Although a Londoner born and bred I am
bound to confess that I was in painful ignorance of the
precise locality of Spital Square until I had occasion to
pay a visit to the Vicar of St. Mary’s, the Rev. G.
C. Daw. It is, therefore, not improbable that many of my
readers may be in a similar position, and it will be well
to state at once where it is and who are the people who
dwell there.
Spital Square itself, as the street is called, is a turning out of Bishopsgate Street, and almost within sight, on the opposite side of the way, of the Liverpool Street Station extension, the terminus of the G. E. R. But the parish of St. Mary, Spital Square is, of course, of much wider extent. It includes two ancient "liberties," viz., those of Norton Folgate and of the Old Artillery Ground. These names call up some very interesting historical associations ; but, as I ventured to remark to the good Vicar when I was chatting with him in his study one evening at the close of a long day’s work, history is at a discount in a utilitarian age like the present, and it will be more to our purpose if we try to picture the parish as it is.
"You have some fine houses," I observed to the Vicar, "in Spital Square I thought yours was an East-end parish."
"So it is," he responded; "you have seen the best of it the way you came in, but it will not be my fault if you don’t see some of the worst of it as you go out. Yet even in Spital Square the houses are not tenanted as they once were. For the most part they are now let out in tenements, whereas a generation or so ago they were all occupied by good families, and one of them was a favourite resort of an English Sovereign."
" It was," the Vicar rejoined ; "but you must not speak disparagingly of our only aristocratic quarter. As I said, we have a history, and we are proud of it. Do you not know that this parish was the home of the silk-weaving industry, and some of the best Spitalfields work was turned out from the looms here?"
"I do not doubt it," I replied. "But that must have been long ago."
"Well, yes,
it was," the Vicar sighed; " we have nothing of
the sort here now. The weavers are all gone, and with
them the old glory of the place has departed. We have one
or two silk factories in the parish, but they are quite
modern ; and factory life at the East-end of London, even
under the best conditions, is not what we should like it
to be. You asked me what class our people belong to. We
have a good number of factory hands, and of respectable
artisans, but we have still more of the lower classes,
such as market porters, dock labourers, costermongers,
and the like. Our best people dwell in the Norton Folgate
part of the parish; but even there we have a few courts.
The Old Artillery Ground, however, is now quite a poor
district. The streets are small, and the houses in them
are nearly all let out in single rooms, while the courts
show a still lower order of things. Single rooms are a
special feature of this part, and frequently we find a
whole family huddled together in one room, the rent of
which ranges from 2s. 6l. to 3s.
6d. a week."
"This must represent a very sad state of things," I said.
"Yes it
does," the Vicar sorrowfully replied ;
"but," he immediately added hopefully,
"our people are respectable, and there is very
little immorality. Speaking generally, family life is
held sacred here just as anywhere else. Our people are
poor - some of them very poor - but our work amongst them
is full of encouragement. If I were asked to describe the
position here, I should at once say it was a decidedly
hopeful parish."
"You are not a stranger to East-end work?" I asked.
"Oh, no," Mr. Daw replied. "As a layman it was my privilege to work as a voluntary helper under the present Bishop of Bedford, Dr. Billing, when he was Rector of Christ Church, Spitalfields. Then in 1891 I was ordained, and my first and only curacy was with the Rev. E. A. B. Sanders, at Whitechapel Parish Church. I think, then, that I may claim to know something of the East-end, and I say that the work here is distinctly hopeful and encouraging. Of course our parish is smaller than either Spitalfields or Whitechapel. But we have 5,000 people, and many of these are Jews."
"Are you making any special efforts to seek these sons of Abraham?"
"Not at present; but I
have plans in my mind which I hope may soon take shape.
