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Over London by Rail A large arch frames scores of closely packed brick buildings and backyards in this dark line drawing. On the left, strong vertical lines, created by a series of equidistant chimneys, draws the viewer’s eye from the foreground to the background. Within each space there is an arched second storey window. Long narrow drainpipes, to the right of each window, repeat the vertical emphasis created by the exterior chimneys. Abutting onto the exterior walls there is a continuous row of smaller structures with chimneys. Each of the smaller structures has a door opening and small windows. Within each section a large barrel leans against the chimney. Thick masonry walls create small exterior divisions behind each of the buildings. Within each section groups of children and adults, busy with various activities, fill the tiny spaces, vying for room with the hanging clothes. A narrow passage dividing companion backyards is indicated by a broad curve of two parallel lines in the center. To the right of the passageway, a companion set of backyards and buildings reflect a continuation of closely packed living accommodations. The passage, filled with shadows of figures, continues to the rear of the image and underneath another set of arches. Smoke billows from a steam engine as it crosses the tall arched bridge, drifting down into the backyards. Background By the middle of the 19th Century, the city of London was a study in contrasts. In the shadows of a metropolis that reflected great culture and prosperity lived another population beset with poverty and disease. Dore’s illustration indicates the cramped living conditions of the lower classes. Late 19th Century terraced houses, built in seemingly endless rows, provided accommodation for the masses. Built in the Dockland areas, away from the city center, the inhabitants main concern was one of daily survival. The monotonous pattern of their lives, as indicated by the repetition of equidistant vertical lines and horizontal backyards, left little room for enjoyment. The massing of the poor – the density increasing with the poverty – is at the root of the evils which afflict most of the great cities of Europe. It is the striking and affecting feature of London especially, where in the lanes and alleys the houses are so full of children that, to use wit’s illustration, you can hardly shut the street door for them. In the poorest of London’s districts the men, women, and children appear, on entering, to have abandoned all hope. There is a desperate, ferocious levity in the air: and the thin, wan, woe-begone faces laugh and jeer at you as you pass by. They are the workless of work-a-day London – born in idleness to die in the workhouse, or upon bare boards. …near where I was is Shadwell, one of the poorest quarters. By the depths of its poverty and misery, as by its extent, it is proportional to London’s enormous size and wealth. The Upper-Marsh, Westminster Road, is what is called a low neighbourhood… right through it runs the South Western Railway, and everywhere about it are planted pawnbrokers’ shops, with an indescribable amount of dirty second-hand clothes, and monster gin palaces, with unlimited plate-glass and gas. Go along there what hour of the day you will, these gin palaces are full of ragged children, hideous old women, and drunken men…
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