Life and labour of the people in London. Final volume, Notes on social influences and conclusion / by Charles Booth ; assisted by Jesse Argyle, Ernest Aves, Geo. E. Arkell, Arthur L. Baxter, George H. Duckworth.

  • Charles Booth
Date:
1902
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Life and labour of the people in London. Final volume, Notes on social influences and conclusion / by Charles Booth ; assisted by Jesse Argyle, Ernest Aves, Geo. E. Arkell, Arthur L. Baxter, George H. Duckworth. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    VOLUME VI (Third Series : Religious Influences') OUTER SOUTH LONDON [Date of Inquiry in this District: 1900] TOE BELT OF CROWDING AND POVERTY. Chap, i., pp. 3-36. Sec. i. The whole district of the coloured map.—It is with the- future as much as the present that we have to deal in outer and outermost South London. Here we have the problem of London’s growth and expansion presented in its most regular shape under the most normal conditions. The coloured map shows at the top an almost uniform belt of crowding and poverty, from which the outward stream has flowed, follow¬ ing the contour of the ground, to either side of the central hills, pp. 3, 4. Sketch map of district and statistics bearing on the area included therein, pp. 5, 6. Sec. ii. North=West of Clapham Road .—In the streets west of Wandsworth Road in All Saints’ parish we touch an extremely low level, while the adjacent streets to the east are also very poor. St. Anne’s: a vicar who truly spends his life in his work : his church adherents gained one by one : admits the decline in conventional church¬ going, but welcomes it as in the direction of honesty : a small but very earnest congregation, many of whom are men: but a wider sphere of influence claimed for church than statistics represent: the vicar has espoused the cause of the working men in their trade disputes. Wheat- sheaf Hall finds its backbone in the more religious and temperate among working men : a church formed by the efforts of a pastor who gives his services and found the money for the building of the hall: this the only competitor to the Church here, but the bulk of the population remain untouched. The Roman Catholics seek only those who acknowledge the authority of their Church. All Saints’: an extremely active local organiza¬ tion created and sustained by the present incumbent: two churches and two mission rooms: an example of very energetic religious work of Low Church type : deep discouragement at lack of permanent result, but no relaxation of effort, and work done enormous: Sunday schools with 3500 children and two hundred teachers: an early morning service (5.30) for railway men. Here as elsewhere the attitude of the men and the bulk of the people is one of utter indifference; and this indifference is growing: slackness of many so-called Church people : ' you must be always behind them.’ The Railway Mission claims some success : fully five thousand railway men in the neighbourhood and among them some religious-minded men who carry on the mission. St. Barnabas’ : the place of middle-class families taken by others less well-to-do: large proportion of railway workers: among the working class scarcely any go to place of worship. The minister of a Baptist chapel speaks of the change in population, and all tell of a middle class fallen to pieces, and a working class respectable but indifferent to religion, and the poor practically untouched by it. St. Stephen’s, stranded by the departure of the well-to-do, has no hold on the people: half-starved struggle for existence on Evangelical lines. Trinity Church, an important Presbyterian centre in Clapham Road, draws its congregation from far and wide: the carriage folk gone and the poor class difficult to reach. St. Mark’s: two mission halls and an active