Professor William Fishman, son of an immigrant tailor, describes London's East End at a time of mass immigration from Eastern Europe to the shabby tenements of Stepney and Whitechapel. He describes the spread of libertarian and socialist ideals among the Jewish community culminating in the great strikes of 1889 and 1912. It was in London's East End that Rudolf Rocker taught himself Yiddish and helped politicize a generation. An extraordinary period of Jewish, immigrant and radical history, described by an inspired storyteller. "An immensely readable work, it should attract a large and enthusiastic audience." - Paul Avrich

East End Jewish radicals, 1875-1914

Religion & Spirituality

Fishman, William J.

Judaism

Duckworth, in association with the Acton Society Trust

The home of successive waves of immigrants, from the Huguenots in the seventeenth century to the Jews in the nineteenth and the Bangla-Deshis today, London's East End has been the scene of its worst poverty and exploitation, and has inspired its greatest philanthropists, reformers and radicals. The East End is, and always has been, a place where conditions are tough, crime violent and work hard, but in which Cockney optimism and love of life are proverbial. In this evocative book, the area's turbulent past and continuing traditions are accurately explored in text and pictures. If East End life has a character that transcends period and generation, it is vividly captured and delineated here, in a book which will delight and intrigue alike the citizen, the historian, the general reader and the visitor. Full of B&amp;W historical photos.

The Streets of East London

Breach, Nicholas

Duckworth, London, England

 East End 1888 is essential reading for anyone interested in social history and the history of London. Professor William Fishman shows what life was like for the labouring poor in the year of Jack the Ripper and the Matchgirls’ strike, when poverty, crime, disease and social unrest were at their height. The communal life of the street, pubs and clubs softened the brutality of the daily grind, where the sweatshop, the ghetto, the poor tenement — and the threat of the workhouse - were ever present in an age of genuine “Victorian values”."In the hands of virtually any other historian this would have been a depressing book. But Bill Fishman has a gift, shared with Richard Cobb, of writing about horrible subjects in such a way as to leave you thinking that there is a God in heaven after all."Norman Stone, Sunday Times"Fishman ís admirable book not merely enlightens us about a dead past, and excites our indignation on behalf of wrongs long since righted. It shows us a past in which we can all too clearly see the present."Leon Garfield, Times Higher Educational Supplement "A brilliantly perceptive study... a marvellous, vivid account of the poverty stricken world of the East End, not only scholarly and well documented but also very easy to read"Spectator 

East End 1888: A Year in a London Borough Among the Labouring Poor

History

Europe

Ronald P Frye & Co

"East End I888" documents in minute detail the social, political, and economic life in the notorious slums of East London during the reign of Queen Victoria. The setting for Jack the Ripper's atrocities, East End was synonymous with crime, filth, disease, and the dregs of humanity. W. J. Fishman focuses on a single year, one century ago and one century after the storming of the Bastille. Poignant accounts of homeless families choosing starvation rather than submitting to the inhumanity and separation of the workhouse are contrasted with lively reports of entertainment in music halls and "penny gaffs" or freak shows, where Joseph Merrick, The Elephant Man, was discovered. Providing numerous excerpts from contemporary newspapers, police records, workhouse journals, novels, medical reports, church sermons, and political debates, Fishman illuminates a slice of life in Victorian England. William J. Fishman is Professor of Political Studies at Queen Mary College, University of London.

East End 1888: Life in a London Borough Among the Laboring Poor

Temple Univ Pr

East End 1888 is essential reading for anyone interested in social history and the history of London. Professor William Fishman shows what life was like for the labouring poor in the year of Jack the Ripper and the Matchgirls’ strike, when poverty, crime, disease and social unrest were at their height. The communal life of the street, pubs and clubs softened the brutality of the daily grind, where the sweatshop, the ghetto, the poor tenement — and the threat of the workhouse - were ever present in an age of genuine “Victorian values”."In the hands of virtually any other historian this would have been a depressing book. But Bill Fishman has a gift, shared with Richard Cobb, of writing about horrible subjects in such a way as to leave you thinking that there is a God in heaven after all."Norman Stone, Sunday Times"Fishman ís admirable book not merely enlightens us about a dead past, and excites our indignation on behalf of wrongs long since righted. It shows us a past in which we can all too clearly see the present."Leon Garfield, Times Higher Educational Supplement "A brilliantly perceptive study... a marvellous, vivid account of the poverty stricken world of the East End, not only scholarly and well documented but also very easy to read"Spectator

East End 1888

Five Leaves Publications