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how do you tell if a neighbourhood was wealthy?

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  • how do you tell if a neighbourhood was wealthy?

    i was wondering what type of neighbourhood westminster, holborn and st george hanover square were.

    my ingle's moved to st george.
    my morton's seem to have been married there, had a kid in holborn, and then settle in westminster for two generations, moving to newington across the river in 1851. they settled there, then just got up and moved to yorkshire in 1900.

    it's been bugging me. any suggestions?

  • #2
    Booth Poverty Map & Modern map (Charles Booth Online Archive)

    This site will give you some idea.
    Caroline
    Caroline's Family History Pages
    Meddle not in the affairs of Dragons, for you are crunchy and good with ketchup.

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    • #3
      As Booth's map will show you, you got all classes rubbing shoulders in many London Districts, so you need to investigate individual streets to get a better idea.

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      • #4
        Another way to tell - lots of servants (rather than just one). Single family occupation with no lodgers or boarders - all the houses in the street, not just your household.

        The occupations of the householders in a street are a clue too. Factory hands wouldn't be living in a posh area, Merchant Bankers wouldn't be living in a poor area.

        OC

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        • #5
          Also try to see if you can find any pictures of the area, and compare the various editions of Godfrey maps. Booth maps are very good for circa 1900, but won't necessarily reflect what an area was like 50 years ago.

          Large houses falling into multiple occupancy, jerry building of back-to-backs, could pull an area down.

          I suspect that the gentrification of areas only happened in the C20th as I can't imagine that you would want to move into an area with an existing poor reputation if you could avoid it.

          I personally find it very difficult to tell what an area was really like, apart from the obviously wealthy parts and the very poor areas.
          Phoenix - with charred feathers
          Researching Skillings from Norfolk, Sworn from Salisbury and Adams in Malborough, Devon.

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          • #6
            Even an area like St George Hanover Square - very nobby - would have also had its poorer areas, hidden round the back of the big houses, to house the servants needed for the upkeep of the large houses!

            I don't have much difficulty in judging what kind of area my townie relatives lived in. They were mostly "respectable working class" and lived in terraced houses, occasionally with one servant (almost always a relative of some sort) or a lodger, and probably a shared privy in the backyard. They were mill hands, shoe makers, wheelwrights, shop keepers etc.

            The ones I do have difficulty with, are the farming lot. Sometimes there are 20 people living in the household, mostly relations and I cannot judge whether they lived in a two room hovel and all slept on the floor, or whether it was a ten-bedroomed substantial house!

            Like has always attracted like and if all the neighbours are ag labs, or cotton weavers, then it is likely a poorish area. My working class lot were upwardly mobile and soon moved on to a better neighbourhood, which can be gauged by the occupations of the heads of household, and also the fact that most of the sons and daughters had no given occupations!

            OC

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            • #7
              The field books for the Valuation Act of 1910 are my current favourite toy. They describe exactly what every property in the kingdom was like (though all Portsmouth & several other areas have gone up in smoke)

              My ag labs in Norfolk, apart from g grandfather in his model cottage, were living in ricketty shacks, usually with just a ladder to the upper rooms. They were usually described as "unfit for human habitation" or "ruinous"
              Phoenix - with charred feathers
              Researching Skillings from Norfolk, Sworn from Salisbury and Adams in Malborough, Devon.

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              • #8
                London has always had extremes of riches and poverty and often rubbing shoulders together. Quite notorious roads are often just a block away from respectable ones. This is probably way after your time, but I read Jerry White's "Campbell Bunk" recently, about Campbell Road in Islington, known as the worst road in London between the wars. Although it wasn't different in the kind of houses from its neighbour streets, its houses were often let by the room and there was a lot of people leaving without paying rent, a highly migrant population with no settled people to add respectability and continuity.

                Booths poverty maps show quite clearly the range of economic conditions in even a small area.

                And its not different today - we all know of local roads where there's a large house or so, and further down a row of terraces, or a posh new development opposite a rundown council block.
                ~ with love from Little Nell~
                Chowns, Dunt, Emms, Mealing, Purvey & Smoothy

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                • #9
                  But to go back to your original query, Westminster was traditionally a bit posher - it was the West End, as was St Geo Hanover Square, whereas Holborn was in the City and parts of it (around Saffron Hill) were slum housing for immigrant Irish and Italian and other minority communities.

                  There are zillions of books on London history which may give you more detail or you can look here
                  British History Online
                  ~ with love from Little Nell~
                  Chowns, Dunt, Emms, Mealing, Purvey & Smoothy

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                  • #10
                    My husband had some wealthier attorneys living in the posh bits round Lincolns Inn, Bedford Row and Staples Inn and a lot more poor folk along Liquorpond Road (now Clerkenwell Road) and numerous courts and alleys.
                    ~ with love from Little Nell~
                    Chowns, Dunt, Emms, Mealing, Purvey & Smoothy

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                    • #11
                      Kylejustin,

                      Did your people actually live in Hanover Square or were they merely registered there? In the C19 it was an extremely populous registration district with a very socially mixed range of inhabitants.

                      Peter

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                      • #12
                        thanx for the input. i find it quite interesting looking at the social areas and communities. you guys have been great.

                        peter, what do you mean by registered? i have family births registered in the area, and they were there for the census. and a few deaths too.

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