DOCKHEAD [To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR, —May we draw
the attention of your readers to an effort which is being made in South London to combat the conditions brought about by the bad housing and other social evils ? In a corner of London called Dockhead, in Bermondsey, immortalized in romance and history, conditions to-day are such that there are nearly six thousand people, mostly dockers and factory-hands, living in an area that covers less than half a square mile. This overcrowding means that there can be practically no home-life and that the streets are the playground of the young.
The Time and Talents Guild which has carried on club work amongst girls and women in Dockhead for some fifteen years, on an interdenominational religious basis, in a disused public- house, found themselves faced with extinction owing to the L.C.C. slum clearance scheme in the district. The L.C.C., however, appreciating the work which was being done, promised a new site in the near neighbourhood of the old club if the Guild could raise the money for erection and equipment of a new club.
It is our hope that this new club-house will become a centre of family life in Dockhead. There will be room for lectures, concerts, dances, and gymnastics, and a reading-room and library ; classrooms for arts and handicrafts ; a roof garden where children can play in safety and where tired mothers can sit and rest in the summer, and a chapel for private and corporate worship.
Those of your readers who appreciate the fact that recreation and rest instructs and elevates in the evening and means better work in the day time will realize from all aspects how important the building of this club is. There is a growing waiting list of those wishing to join in the various activities of the club and who cannot be received in the present inadequate premises.
The sum required for the purchase of the site and to build and equip the club is £12,000. The Guild set out to raise the sum and in little over a year has raised nearly £7,000, most in small sums, a good deal of it through local effort, for the work has enthusiastic support in Bermondsey itself. We want to raise the remaining £5,000 before the end of another year. Will your readers help ?
MAUD kELHAM, President, Time and Talents Guild.
HENRY COCKBURN, Esq., Hon. Treasurer, 29 Collingham Road, S.W. 5 ; WYNDHAM DEEDES, Hon. Secretary, Association of Residential Settlements.
[We wish the Time and Talents Guild all success in its attempt to raise the balance required to build and equip its new club in Dockhead, Bermondsey.—En. Spectator.]
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