My work as Vice-Principal of the London Jews' Society
College at Palestine Place - a post I held for ten years
- has given me a keen interest in the welfare of the
Jewish people, and it will be a great joy to me if I am
permitted to bring some of my Hebrew parishioners to a
knowledge of the Lord Jesus as the true Messiah. But
special work of this kind requires time for its
development, and as I have been here but little more than
eighteen months I have had to spend much of the time in
building up parochial machinery and organising the
general work of the parish. My predecessor was a most
devoted and saintly man, but he was left here too long,
and with the growth of years his earlier energies
naturally fell off. My desire has been to get hold of
young people ; I don't mean children only, but young men
and young women, and I am much cheered by the results
that have attended our efforts. I say 'our' because it
would be quite impossible for any man single-handed to
make an impression on this parish. Thanks to the C.P.A.S.
this parish has enjoyed a grant for some years, and I
have been able to have the services of a curate whose
work here has been invaluable. I regret to say, however,
that the clergyman I refer to, the Rev. H. F. Mercer, has
just broken down in health, and I fear that the doctor
will not allow him to return to East London work. But the
point I want to make is this that the services of a
curate in this parish are essential, and that without the
help of the C.P.A.S. it would be impossible for that need
to be supplied. I must, however, repeat that Mr. Mercer
has been a most diligent and active worker. His open-air
services in the summer were most successful, and I have
reason to believe that they were greatly blessed to many.
Then his Bible Class for young men has been a power in
the neighbourhood. He also took a deep interest in
temperance work, and the Band of Hope has increased quite
four-fold since he took it in hand. Another special
department of his work has been the Church Lads' Brigade.
He managed to get hold of some of the roughest lads of
the parish. I am much disappointed that his health does
not seem strong enough to bear the strain of an East-End
parish. For strain it most certainly is. The visiting
alone is enough to try even a strong man. You can imagine
what it must be to spend a whole day going from room to
room in these narrow courts. But it must be done. I know
of no work more important than that of visiting the
people in their homes. It gives us an influence over them
that we cannot acquire in any other way. And it is most
hopeful work here. I find it far less difficult than I
did in Whitechapel. I can get into every room without the
least hindrance, and I have never once been
refused."
Mr. Daw then suggested that we should have a look round the parish. It was getting late and I feared that there would not be much to see. "Oh, we are late people in these parts," he observed, and so it proved.
The light was still burning in the school room (St. Mary's is one of those parishes which, in spite of their poverty, are gallantly maintaining their voluntary schools), and we looked in. There, in one of the upper rooms, was the Mothers' Meeting just coming to a close. It seemed a strange time for such a gathering, but the women there assembled could not come at an earlier hour, for many of them had been at work all day.
A Bright Church.
From the
schoolroom we passed into the church. It has lately been
renovated and one could not but be struck by its bright
and cheerful appearance. The walls and front of the
galleries have been decorated in art colours, and the
old-fashioned, high-back pews have given place to wide
open benches. The Vicar has done well to make his church
as bright and clean as possible, for there is too much
that is dismal and dirty in the immediate neighbourhood.
Asked about the congregations, he readily responded that
they were increasing every week. When he first went there
the church was but very sparsely attended, but the work
in the parish is having its effect, and there seems
reason to hope that before long the church will be
comfortably full, at least at the evening service. The
Vicar has secured grants from the S.P.C.K. and other
Societies, and by these means is able to put a Bible, a
Prayer-Book, and a Hymn-Book into the hands of every one
who comes into church. He uses the "Numbered
Prayer-Book," and as the service proceeds announces
the pages at which the different parts will be found -
the necessity for which is highly significant of the
class of people attending the church.
Before bidding me good-night the Vicar piloted me through some of the smaller streets and courts of his parish. I found that they corresponded in every respect to his description of them - dark, dirty, and overcrowded - and I could well appreciate the force of what he said in reference to the trying character of a day's hard visiting in this neighbourhood. But there is light in the darkness, and one rejoices to know that the light is spreading. It is in such a field as this that the C.P.A.S. finds congenial soil, and its work there may, by God's blessing, be the means of turning a wilderness into a garden of the Lord.
by H. C. H.
Reprinted with permission of David Rich, Tower Hamlets History On Line.
