Booth’s Survey of Dorset Street and Miller’s Court, 1887.

[Gary Barnett]

Survey Notebook 18 (BOOTH/B/25) covering Whitechapel and Stepney, has now been digitised by the LSE. It’s full of interest, particularly in respect of Dorset Street and Miller’s Court.

Let’s start with Miller’s Court.

The Whitechapel/Spitalfields survey was carried out by a Mr Pointer in February and March, 1887. What a pity he didn’t do so a year or so later, we might then have had a record of Mary Kelly and Joe Barnett to mull over. As it is, only 5 houses were recorded in Millers Court, nos 1 - 5, and only 1, 2, 3 and 4 seem to have been inhabited. No. 1 contained 2 rooms and Mr Pointer, probably with input from a police minder, came to the conclusion that its occupants were ‘probably prostitutes’. There were three children, two of school age and one under 3 living in the household of a labourer at no. 2. The rent for two rooms in the court was 4/- per week.

The court was classified as black - Lowest class. Vicious, semi criminal.

[Gary Barnett]

If I’m reading it correctly, Dorset Street itself was classified as L Blue and Black and described as being inhabited by ‘Poor and low class of people. A few Jews.’ Pointer adds, ‘The girls are at any rate not open prostitutes and possibly are not so at all. They make no display of it.’



The businesses recorded in the street included:


3 - Furnished rooms for females.

4 - Furnished rooms.

8&9 - Lodging house.

16, 17, 18 & 19 - Lodging house.

20 - Prop[ietor] lod[ging] ho[use].

21, 22, 23 - Pub.

24, 25, 26 - Over stables.

27 - Grocer sh[op] (more about this later).

28, 29, 30 - Back of Lodging ho[use].

32 - Pub

33, 34, 35, 36 - Lodging house. New.

38 - Furnished rooms for females.

39 - Coal shed

[Gary Barnett]

It’s seems odd that Dorset Street was L[ight] Blue and Black.

The classifications were:

Lowest class. Vicious, semi-criminal.	Black
Very poor, casual. Chronic want.	Dark blue
Poor. 18s. to 21s. a week for a moderate family.	Light blue
Mixed. Some comfortable others poor.	Purple
Fairly comfortable. Good ordinary earnings.	Pink
Middle class. Well-to-do.	Red
Upper-middle and upper classes. Wealthy.	Yellow

[Gary Barnett]

OK, no. 27.

A grocers shop. The R[espectable] grocer had 2 children of school age. His wife and 1 s[on] assisted him in the shop. There was also a poor bootmaker living at the address. The bootmaker also had 2 children of school age.

I’m assuming the son who helped out in his father’s shop was ‘Steve’ McCarthy.

[Gary Barnett]

As I mentioned above, nos 24-26 were ‘above stables’. And at the time the survey was conducted 25 & 26 were unoccupied, which presumably partly explains the low number of residences with a Millers Court address.

[Gary Barnett]

Paternoster Row was recorded as Dorset Court. It was classified as D Blue and it’s condition was summarised thus: ‘Very poor class of Jews except for the lodging houses’.

Two notable residents:

A lodging house keeper with 5 kids at no 3. Who might that have been? No. 4 was a lodging house.

A grocers’s assistant at no. 9. McCarthy’s ‘shopman’ (muscle)?

[Gary Barnett]

For reference:

From the 1890s?

[Debra Arif]

Paternoster Row was recorded as Dorset Court. It was classified as D Blue and it’s condition was summarised thus: ‘Very poor class of Jews except for the lodging houses’.

Two notable residents:

A lodging house keeper with 5 kids at no 3. Who might that have been? No. 4 was a lodging house.

A grocers’s assistant at no. 9. McCarthy’s ‘shopman’ (muscle)?

Mary Ann Kennedy was described as a lodging house keeper at number 4 in 1881. By 1891 she had moved to number 3 but was described as a laundress deputy (wash) so a combination of right address and right occupation but at different times!

[Chris Phillips]

Thanks for posting those interesting details.

Regarding the odd classification of light blue/black, the division between the two is shown on the 1889 version of the Booth map. The copy I have, from here, doesn't have brilliant resolution unfortunately; no doubt someone has a clearer version:

[Gary Barnett]

Thanks, Debs and Chris.

[Gary Barnett]

I wonder if the grocer’s assistant was Henry Buckley or Daniel McCarthy.

[Rob Clack]

This is from the Charles Booth London website
https://booth.lse.ac.uk/map/14/-0.1174/51.5064/100/0

[Chris Phillips]

This is from the Charles Booth London website
https://booth.lse.ac.uk/map/14/-0.1174/51.5064/100/0

Thanks. That is the 1898-9 version, I think, which is a bit different from the 1889 one I posted earlier. I don't think there is any light blue on Dorset Street in 1898-9.

[Rob Clack]

Ah, didn't realise. Looking at it, it's quite different.

[Rob Clack]

This one isn't much better. It's a large detail from a reproduction.