to be renamed the Windrush line.[46]
Whitechapel station was originally calledWhitechapel (Mile End) to reflect its position just inside Whitechapel's boundary withMile End and also its boundary with Bethnal Green.
Aldgate East station was originally 150 metres west of its current location and there was once an additional district line station immediately east of the modernEast London Mosque calledSt Mary's (Whitechapel Road).
In the 1930s, Aldgate East station was relocated 150 metres east of its original position, meaning there would then be three stations in very close proximity; as a result, the railway economised by closing St Mary's, in the middle of the three stations.
London Buses15,25,106,115,135,205,254,D3,N15,N205,N253,N550 andN551 all operate within the area.
Whitechapel is connected to theNational Road Network by both theA11 onWhitechapel Road in the centre and, to the south, theA13 andThe Highway A1203 running east–west.
Cycle Superhighway CS2 runs fromAldgate toStratford on the A11.
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In addition to the prominent figures detailed in the article:
Whitechapel Market and the A11 corridor is currently the subject of a £20 million investment to improve the public spaces along the route. The London Boroughs of Tower Hamlets & Newham are working with English Heritage and Transport for London to refurbish the historic buildings at this location and improve the market.
As one of the few mosques in Britain permitted to broadcast calls to prayer (azan), the mosque soon found itself at the center of a public debate about "noise pollution" when local non-Muslim residents began to protest.
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