The Slums of Fulham
lARIVING down to Hurlingham, one wonders how many people know that just beyond Stamford Bridge, at Stamford Place, there is a little house sheltering fifteen people in four rooms ?
The ground floor back of this house was perhaps the worst instance _of overcrowding that we have seen in the course of our inquiries into these areas of misery which are a disgrace to London---and to us all as Christians. We write was, because since this article was written many good people have been astir and sonic of these evils have been remedied. Yet we publish the article as it stands, for it describes what still exists in various parts of London, and what must be very rapidly put right if we wish London to -be comparable in cleanliness and decent housing to the capitals of Northern Europe. The room we have in mind, then, is really a passage, Out of which the stairway leads. A bed fills up.
i one side of it--this gives an idea of its size. Most of the _ remaining space is. taken up by a couple of tables. A man and his wife and five • children live and sleep in this mournful •little den. In a front room of similarly minute proportions a man and his wife and two children live. There was another child, but it died by suffocation. Dare we, in face of the mother's anguish, .say that this was the result of her carelessness ? The Coroner did not think so. How many of us, we would ask our readers, would like to live or indeed could manage to exist in similar circumstances ? Yet these poor people must exist there, while we discuss; statistics and townTlanning, for they have nowhere else to go. Far be it from us to suggest that town planning and statistics are not necessary. We have already indi- cated their urgency. But behind theni must he the irresistible weight of public opinion to say : " This shame shall not endure."
Let us look at this particular house more closely. Upstairs a woman and three girls liVe in two rooms: There is one kitchen-stove for the house in the front room (where, as we have already said, four people -are living), so that the fifteen inmates of this huinan rookery must come here for their cooking. There is one closet in the tiny yard -outside. The rubbish for the whole house- hold is contained in an overflowing dustbin, which is only. cleared once a week. For the rest of the week the effluvia from the garbage is right under the noses of the women and children. How can people lead decent litres. in conditions which are Worse than those of the galley slaves -in a Phoenician trireme ?
One would have thought that tuberculosis and rickets and all the diseases of darkness would hold their sway here, but we have to report, in justice to the Health Authorities of Fulham, that the children of these par- ticular families all looked remarkably well. Of the mother whose child had died we will not write. The death is recent, and we did not trust ourselves to speak to her of the tragedy. or even search her eyes, " But if these surviving children are well and happy, is it not rather a matter on which to- congratulate their parents rather than congratulate ourselves, or the Borough Council of Fulham, unless it be on the virility and hardihood of our race that allows such flowers to bloom in such a quagmire of corruption ? . Do we wish a -respectable man and woman, with their five young children, to continue living in a room in which no reader of the Spectator would allow one of his own children to live ?
- At the back of Queen's Club is Albert Mews, with its derelict houses and litter from costers' carts. Near it, in a side street, we visited a single room in which Mrs. B. and her husband and their four fair-haired children live. In this case, again, the bed fills up all one side of the room. Yet six human beings pass about half their lives here. The couple have lived in this place for seven years (although not with their present family) and cannot now 'find any other accommodation. Mrs. B. has tramped -the streets until she is weary, in search of a place to live. " Have you brought me good news ? " she inquired with pathetic eagerness of the welfare worker who accompanied us on our visit. " I did hope you had good news. It is so hard to manage here," she added, " and the children are getting ill. They won't take us anywhere with four children. Animals they don't mind, but landlords won't have children ! "
At a house in Aintree Street lives a woman, with a daughter of eighteen and two small boys. They have two dark basement rooms and a kitchen, and consequently are not so overcrowded as some families, but their surround- ings are so dismal that they appal the visitor. The walls are peeling owing to the damp. There is inadequate ventilation, and, upstairs, in the front room where Mrs. A. lives, her closet is in the same room as the sink in which she washes up. We would suggest to the landlord of this house, that he would do well to improve its amenities to a greater extent than he has already done.
Here then, very shortly and simply stated, is a record of things seen in the course of an afternoon in Fulham. There is much more to be said, but we do not wish to publish what might appear to be an indictment of the Borough Council or the Health Authorities of Fulham until we know whether or not they are alive to the urgent public demand for housing reform throughout London. Are the Council preparing a plan for slum clearance ? If so, when will the good work be started ?
We are not among those who believe that discussions by experts will, of themselves, solve this problem. " While they dither with statistics, our people die," a social worker said to the writer. The charge, se none vero, e ben trovato. We want men of good will, architects, surveyors, town- planners by all means, but also we want the " man in the street " to see the slum streets of London for himself or herself. " Seeing is believing "—and the root cause of our lethargy with regard to slum clearance is that we do not yet know of a tithe of the horrors that exist and persist.
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