Keep It Clean,
made partly in
Colvin Street in 1956.
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Return to text. |
| See stories from local press | |
| See info about a film called Keep It Clean, made partly in Colvin Street in 1956. | |
| Colvin Street, Hammersmith. It was demolished not long afterwards and is now a car park. |
| See large picture of Colvin Street. |
| See Charles Booth survey from the 1890s. This features a map. |
| There were only 21 houses in the street, each with two rooms upstairs and two downstairs (two up, two down). Each house probably also had an outside lavatory, or privvy. In 1891 those 21 houses, or 84 rooms, contained 137 people, an average of 6.5 per house. Only number 9 had three people in it (a widow and her two grown up children) and they only occupied three rooms of the house, the other room was probably vacant awaiting a new tenant. The two most densely occupied houses were numbers 8 and 15. Both had ten people living in them, number 8 in two families, number 15 in three families.
The 137 people who lived in the road included 62 children aged 16 or under. None of the children over the age of 13 appears to have been in full time education. Amongst the 14-16 year olds there were two newsboys, a laundress and a dressmaker, a labourer in a soap factory, a bookseller's assistant and Charles (Teddy) Brind, who was an apprentice compositor. The most common female occupation was laundry work. The most common male occupation was the building trade, notably painting. John Brind was a stone mason, and therefore a skilled building worker. Amongst the oldest inhabitants, the 13 who were aged 50 or over, only three were born in London and two in Middlesex. The others were born in Berkshire, Devon, Hampshire, Hertfordshire, Somerset, Suffolk, Surrey and Sussex. Evidently the population of Hammersmith had been growing fast as a result of immigration from the rural shires, as well as some movement outward from the city itself. The two oldest residents of the road were widows, a 76- year-old born in Hertfordshire, and a 77-year-old, born in Middlesex, who said she was supported by friends, when asked how she earned her income by the census collector. |
| Occupation | No. | Occupation | No. | Apprentice Engineer & fitter | 1 | News boy | 2 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apprentice compositor print | 1 | Nurse | 1 | |
| Barge Owner | 1 | Omnibus Coachman | 1 | |
| Boiler stoker (stationary) | 1 | Omnibus Conductor | 1 | |
| Bookseller's Assistant | 1 | Painter | 4 | |
Building labourer |
3 | Painter & Window Cleaner | 1 | |
Cab driver |
1 | Plate layer | 1 | |
| Cap manufacturer | 2 | Postman | 1 | |
| Caretaker | 1 | Potman | 2 | |
Carman |
4 | Printer compositor | 1 | |
Children |
30 | Saw sharpener | 1 | |
| Domestic servant | 1 | Scholar | 25 | |
| Dressmaker | 2 | Shoemaker | 1 | |
| Grocer's assistant | 1 | Stableman | 1 | |
| Harness maker | 1 | Stone mason | 1 | |
| Horsekeeper | 1 | Washerwoman | 1 | |
| Ironer | 1 | Wheelwright | 1 | |
| Labourer | 4 | Wheelwright smith | 1 | |
| Labourer soap factory | 1 | Widow | 2 | |
| Laundress | 10 | Wife | 18 | |
| Laundry Maid | 1 | Mangler | 1 | |
| *** Total *** | 137 |
| RG 12/37 | Administrative County of London | The undermentioned Houses are situate within the Boundaries of the Civil Parish Hammersmith | Ecclesiastical Parish or District St Johns |
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| 1 Colvin St | John Reynolds |
| 1 Colvin St | Ada Reynolds |
| 1 Colvin St | Caleb A Illsley |
| 1 Colvin St | Margaret Illsley |
| 2 Colvin St | John Beach |
| 2 Colvin St | Alice Beach |
| 2 Colvin St | Arthur Beach |
| See next page of census |