Peabody – ideal and reality

The Peabody Trust, which today still houses large numbers of people, was formed in 1862 “to ameliorate the condition of the poor and needy of this great metropolis, and to promote their comfort and happiness.” Such was the significance of these buildings in the history of working-class housing that many of the surviving older Peabody estates have been awarded Grade ll listed status, including those at Blackfriars, Islington, and Shadwell.

Peabody Square, Blackfriars Road

As the 19^th century progressed, housing the working classes of London was the most pressing problem after health. By 1850-80 it had become a major social issue, part of the general development of a ‘social conscience’. Slum conditions in the Victorian period were dire, with districts such as Seven Dials and St Giles becoming notorious. Slum clearance was necessary to make way for the new roads and railways that were being built at this time, and to accommodate a population that had quadrupled during the second half of the 19^th century - the numbers swelled by immigration from Ireland and of Jews from eastern Europe. Overcrowding was not just the result of demographic pressures and low housing supply, but of displacement of the working class: the City was fast becoming non-residential and the building of docks resulted in the demolition of thousands of houses. But dock building was not the only cause of displacement – public works also caused the wholesale demolition of working class housing, e.g. the building of the Law Courts, the Embankment and Holborn Viaduct, not to mention railway buildings. Weekly tenants (such as those displaced from Agar Town for the building of St Pancras station) were not entitled to compensation on being evicted. It is documented that in 1844 almost the entire working population of Whitechapel and Aldgate lived in one room. Up until this time, no-one had been interested in building for the lower classes – few capitalists saw the poor areas of London as likely to provide a return on their investment, which is why early attempts to solve the housing problem were made by wealthy individuals or charities.

It was against this backdrop that the concept of ‘model housing’ came into being, providing clean homes for rent by workers (as opposed to the destitute or very poor who were left to the workhouse). Founded in 1844, the ‘Society for Improving the Condition of the Labouring Classes’ took the lead, followed in 1845 by the ‘Metropolitan Association for Improving the Dwellings of the Industrious’. Other such organisations came into existence in the 1850s and 1860s. By the latter part of the century there were over 30 ‘model dwelling’ companies and trusts operating in London. Many of these, however, were small-scale initiatives that had little effect… until the arrival of George Peabody in 1862.

George Peabody came from near Boston in the US and was himself of humble origins. He set up

his own export business, building up the cotton trade between the US and Lancashire. He visited Britain for the first time in 1827, and by 1838 had made London his primary home. He then left the export business to concentrate on merchant banking. Between 1862-9, Peabody donated over £500,000 towards establishing the Peabody Trust, aimed at helping Londoners who were poor but ‘of good character’. He died in 1869 and a statue was unveiled outside the Royal Exchange in Threadneedle Street. His funeral was held in Westminster Abbey – the only American to be accorded that honour. A plaque there reads (his own words): “I have prayed my Heavenly Father day by day that I might be enabled before I died to show my gratitude for the blessings which he has bestowed upon me by doing some great good to my fellow men.” Evidence of Peabody’s legacy in bricks and mortar can be found all over inner London…

 

Commercial Street

The first Peabody building was erected in 1864 on the corner of Commercial Street and Folgate Street in Spitalfields. It consisted of 4-storey blocks round a central courtyard. The exterior was sparse, the interiors (by our standards) utilitarian. In all there were 40 flats, with laundries, drying areas and baths on the top floor, plus covered playgrounds for the use of children in wet weather. The size of the flats varied from one room (2s 6d) to a set of 3 rooms for 5s. All lavatories and washing facilities were on the landings outside the flats and the interior walls were bare brick – tenants were forbidden to paint or paper them. Cooking was done on small coal ranges and lighting was by candles or rush lights (gas was only for the upper classes!) Rubbish went down a chute on each landing. By 1870, further estates had been opened in Islington (1865), Shadwell (1866), and Chelsea (1870). Between 1871 and1885, 12 more were built. By 1880 the Peabody Trust had invested over half a million pounds in working class housing and by the end of the century the Trust’s blocks were all over London – Spitalfields, Islington, Shadwell, Westminster, Chelsea, Bermondsey, Blackfriars, Southwark, Pimlico, Clerkenwell and Whitechapel. By 1875 nearly 4,000 people were living in the comparative luxury of Peabody properties which were surrounded by tall iron railings with gates that were locked at night.

