| Hackney | |
|---|---|
 Mare Street, Hackney, 2014 | |
  Hackney Location withinGreater London | |
| Population | 259,956 (2021 census)[1] |
| OS grid reference | TQ347845 |
| • Charing Cross | 4 mi (6.4 km) SW |
| London borough | |
| Ceremonial county | Greater London |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | LONDON |
| Postcode district | E5, E8, E9, E20, N1, N16 |
| Dialling code | 020 |
| Police | Metropolitan |
| Fire | London |
| Ambulance | London |
| UK Parliament | |
| London Assembly | |
| 51°32′35″N0°03′32″W / 51.543°N 0.059°W /51.543; -0.059 | |
Hackney is a district inEast London,England, forming around two-thirds of the area of the modernLondon Borough of Hackney, to which it gives its name. It is 4 miles (6.4 km) northeast ofCharing Cross and includes part of theQueen Elizabeth Olympic Park. Historically it was within the county ofMiddlesex.
In the past it was also referred to asHackney Proper to distinguish it from thevillage which subsequently developed in the vicinity ofMare Street, the termHackney Proper being applied to the wider district.[2]
Hackney is a large district, whose long established boundaries encompass the sub-districts ofHomerton,Dalston (including Kingsland and Shacklewell),De Beauvoir Town,Upper andLower Clapton,Stamford Hill,Hackney Central,Cambridge Heath,Hackney Wick,South Hackney andWest Hackney.
Hackney was an administrative unit with consistent boundaries from the early Middle Ages to the creation of the larger modern borough in 1965. It was based for many centuries on theAncient Parish ofHackney, the largest inMiddlesex.
.jpg)
Hackney was a sub-manor of theManor of Stepney, and the ancient parish of Hackney was an early daughter parish of Stepney, though the date the Hackney parish was established is not known.Hackney's church is first recorded around 1275 and Hackney may have been an independent parish by that time. The parish would have been based on the boundaries of the sub-manor of Hackney at the time it was created. Any boundary changes to the manor after around 1180 would not be reflected in changes to the parish boundaries as, across England, they became fixed at around that time, so that boundaries could no longer be changed at all, despite changes to manorial landholdings – though there were examples of sub-division in some parishes.[3] The manorial system in England had largely broken down in England by 1400, with manors fragmenting and their role being much reduced.
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), a historic 'county within a county', under the leadership of theLord-Lieutenant of the Tower Hamlets (the post was always filled by the Constable of the Tower of London). The military loyalty to the Tower meant local men served in the Tower garrison and Tower Hamlets Militia, rather than the Middlesex Militia. This arrangement lasted until 1900.[4][5]
The ancient parishes provided a framework for both civil (administrative) and ecclesiastical (church) functions, but during the nineteenth century, there was a divergence into distinct civil and ecclesiastical parish systems. In London, the ecclesiastical parishes sub-divided to better serve the needs of a growing population, while the civil parishes continued to be based on the same ancient parish areas.
TheMetropolis Management Act 1855 merged the civil parishes of Hackney andStoke Newington under a newHackney District. This proved unpopular, especially in more affluent Stoke Newington, and after four unsuccessful attempts, the two parishes regained their independence when they were separated by mutual consent under theMetropolis Management (Plumstead and Hackney) Act 1893 (56 & 57 Vict. c. 55).[6]
TheLondon Government Act 1899 converted the parishes intometropolitan boroughs based on the same boundaries, sometimes with minor rationalisations. Neighbouring Stoke Newington was smaller than the desired size for the new boroughs, and there were proposals to re-merge Stoke Newington and Hackney, or to detach the northern part of Hackney and join it with Stoke Newington. These proposals were rejected due to the experience of"intolerable and interminable feuds" between the districts when they were previously"forced together", and because theFirst Lord of the Treasury,Arthur Balfour recognised that there was"great ill-feeling and mutual ill-will... between the inhabitants of the two districts".[7]
In 1965,Hackney merged withShoreditch andStoke Newington to form the newLondon Borough of Hackney.
Prior to 1994, a small part ofVictoria Park was in Hackney, but a minor boundary alteration was made so that the whole park came under the control ofTower Hamlets.[8]
The first surviving records of the place name areHakney (1231) andHakeneye (1242 and 1294).The name isOld English, but the meaning is not certain. It seems clear however that the 'ey' element refers to an island or a raised or otherwise dry area in marshland. The term 'island' in this context can also mean land situated between two streams.[9]
The 'island' may have been beside theLea or perhaps near the confluence of theHackney Brook and Pigwell Brook in theHackney Central area.
