The 1860s The Victorian Slum

150 years ago,

Victorian Britain became the world's first industrial superpower.

And as the country thrived, London, the beating heart of Empire,

became the world's richest city.

But just as it is now,

Victorian London was a city divided by extremes of wealth and want.

This is the story of one poor community

living in London's East End.

In the heart of modern Stratford...

..a Victorian slum has been recreated.

And a group of 21st century people are moving in.

Oh!

Absolutely awful.

I am just a bit dumbstruck.

Like the original slum-dwellers,

they'll have to work to keep a roof over their heads...

It's absolutely shattering.

Ha'penny a tattie!

..and put food on the table.

I'm starving. This makes me a bit emotional, to be honest.

They'll explore the lives of their own East End ancestors...

I needed to be here.

I need to find these people.

I wish they could be here to see me do this.

..discover the history of their trades...

So, this is a workshop, yeah?

..and experience first-hand what life was like...

You will call me ma'am.

..for those at the bottom of the economic pile.

If they were disabled, they couldn't do it. They didn't eat.

They didn't eat, they died.

They'll live through five decades of turbulent history.

Look at the newspaper!

From the 1860s, when the poor knew their place...

It's just another nail in the coffin.

You might as well be dead.

..through depressions...

Can't believe people have to live like this all their life.

..revolutions...

I am proud to be an East End suffragette.

..and seismic social change...

-Jelly!

-GASPS

The Irish are moving up.

..to the turn of the century...

Death of the Queen.

-ALL:

-Long live the King.

..when the people who powered Britain's industrial success

finally found their voice.

The poor cannot be trodden on.

Power to the people.

And the foundations were laid for lasting change.

Victory!

This is the story of how

a quarter of a million slum-dwellers in the East End

changed our attitude to poverty for ever.

CHEERING AND LAUGHTER

This is The Slum.

Fuelled by the Industrial Revolution, in 1860,

London's economy was booming.

Here in the West End, the city as we know it now was taking shape.

There was new housing,

grand railway stations,

and the streets were filled with smart shops

all showcasing London's wealth.

As today, people came to London in search of work.

In fact, the population tripled in just 50 years.

But this was a city divided.

For the first time,

geographical lines were drawn between those enjoying

the nation's wealth in the West...

..and those who weren't, in the East.

Hidden away from public view,

people lived lives of almost unimaginable poverty,

packed into dilapidated buildings,

and the crammed courtyards of the East End slums.

This was the industrial heart of the city.

The air here would have been heavily polluted by the tanneries

and by the gasworks.

But despite that, people came from all over,

desperately in search of work.

The three miles between Aldgate and Bow

held one of the highest concentrations of working poor

in Britain.

This was the underbelly of the Industrial Revolution.

This corner of modern Stratford,

a stone's throw from the Olympic Park,

has been taken back to the 1860s.

The slum was a microcosm,

a mixture of skilled, semiskilled and unskilled workers,

all living together in tumbledown terraces and tenements.

Recreated from historical accounts of slums,

like the notorious, deprived Old Nichol in Shoreditch,

this tenement building typifies the abject poverty

which was rife in Victorian cities

just over a century ago.

From the smallest, barest rooms at the top of the building,

to larger, more expensive dwellings at the bottom,

people got by with the bare minimum.

The courtyard houses a single communal water pump,

a stove,

and shared privies.

There are businesses here, too.

A lodging house known as the doss-house

for those who couldn't afford to rent a room,

and a small shop, the lifeblood of the slum community.

Now a new group of residents are moving in,

to bring the forgotten world of the Victorian poor

back to life.

-Oh!

-Oh, my God!

-No!

It looks like a dungeon.

First to arrive is the Potter family.

-Wow.

-The garden.

-Look how dirty it is.

-Look at all the mud!

-Do you think you can live in this?

-No.

-Do you think you've got a choice?

-No.

The Potters are a close-knit clan from Derby.

Fish and chips! Come and get it.

Mum Alison lives around the corner

from Grandad Graham and Grandma Heather.

-Thank you.

-They're hot.

Heather's ancestors are from Bethnal Green

in London's East End.

All my life I felt that my roots were not in Derby.

A couple of years ago I started to search my ancestry,

but it's more than just getting dates and names and numbers.

I want to go back and I want to know the people.

I want to do it for Nan because it's, like,

very, very important to her

and it will help her learn more about our Victorian ancestors.

-This is it.

-Heavy door.

Oh, my goodness.