In terms of design, Peabody buildings (all those pre-1900 were designed by Henry Darbishire) have a characteristic, some would say barrack-like, quality. Features such as bleak corridors, small windows, tiers of iron galleries round a large inner courtyard are typical. As Michael Jenner observes, this was “the architecture of stern paternalism and social control”. Often sited in the heart of slum areas, these buildings were intended to act as “bastions of respectability to protect the occupants from the depravity which still lurked on the doorstep.” Boodle, agent for the Grosvenor and Northampton estates, stressed that model dwellings provided “a good example of cleanliness and decent behaviour in the whole neighbourhood”. The medical officer for the St Saviour’s district board of works described model blocks as “small plots of civilisation, cultivated in the midst of a wide waste of barbarism”. As grim as many thought they looked, such block dwellings were generally deemed a considerable improvement on the slums they replaced. And there is no denying that they had a proven effect on health. According to the Report of the Trustees of the Peabody Donation Fund of 1893, the death rate among residents was 17.6 per thousand people, 3.7 per thousand below the average for London. Infant mortality was 126.4 in every thousand births, 37.9 below the average figure for the whole of the city.

However, there were also fears expressed about the blocks. Not only were they felt to be impersonal, it was believed that segregating the working classes could encourage the galvanising of a common identity, leading possibly to the fomenting of revolution. There were also fears of possible epidemics, and that high-density living was morally harmful. Dr Tidy, medical officer of health for Islington, declared that “congregation always rears degeneration”. One critic described the buildings as ‘family packing cases’. William Morris called them ‘bastilles’, though he did also concede that the existence of a common garden and other amenities at least promoted a sense of communalism. The Daily Telegraph declared them to be “a cross between the reformatory and workhouse style” with their gloomy passages and pokey rooms. And yet there is evidence to show that the barrack-like appearance of the blocks did not deter prospective tenants. In 1885 there was a waiting list of up to two years for a Peabody property.

By far the biggest complaint was that the blocks were not housing the class for whom the crisis was most acute – the labouring class. Peabody housing was designed for skilled workers and small tradespeople (the ‘aristocracy of the working classes’), not the very poor, and applicants were carefully screened for suitability. Originally Peabody barred tenants who earned over 30 shillings and less than 12 shillings. This meant that the rents were too high for the casually employed or manual labourers. Added to this, those who qualified were required to pay their rent in advance and provide an employer’s reference, both of which, by definition, were impossible for casual workers. Despite these criticisms it’s clear that the Trust provided rooms at rents lower than those in the immediate neighbourhood – often two rooms could be had for little more than the price of one room in surrounding streets, hence their popularity.

The emphasis with Peabody housing was unashamedly on respectability and, to this end, there were rules of conduct for each estate. The success of the Peabody project rested on the effectiveness of the individual superintendants of the properties. He (or sometimes she) dealt with regular inspections of the property, applications for rooms, collection of all rents, and the enforcement of Peabody’s rules.  The brief was clear: “Firm discipline [should be] maintained, for without it tenants will not only be careless in the matter of rent, but careless and destructive of the property”. “Drunkenness, sexual laxity and financial fecklessness were outlawed, cleanliness and order were ordained. Intolerance of rent arrears alone insured that only those workers in stable employment […] could get and keep their rooms.” According to Edward Bowmaker in The Housing of the Working Classes: “Residence in the Peabody buildings is an undeniable certificate of character”. Many of the rules were aimed at good community health: no applications for rooms to be entertained unless every member of the applicant’s family has been vaccinated. Passages, steps, closets and lavatory windows had to be washed every Saturday and swept every morning before 10am (this to be done by the tenants in turn). Washing was only to be done in the laundry. Tenants were required to report to the superintendant any births, deaths or infectious diseases occurring in their rooms. Any tenant not complying with this rule would receive notice to quit.  

So, did Peabody and his like solve London’s housing crisis? The truth is that the model dwelling movement fell far short of housing all those who needed somewhere to live. It failed not because of a lack of capital or low dividends but because of the sheer magnitude of the task it had undertaken. Yet the movement did leave an impressive legacy. Without the houses it provided, many working class people would have had little hope of bettering their domestic standards. These dwellings, close to the inhabitants’ workplaces, were a real boon. They were solidly-built and much better equipped than most other working-class dwellings.  They have also proved amenable to modernisation, which explains why many are still standing when so much experimental ‘modernist’ social housing has failed. And, thanks to the trustees’ initial insistence that there should be a return of at least three per cent on all its investments, the Peabody Trust continued and today is the oldest and largest housing association in London, managing 27,000 homes housing 80,000 people. And it is still building affordable homes - George Peabody’s legacy lives on.

 

 

References:

www.peabody.org.uk

The East End Nobody Knows E. Jones

London in the 19^th century Jerry White (blog: https://londonhistorians.wordpresscom )

London Heritage Michael Jenner

The Housing of the Working Classes Edward Bowmaker (1895)

The Eternal Slum: Housing and Social Policy in Victorian London Anthony S. Wohl (2009)

Victorian London Liza Picard (2005)

The London Doré Saw: a Victorian Evocation Eric de Maré (1973)

Peabody Buildings Rules: visual courtesy of Westminster City Archives