The Oxford Dictionary of English Place Names examined various interpretations of the place name and favoured the interpretation that Hackney means 'Haka's island', with Haka being a notable local person The Dictionary suggests that the 'Hack' element may also derive from:
Hackney is a mostly low-lying area in proximity to two rivers, theLea and theHackney Brook. This would have made the area attractive for pastoral and arable agriculture, meaning most of the area is likely to have been deforested at an early date. There is archaeological evidence for settlement and agriculture as far back as the Stone Age.[11]
During the late Iron Age, the area was part of the territory of the powerfulCatuvellauni tribe.
There will have been a network of probably minor, local roads in Hackney before the Romans conquered southern Britain after 43AD, but the area's proximity to the provincial capital,Londinium, meant that it was soon crossed by two large long-distance routes. The first wasErmine Street (modern A10) which emerged fromBishopsgate and headed north to Lincoln and York. The second was a route which branched off Ermine Street just outside Bishopsgate and headed SW-NE across Hackney, across theDalston,Hackney Central andLower Clapton areas to cross to the Lea on its way toGreat Dunmow inEssex.[11]This crossing appears to have crossed the Lea 168 metres south of the Bridge at Mandeville Street near Millfields Road (sometimes known as Pond Lane Bridge).[12]Three Roman sarcophagus burials have been found, two of stone and one of marble. These, particularly the marble example indicate a high-status settlement of some sort. The stone examples had a coin hoard found nearby.
The area around Millfields Park,Lower Clapton, is sometimes described as the site of a battle in whichAescwine, having rebelled againstOcta,King of Kent, defeats him in battle and became the (reputed) firstKing of Essex.[13][14] The ford over the Lea neighbouringLeyton is referred to in the (much later) accounts of the battle. Historical records describing this period are extremely sparse, so the historicity of the battle and even Aescwine himself is disputed.
The place nameHackney is Old English, so was probably first applied in this era.
Hackney was part of the territory of theMiddle Saxons, a people who seem to have formed a province of theEast Saxons, albeit not part of their core territory. The area was a part of the huge manor ofStepney, an area owned by theBishop of London, and its great size and proximity to theCity means it may have been part of the grant of land made when theDiocese of London (The East Saxon Diocese), was re-established in 604 AD.
Later, the Middle and East Saxon area would become subject to various other Kingdoms, last among themWessex, which sought to uniteEngland and roll back the partialViking conquest of the country. A coin ofEgbert of Wessex was found onStamford Hill.The Kings of Wessex divided their kingdom into shires, with Hackney becoming part of the shire ofMiddlesex, an area named after theMiddle Saxons.
After their victory at Hastings, the Normans needed to secure London. To this end, they burnedSouthwark, crossed the river upstream and harried much ofMiddlesex and Hertfordshire. TheManor of Stepney was less badly hit than much of the rest of Middlesex, though the area alongErmine Street (the A10), in Hackney, is believed to have been badly affected.[15]
TheDomesday Book of 1086 covered England atmanorial level, so Hackney is only assessed as part ofManor of Stepney, of which it was a sub-manor. The landscape at this time was largely agricultural, Domesday returns for Middlesex indicate that it was around 30% wooded (much of it wood-pasture), about double the English average.[16] Hackney would have had a lower proportion than the county as a whole, consisting of mostly lower land, close to rivers that made it more attractive for farming. The proportion of woodland in England decreased sharply between theConquest and theBlack Death[17] due to the pressure of a rapidly increasing population, and the same pressures would have been experienced here.
From the Tudor period onwards, the various settlements in Hackney grew as wealthy Londoners moved to what they saw as a pleasant rural alternative to living in London which was, nonetheless, close to the capital; in some ways it was comparable to a modern commuter town.A number of royal courtiers lived inHomerton, whileHenry VIII had a palace atBrooke House,Upper Clapton, whereQueen Mary took theOath of Supremacy.Sutton House, the oldest surviving residential building in the district, was built in 1535.