Like many Victorian East Enders,

Heather's ancestors were unskilled workers

who could only afford basic accommodation.

Another bed.

The family of five will live in just one room.

They have two beds,

a table and chair,

and little else,

but even housing this austere would have cost a Victorian labourer

over a third of their weekly wage.

If we have this bed...

-Right.

-..would you and the girls be OK with that one?

-Yes.

How are you going to sleep, though, cos there's three of you?

Oh, we'll work it out between us.

-You can go in the middle.

-Yeah.

What do you think?

I'm just a bit dumbstruck, I think.

I just think it's very sad that people had to live like this.

Yes, it's a bit bleak, isn't it?

Yes, very bleak.

As well as unskilled workers,

the East End was also home to many who had a trade.

Moving into one of the larger dwellings downstairs

is the Howarth family.

Oh, my God!

Dad Russell is a tailor.

As a skilled worker,

he would have been able to afford double the Potters' rent.

For that, they get the relative comfort of two rooms.

It's bigger than I thought.

Tin bath and, unlike their poorer neighbours,

a small stove to cook their own food.

-You can't cook with that.

-Well, I'm going to have to.

Look at the filth on it.

-I know.

-The filth on the walls.

I just can't get my head around this is our home now.

For some, like the Howarths,

the slum provided an opportunity of sorts.

They had the skills and the means to make money.

Others weren't so lucky.

Wow!

The slums were home to thousands of lone parents,

usually widowed or abandoned women,

with nowhere else to go.

-What do you think?

-What's this?

That's just our bedding, I think.

It's so dirty.

Shazida and her twins may be moving into the smallest room...

..but even so, finding the rent on one income will be tough.

Very basic, isn't it?

Very basic.

I can't believe people had to live like this all their life.

In the 1860s, 90% of Victorians rented their homes.

If you were poor, you moved to an area like the East End

where you would rent a room rather than a whole house.

The one advantage of living in an area like this

is you didn't have to provide proof of employment or good character

as you would have had to do elsewhere.

The slums drew people from the fringes of society.

Low-paid workers, immigrants, even fallen aristocrats,

driven to the East End by hard times.

Poverty and misfortune sent people here by the thousand.

There were very few safety nets.

This was a time before welfare benefits,

the NHS, or the minimum wage.

The poorest of all couldn't even afford to rent their own room.

Some paid to sleep in other people's beds.

Others opted for the doss-house.

In 1860,

50,000 people had no option but to pay fourpence a night

to sleep in rows in what were known as coffin beds.

In charge of this doss-house

is 39-year-old Andy Gardner from Oxfordshire.

It looks like Victorian flat pack.

Most slums were owned by absent landlords

who employed local men like Andy to run the doss-house

and collect rent from the other tenants.

Oh, dear me. That's one way of ingratiating myself with the group,

isn't it?

Hi, guys. Nice to meet you. Give me your money.

Or I'm going to kick you out of your room.

As rent collector, Andy gets free accommodation.

Here we are, then.

But he'll need an income from the doss-house or find other work

-to pay for food.

-There's not a lot here.

I have got something to keep warm,

somewhere to sit down and eat,

somewhere to wash,

somewhere to sleep.

This is the lap of luxury, really, compared to the doss-house.

The residents are exploring their new surroundings...

Oh, look at the mud everywhere.

Lovely, I love it.

-Hello.

-Hi!

..and meeting their neighbours.

What's your room like? Bigger or smaller?

It's a lot smaller.

I think it's half of this size.

Welcome. I'm your local rent man.

Are you?

Get the rolling pin ready.

Get the rolling pin ready! Otherwise you'll be down here.

Have you seen how they sleep in here?

No. Is this the doss-house?

-This is the doss-house.

-This is the doss-house.

If you can't afford the coffin bed for fourpence,

you'll like the other one.

-Want to sit down on the bench?

-OK.

-Like this?

-Yes.

That is disgusting for a human being to actually even pay.

It's either that or the street.

This is the tuppenny hangover,

where people slept upright supported only by a rope.

Something the residents could experience

if they fail to pay Andy at the end of the week.

So if you can't afford the rent on that day,

would you come back again another day?

-No.

-So it's that day or nothing?

Other people would be waiting to come in.

That's harsh.

Yes, very.

-Really harsh.

-Extremely harsh.

You've come to work then, won't you?

Right, you need to work really hard.

And you can't get us into debt.

No.

For the Victorian poor,

keeping a roof over your head was the absolute priority.

