London’s Italian community

On a recent walk round Bethnal Green I happened across Pellicci’s (famous as the Krays’ favourite caff and now with listed status due to its stunning Art Deco interior), and got to wondering about London’s Italian population – when and why they came, and where they settled. Not the East End, as it turns out, but a different part of London altogether…

Map of Little Italy

Before 1800, Italian migrants were few and far between and widely scattered across London. Their

Pellici's café Bethnal Green Road

number increased in the 1830s, when many exiles arrived as a result of agitation for Italian unification. They mostly settled in Clerkenwell and Holborn, the historic heart of their community lying between Saffron Hill and Leather Lane to the south of Clerkenwell Road (with Hatton Garden at the centre), and Eyre Street, Back Hill and Warner Street to the north of it. In Victorian times this area was a maze of narrow, overcrowded streets, alleyways and courtyards. In the mid-19^th century a second wave of Italians arrived, this time poor and unskilled, driven out of Italy by poor economic conditions after the Napoleonic Wars. These also mainly settled in Clerkenwell and lived in awful conditions – a survey in the 1880s found that conditions were worse in Italian households than for any other group.

Italian street musicians c. 1876

The early settlers were skilled craftsmen from northern Italy - mainly makers of looking glasses, picture frames and precision instruments, e.g. barometers and thermometers. They were attracted to the Holborn area because it was close to the city and the West End. These men often lived in large houses and were comparatively affluent. In the 1870s most Italian migrants were organ-grinders and street musicians.
 Some played hurdy-gurdies, harps and fiddles, most played mechanical barrel-organs. Some of the grinders had monkeys, who would dance, beg for money and thank the customers. Many musicians were seasonal migrants who returned to Italy in the winter.


Organ grinders c.1875

Little evidence remains today of the prevalence of organ-making and playing in this area, although Chiappa & Sons (established in 1877) is still in business in its original premises, these days making and repairing organs for fairgrounds.
 Other ‘Italian’ professions included mosaic and parquet layers (many of London’s lavatory walls and floors and pub entrances were worked by Italian craftsmen), plaster figure-makers and picture-framers. All of these stopped gaps in London’s labour market. By the late 19^th century, with organ-grinding now in rapid decline, selling ice-cream became by far the favourite occupation. Ice cream first appeared on London’s streets in the summer of 1850. By the 1870s its production was almost entirely in the hands of London’s Italians and manufactured in (often filthy) backyards. This led inevitably to accusations of spreading disease, especially as the product was originally sold in ‘licking glasses’, used by several customers! A familiar sight on every street corner, the sellers became known locally as ‘okey-pokey’ men (a corruption of their cry of ecco un poco meaning 'Here's a little (taste). In 1900 there were around 900 ice cream sellers in the Holborn area.

1847 saw the arrival in London of one of the most famous Italian migrants of the 19^th century - Carlo

Man selling halfpenny ices c.1876

Gatti. He started off selling coffee, waffles and roast chestnuts but by 1853 he had started selling ice-cream, going on to pioneer the use of refrigeration in the food industry, importing ice from Norway and storing it in a wharf by the Regent’s Canal. He later established the prestigious Gatti’s Restaurant near Charing Cross, as well as Gatti’s Under the Arches, a popular music hall of the time. When he died in 1878, Gatti was a millionaire.

By 1901, there were about 11,000 Italians living and working in London, three quarters of them men. As more and more settled and brought their families over to London, so the area started to develop its own facilities and institutions: schools, clubs, pubs, cafes… and grocers. A contemporary witness describes Italian-owned shops selling: “maccaroni, all manner of beans in bowls… and common sausages in their vulgar brown skins”! Food shops sprang up, e.g. Terroni’s in Clerkenwell Road - which still claims to be London’s oldest delicatessen - and Gazzano’s, which opened in 1901 in Farringdon Road and is still going strong. 

Italian children in Saffron Hill, Clerkenwell 1935

The Italian Hospital

In 1884, an Italian hospital (the Ospidale Italiano)   opened in Queen Square, staffed entirely by Italian speakers. As most of the patients were poor, care was provided free. It lasted until 1989 when it became part of Great Ormond Street Hospital. There was also an Italian Benevolent Society from 1861 “to relieve poor Italians - to procure them employment – [and] to assist the distressed back to Italy”. The community also had its own small education and dramatic societies, and newspapers - including the Gazzetta Italiana di Londra. In 1864 a club for working men opened called the “Society for the Progress of the Italian Working Classes in London”. It later became the Mazzini Garibaldi Club and in its heyday formed the heart of social activity for the men of the Italian quarter.

St Peter's RC church

The Italian community naturally  also needed a place to worship. Having raised sufficient funds back in Italy, St Peter’s Roman Catholic Church was built in Saffron Hill and dedicated in 1863. The church (Grade II-listed and still in use today) is in Roman basilica style, despite being designed by an English Protestant architect!

The Second World War was a difficult period for London’s Italians. After Mussolini’s declaration of war on Britain in 1940, many local men were imprisoned and institutions like the hospital and the Mazzini Garibaldi Club were requisitioned as enemy property. The streets of Little Italy were also badly bombed. The once thriving Italian community of this part of London now dispersed, and by the 1950s (continuing a trend that had begun in the 20s and 30s) a large number had moved to Soho, where a second Little Italy grew up.

References:

London in the 19^th century Jerry White (2007)
London: the Illustrated History Cathy Ross and John Clark (2008)
London Street People: Past and Present Bob Pullen (1989)
London At My Feet Geoffrey Fletcher (1981)
Little Italy: The Story of London’s Italian Quarter Tudor Allen (2008)