The main‘Hackney Village’ grew much larger than the others, in 1605 having as many houses asDalston,Newington (i.e. West Hackney),Kingsland andShacklewell combined.[18]
In 1727Daniel Defoe said of the hamlets of Hackney
All these, except theWyck-house, are within a few years so encreas'd in buildings, and so fully inhabited, that there is no comparison to be made between their present and past state: Every separate hamlet is encreas'd, and some of them more than treble as big as formerly; Indeed as this whole town is included in the bills of mortality, tho' no where joining to London, it is in some respects to be call'd a part of it.
As the population of London and surrounding areas grew, areas such as Hackney became home tomarket gardens which used new agricultural methods to produce large amounts of fruit and vegetables to help feed the capital. At this time Hackney was particularly famous for a type of turnip grown in the area.[19]
In the 1770s Hackney became home to one of the largest and most celebrated plant nurseries in England, Loddiges Paradise Field Nursery, founded by German born Joachim Conrad Loddiges (1738–1826) and continued by his son George Loddiges (1786–1846), and known as The Hackney Botanic Nursery Garden. With its range of heated glasshouses the nursery was famed for displaying newly discovered plants from around the globe including the Americas, the Caribbean, Australia and the far East.[20]
The growth of theEast End of London was stimulated by the building ofRegent's Canal between 1812 and 1816, with construction work on a new town atDe Beauvoir beginning in 1823 and continuing through the 1830s. The arrival of the railways, around 1850, accelerated the spread of London and the expansion of the existing nuclei so that Hackney was almost entirely built up by 1870.
In 1907, theFifth Congress of theRussian Social Democratic Labour Party held at theBrotherhood Church on the east side ofSouthgate Road. The conference was held in the UK after being banned in other countries.
Attendees includedLenin,Stalin,Maxim Gorky,Rosa Luxemburg andLeon Trotsky. The congress debated strategy for a communist revolution in Russia and strengthened the position of Lenin'sBolshevik.[21]
From 1860 to 1912, Hackney was part of the recruiting district of the7th Battalion, Essex Regiment. Hackney provided three of thebattalion's eightcompanies,Leyton andWalthamstow two each, andWest Ham (with a depot atSilvertown) one. The establishment of a recruitment district spanning the Lower Lea was anomalous in that Hackney (unlike Leyton, Walthamstow and West Ham) was part of theTower Hamlets (or Tower Division) of Middlesex, rather thanEssex. However the local connections meant the arrangement worked well.
From 1912 onward,Hackney raised its own infantry battalion with the Hackney companies of the 7th Essex transferred over to form the core of the new battalion, which retained some Essex Regiment traditions until at least the 1920s.[22] The 7th Essex struggled to replace their Hackney comrades and were still understrength at the start of WW1. The new battalion focussed recruitment in Hackney, but also attracted men from neighbouring areas such asStepney andShoreditch.
The battalions would be nicknamed theHackney Gurkhas orCockney Gurkhas. It’s not clear which shared traits gave rise to the nickname - though smart appearance, tenacity and cheerful resourcefulness have all been suggested - but some sources emphasise their short stature, resulting from a malnourished upbringing in some of the country’s poorest districts. Whatever the origin, the Eastenders were flattered by being likened to their tough far eastern counterparts and proudly adopted the term, ensuring it survived through both world wars and beyond.[23][24][25]
The battalion had its own cap badge, depicting Hackney's emblem,St Augustine's Tower, together with theborough's latin mottoJustitia Turris Nostra. A direct translation into English isJustice is our tower, but this may be paraphrased asFairness is our strength.[26][27]
The battalion was 'duplicated' in WWI, so that Hackney raised two front-line infantry battalions for theLondon Regiment: the1/10th (City of London) Battalion (Hackney) and the2/10th (City of London) Battalion (Hackney).
The 1/10th was assigned to the162nd (East Midland) Brigade in the54th (East Anglian) Infantry Division, seeing service atGallipoli and the Middle East, finishing the war inBeirut. The 2/10th was assigned to the175th (2/3rd London) Brigade, in the58th (2/1st London) Division, fighting on thewestern front and finishing the war in thePeruwelz area of Belgium. A third Hackney battalion, the 3/10th was based in the UK and used as a training unit, providing reinforcements to the two frontline battalions.[28]
By WW2, Hackney's battalion was organised as the 5th Battalion of theRoyal Berkshire Regiment, a very unusual arrangement as Hackney had no connection with Berkshire, and most of the men had never been there.
