Blackest Streets

Product Description

In 1887 Government inspectors were sent to investigate the Old Nichol a notorious slum on the boundary of Bethnal Green parish where almost 6 000 inhabitants were crammed into thirty or so streets of rotting dwellings & where the mortality rate ran at nearly twice that of the rest of Bethnal Green. Among much else they discovered that the decaying 100-year-old houses were some of the most lucrative properties in the capital for their absent slumlords who included peers of the realm local politicians & churchmen. The Blackest Streets is set in a turbulent period of London's history when revolution was in the air & award-winning historian Sarah Wise skilfully evokes the texture of life at that time not just for the tenants but for those campaigning for change & others seeking to protect their financial interests. She recovers Old Nichol from the ruins of history & lays bare the social & political conditions that created & sustained this black hole which lay at the very heart of the Empire.