Sunday, 26 January, 2020
I volunteered for a Feldenkrais session with Charlotte, who I used to have classes with – Lisa had taken me along. I have to admit Feldenkrais – and Charlotte – come across somewhat flaky, but I like to experience new things and it sounded quite relaxing. It was also a chance to go to Homerton. It’s part of Hackney, and one of the more rundown areas. The biggest thing there is the local community hospital.
In the 19th century a 200 bed fever hospital was built at Homerton. It stood where the present hospital is until 1982. There were six wards for typhus, two each for scarlet fever and enteric patients. Two smaller wards were reserved for ‘special cases’.
There are remains in Homerton dating back to the 11th century but most of its history isn’t known until the 14th century. Like much of Hackney, Homerton has been farmland and it’s been a genteel Tudor hamlet of estates and grand houses formed from the former Templar lands. Around 1790 Sutton Place, now a Heritage museum, was built and remains as the oldest house in Hackney. There’s quite a grand history of religion and education with many lectures and sermons being held, some attended by John and Abigail Adams. Among its ministers was polymath, Joseph Priestley, discoverer of oxygen.
Homerton wasn’t so grand in recent times, though. I’ve seen pictures of a bustling Homerton High Street, whereas today the street is dirty and quiet.
Things are changing, as they always do. Older buildings are being torn down and newer ones are going up. The contrast is striking.
Flaky or not, my session with Charlotte was rewarding. I learned a lot about how my posture – above all my typing habits and even my eyesight – contributed to my aches and pains. No big surprise, to be honest, but a very good window into what I really need to do to change this. Not that I have yet but I do have the awareness.
Charlotte’s flat was one of the modern ones – large and airy. I was envious, of course.After visiting her, I took a longish walk down to Well Street. I’d heard about a Korean restaurant that had opened in a pub there and it was on my new year’s resolution list. The walk down was reasonably boring but I have to say I was walking lighter after that session.
Anju has been open for a little while inside The Gun pub on Well Street. I stayed downstairs in the dark and unadorned pub instead of going up to the restaurant space. Perhaps I need to go up one day when I’ve not walked a mile. The menu was short, the few main courses pricey for a back-street pub – at £13-14 – and I’m not really up to a big meal much of the time, so I chose a starter instead: Korean Sushi Rolls (Bulgogi Beef or Braised Sweet Tofu, I chose the beef).
My review? They were fresh and pleasant. I was thinking that putting some hot beef in there would have made them more delicious but this was just a taste. Maybe I’ll go again and have something larger. Back on my list, then. I popped into Well Street Fish and Chips to get something for Krish – a few ‘cod bites’ – but forgot to take a photo.
When you leave Well Street, you hit Morning Lane. I consider this street pretty dire. We once viewed a flat there and I have no idea how I’d have stayed for more than the five or so minutes we were there, the place was in such bad repair.
I’ve been reading that this area east of St John at Hackney church was once the site of watercress fields, fed by the now-buried Hackney Brook. When the brook was put into a culvert, well-to-do houses sprung up but the time I arrived in the early 2000s this was a street full of almost derelict homes, sooty old council flats, and uncared-for shops. The Burberry clothing factory was also here and still is, although it bears little resemblance to its original state. Today’s Morning Lane is different and evolving – well worth blogging about – but at the top at Well Street the large block of flats is a remnant of that dingy time. There are others just like them throughout the Homerton area.
I once worked as a temp for Hackney Council. The red brick buildings on the let of the above photo are the newly built Council offices. When I worked there, it was a tangle of rusty buildings. I could get lost inside there going from one section to another. But those new buildings are a reminder for me how much things have changed since I arrived. And, yes, this is another blog – before there’s nothing left of what it once was.
Postscript for Homerton Hospital:
Along Brooksby’s Walk, the arched wall (probably) by the parking area, and the plainer wall further toward Clifden Road (definitely) are sections of the old boundary wall of the Eastern Fever Hospital, formed in 1884 from the 1870 200-bed Homerton Fever Hospital and a 100-bed smallpox hospital. It was one of the earliest ‘state-funded’ hospitals in England. It opened in 1870-1871 to combat a major epidemic of smallpox, typhus and typhoid sweeping through London. Behind that plainer section of wall is Chatsworth House. Both the building and the wall are largely ivy covered and are believed to be a late 19th century addition to the original 200-bed fever hospital and 100-bed smallpox hospital. Chatsworth House and the boundary wall section/s are all that remains of the Fever Hospital.
It became the Eastern Hospital in 1948 as part of the NHS. Its focus was on neurological patients until it closed in 1982. The present hospital opened in 1986-1987. Two old hospitals were closed when the new Homerton facility opened: The Mothers’ Hospital on Mare Street, the German Hospital on Dalston Road. In 1995 the new hospital took over from the Hackney Hospital on Homerton High Street, which then also closed.