On 1 September 1939Germany invaded Poland, and with war expected, the Battalion was mustered toWest Ham United'sBoleyn Ground. A call for volunteers would lead to some of the Hackney men, together with men from other units, formingNo. 3 Independent Company, a precursor to the Commandos. Afterservice in Norway, the Company was disbanded and the men returned to their units.[29] In the early years of the war the Hackneys were deployed to defend the east coast against a potential German invasion.[30]
The Hackney Battalion came ashore under fire, in support of theCanadian 3rd Division, at and aroundBernières-sur-Mer,Juno Beach, early on the morning ofD-Day, the 6th June 1944. It fought as infantry on D-Day, with a particular focus on mopping up by-passed strongpoints (such aspill-boxes) and other resistance so troops landing later could land unhindered. Some elements pushed forward five miles with the Canadians that night.[31][32][33]
After D-Day the focus switched to its Beach Group duties which was mainlystevedore work, but also included marking minefields, processing prisoners, the wounded and the dead. The battalion continued to take casualties through artillery, airstrikes, mines and accidents.[34][32]
The allies broke out from Normandy in July 1944, at which point the Hackney Battalion was broken up with most troops being re-assigned to battalions which had suffered the highest losses in the campaign. Officers were astonished at the offended parochial pride this caused among the Hackney men. As a concession to their local loyalties, whole intact Hackneyplatoons were transferred to the depleted battalions receiving them. These platoons fought their way across France, Belgium the Netherlands and into Germany.[32] Some other platoons joinedGeneral Slim's14th Army (known as the Forgotten Army) to campaign against the Japanese in India and Burma.[29]
An undersize rump of the battalion was retained as a 'Bank Group', a similar role to a Beach Group, and deployed in theBattle of the Bulge as a mobile reserve.[35] At 2am on 24 March 1945, two companies of the Hackney Battalion troops, acting in support of15th (Scottish) Infantry Division as part ofOperation Plunder, were among the first British troops to cross theRiver Rhine, in theXanten area.[36] The battalion was still in the area whenVE-Day came soon after.
It was disbanded in June 1945. The Hackney's were revived as 648th Heavy Anti-Aircraft Regiment, Royal Artillery in 1947, before finally being disbanded in 1955.
The first bomb of the first air raid on London, fell on 16 Alkham Road,West Hackney, in May 1915 by the German Army airshipLZ 38. No one was seriously hurt at that address but 2 people, Henry Good, a 49 year old labourer, and his wife Caroline were found burnt to death in Balls Pond Road, Hackney. It was widely reported that the couple were found kneeling, as though in prayer and the Henry Good's arm lay round his wife's waist. Five people were killed elsewhere in London, including four children, causing great anger among the public.[37]East London was at particular risk at this time, due to theKaiser's order, later rescinded, that the raiders limit their attacks to targets east of the Tower of London.[38]
During theSecond World War, Hackney was badly affected by wartime bombing that left the area with 749 civilian war dead,[39] with many more of its citizens injured or left homeless. Many other Hackney residents were also killed on active service around the world. The number of devices hitting Hackney was upwards of 613 high explosive bombs, 16parachute mines, 37V-1 'doodlebugs', 10V-2 rockets and many thousands of 1 kg incendiary devices.[40]
Notable buildings destroyed by bombing included Tudor-eraBrooke House[41] in Upper Clapton andWest Hackney church.
The post-war period saw extensive re-building, and the area became increasingly multi-cultural in character. During the 1930s, 1940s[42][43] and 1960s[44][45] the area's large Jewish and other minority populations made it a target for provocative rallies byOswald Mosley and the far-right organisations he founded. These were actively opposed by many local people, together with organisations such as the43 Group and this led to a number of violent confrontations, notably in the Ridley Road area ofDalston.
