Watney Market

In the early years of the 20th century the shops and stalls of Watney Street, making up Watney Market, was one of the liveliest local markets in London: in 1902 there were over 100 shops and 100 stalls. Here are some pictures from that period. At  no.68 there was an early branch of Sainsbury's (their first shop, in Drury Lane, opened in 1869): in 1881 John James Sainsbury took over his brother-in-law Edward Staples' shop selling cheese and salt bacon to dockers and lightermen, many of them Irish. They were in competition with Mike Drummond, a popular Irish shopkeeper at no.67, and (as later recalled by J.J.'s son John Benjamin) employed a jocular character called Husk to invite passers-by to try out their butter and other products. They bought a house behind the shop, at 21 Morris Street [now an open space above the London Overground lines - which run underground at this point!] to conceal their deliveries [pictured right]. When Mike Drummond retired in 1894, the Sainsburys bought his shop.

By 1928 the number of stalls had more than doubled, and Christ Church Watney Street joined with other local churches in opposing the renewal of licences for shops and stalls, because they were trading on Sundays. This was an issue for churches elsewhere in the parish - see here. But despite the illegality, licences continued to be issued. A compromise was attempted with the Shops (Sunday Trading Restriction Act) 1936 - superseded by the 1950 Shops Act - but this proved broadly unenforceable in heavily Jewish areas. Watney Street suffered in the blitz; an unexploded bomb fell on the Maypole Dairy, and Sainsbury's, next door, traded from a street stall for a time.  [Right is Johnny Philipps' rabbit stall in 1949].

In 1956 the Watney Streeters - most of them dockers, descendants of an earlier Watney Street gang who defended their patch against rivals from Bethnal Green - were involved in brawls with the Kray twins and their associates. 'Their' pub was The Britannia, at 44 Morris Street (run by Watney's), a few yards behind Watney Street: here Ronnie Kray bayonet-stabbed Terry Martin, a member of the gang, while the rest escaped through the back door. In retaliation they beat up Billy Jones, who ran a West End club, which in turn led to one of their leaders, Charlie, being 'worked over' by Bobby Ramsey at The Artichoke in Stepney Way (more details here). The Britannia was acquired by Belhaven in 1991 and closed in 2005; it now houses a fast food outlet, but the sign remains [pictured].

By the 1960s Watney Market was in decline: people were moving away, and beginning to shop elsewhere. By the end of the decade only a handful of stalls was left. Here are scenes from the 1960s.

Sites were cleared for redevelopment - housing and a new market - but it was slow in coming. Sainsbury's - by then on the corner of Commercial Road - moved to Cambridge Heath Road (their site is now occupied by Iceland). By 1979 there were only eighteen stalls left.

Twenty years on, the rebuilding is now more or less finished, and the area has been expensively landscaped, but much of its character has gone.

Tower Hamlets Council has plans to regenerate the market, increasing the number of stalls and making them more attractive, widening the range of goods on sale and catering facilities, both for local people and as a 'venue' for those who work nearby (eg at News International) or who will be passing through now that the East London line has re-opened as part of London Overground in June 2010; they will also add a neighbourhood Ideas Store. We await developments...

At the southern end of Watney Street was The Old House at Home pub at no.87, on the corner of Cornwall Street; when it closed, it became a Polish deli, with flats above, and is now Asian-run but with some Polish products. Next door was Peter's Pie and Mash shop (see various sites which describe the parsley-flavoured 'liquor'): it closed in 2011 when Peter retired.

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