Hackney was one of the host areas when London staged the2012 Olympic andParalympic Games, with three venues falling within its part of theQueen Elizabeth Olympic Park:
Hackney's solution toaffordable housing has been able to put more of it on the market by making use of inclusionary[clarification needed] practices.[46] This district built a significant number of affordable units and subsidised them with market-rate units.[46] In Hackney about half of the new units are affordable. In an effort to avoid displacing current residents, construction was completed in phases.[46]
On the 3rd of April 2025,Trust for London reported that Hackney had one area that was 'gentrified' since 2012 and 2025 with the areas families are having less children and a drop in the black communities. According to Trust for London the average house prices in the 'gentrified areas' searing to 2.5 times than the average house prices during the time between 2012 and 2025 compared to 2 times the average price than the rest ofLondon.[47]
The outline of Hackney's traditional boundary resembles a right-angled triangle with the right-angle in the SW and the Lower Lea Valley, running NW–SE forming the hypotenuse. The western boundary is based on the N–S axis of the Roman A10, though the sub-district of De Beauvoir Town lies beyond it, as do small areas of Dalston and Stamford Hill.
The district's southern boundary follows theRegents Canal–Hertford Union Canal in part, and for the remainder marches a little to the north of it, withVictoria Park also forming part of the southern boundary.
The highest points around Stamford Hill and Clapton Common are over 30m AOD, with the lowest areas being along theRiver Lea. TheHackney Brook was the largest natural internal watercourse, entering Hackney in the NW, at the foot of the southern foot of Stamford Hill and exiting in the south-east, however, this watercourse was fully culverted in the 19th century.
The boundaries of Hackney take in the sub-districts ofHomerton,Dalston (including Kingsland and Shacklewell),De Beauvoir Town,Upper andLower Clapton,Stamford Hill,Hackney Central,Hackney Wick,South Hackney andWest Hackney.
The Lea and Hackney Marshes are underlain byalluvium soils, and the higher ground between Homerton and Stamford Hill is formed on a widening bed ofLondon Clay.Brickearth deposits are within tongues of clay extending beneath Clapton Common, Stamford Hill and Stoke Newington High Street. The centre and southwestern districts lie on river terrace deposits of Taplow Gravel. The area around Victoria Park and Well Street Common lies on flood plain gravel.[48]
It lies approximately 49 feet (15 m) above sea level.
Open spaces in Hackney include:
Hackney is served by six stations, including by theLondon Overground atHackney Central railway station, and it is named after thecentral area of Hackney, as well asHackney Downs. Central was open by theNorth London Railway opened asHackney on 26 September 1850, to the east of Mare Street. It closed on 1 December 1870 and was replaced the same day by a station to the west of Mare Street, designed by Edwin Henry Horne and also namedHackney. This station passed in due course to theLondon & North Western Railway and later on to theLondon, Midland and Scottish Railway, which closed the entire North London Line east ofDalston Junction to passenger traffic in 1944.[50] Downs was opened on 27 May 1872 when theGreat Eastern Railway opened the first part of its new line fromEnfield Town toStoke Newington.[51][52]
A pedestrian link between Hackney Downs and Hackney Central stations was opened in 2015 byLondon Overground Rail Operations. Until Hackney Central's closure in 1944, a passenger connection had linked the two stations. However, when Hackney Central re-opened in 1985, the footway was not reinstated and passengers transferring between the two stations were obliged to leave one and walk along the street to the other until the link was rebuilt.[53]
Hackney Wick opened on 12 May 1980[54] byBritish Rail on the re-routed line which bypassed the site of the formerVictoria Park station as part of theCrosstown Linkline.
In 1872,London Fields railway station was opened by the Great Eastern Railway.[55] It closed in 1981 due to a fire, repairs were eventually carried out and the station reopened in 1986.[56]
In February 2006, aDocklands Light Railway (DLR) report called Horizon 2020 was commissioned, which suggested that the DLR be extended to Hackney Central fromBow Church viaOld Ford andHomerton, taking over the old parts of theNorth London Line to link up withPoplar andCanary Wharf.[57]
Hackney is served by a large number ofLondon Buses routes,26,30,38,55, 56, 106, 149, 236, 242,253, 254, 276,277, 388,394, 339, 425 and 488 as well as the D6, and W15. Hackney is also served by the London night bus network with routes N26, N38, N55 and N253 all running in the area.[58] Route N277 also serves here when the 277 route was withdrawn between Dalston and Highbury Corner and the N277 was retained.[59]
Hackney's twin towns and sister cities include:[60]
Suresnes,Île-de-France, France
St George’s, Grenada
Bridgetown, Barbados
Göttingen,Lower Saxony, Germany
Haifa, Israel