After that came food,

and in the 1860s food was surprisingly expensive.

It consumed an average of two-thirds of a slum-dweller's income.

So a reasonable living could be made from keeping the slum fed.

Ah, do we have a business?

-A job which falls to Adrian and Wiebke Bird.

-Oh!

Aha! We're going to be grocers.

Adrian and Wiebke have homes in rural Hertfordshire and Wales.

Their family histories echo the mass migrations of the 19th century.

Migration's a really big theme in my own life,

living in the States and then coming to the UK,

and then also in my parents' lives,

growing up in Germany and migrating to the United States.

I want to know what it was like for people to be moving

from the countryside to the cities for opportunity.

In Victorian times,

country folk were moving to towns in their droves,

and handyman Adrian's passion for rural crafts

should stand him in good stead.

I think I'm prepared.

I think the skills I've got will be very well suited to the slum.

I'm going to have to draw on all I've learnt

over the last number of years

to be able to keep us going and keep us fed.

Oh, my.

Wow. Look at the wallpaper.

This is home.

With a shop and a room to rent,

the Birds have the highest outgoings of all.

We're living in luxury!

But they also have a stove on which to cook

and the fanciest furnishings.

As shopkeepers, they have decent earning potential.

For a slum, this must have been one of the nicest places.

This must have been the top of the heap.

I'm beginning to think we're probably doing OK.

Many slum-dwellers had no way to cook for themselves.

That's rank! That's strong.

So shops like these were pivotal to the community.

-Hello.

-Come on in.

With most residents living day-to-day and hand-to-mouth,

cash flow was a major problem.

What can we do for you guys this evening?

So slum shops sold them only what they could afford,

bread by the slice,

tea by the spoonful,

and small portions of hot food.

They'd even rent a bowl and a spoon to eat it with.

We have to say now that we haven't got any money.

We know the situation. You're all in the same boat.

Do you tick till Friday and then your bill's due Friday, please.

Friday. OK.

Tick was a system of credit based on trust

and it kept the slum economy moving.

-I'll put that in the book for you.

-OK. Thank you.

We will see you tomorrow.

Like many poor Victorians who came to the slums,

these residents face starting their new life already in debt.

Obviously, as a priority food, bread and cheese.

It all depends how much it is.

I'm just worried because we don't know how much Dad is going to earn

and we've got rent to pay. In four days we've got rent.

If we don't pay the rent,

I am not going to live in one of those other rooms.

On a bit of rope.

It's not going to happen. There's no way you can sleep in that doss-house

with a rope.

Make do without the heat in the room tonight?

Yeah, we'll just have to all cuddle up and make do.

I'd rather be cold...

And hungry.

..and hungry, and pay the rent.

Put it on the tick for you.

As long as it's paid before Monday.

That's the rent day as well.

That's our rent day too,

-that's why.

-We are all in the same boat, to be honest.

You do feel as if you have some responsibility

to try and help these people, definitely.

That's hit me.

I feel a little bit more responsible than I thought I would.

We decided not to have a fire because we didn't want to

run up too much debt straightaway.

It feels scary that you feel like...

..you're in debt before you even get anywhere, before you do anything.

We're already in debt.

In 1860, London was a modern metropolis

with a booming population.

But there was little sympathy for those who were struggling.

Poverty was seen as part of the natural order of things.

You were either born poor,

or you fell into poverty because of your own moral failings.

If you were poor,

you simply had to work harder, or endure.

I'm struggling now.

That's on day one. I am.

I'm struggling now. I'm tired and...

..I hurt,

and all I want to do is go to bed.

It's not going to be very comfortable.

It's going to be very cold.

But hopefully we will keep each other warm.

I do feel very much isolated.

The other families have got a male presence

whereas it's just the three of us. So...it's a lot tougher.

You jump in.

Sharing a bed is definitely going to be a challenge.

I'm going to have to rise to it because I've got no other choice.

I think we'll band together as a family,

and we'll probably get closer, to be honest.

A few minutes ago I was like, "Where's the biscuits?"

Then I just remembered, "Oh, no, we can't afford biscuits."

I just felt a depressing feeling inside,

like a ship's just sunk inside me.

BANGING

-Come on, you three.

-GROANING

Up you get. Time to get up.

It's their first morning in the slum.

-You all right?

-Yeah.

And with rent day already fast approaching...

-I'm going to go and find some work.

-OK.

..everyone has the same priority.

See you later.

-Ta-ra.

-Bye.

-See you, girls.

-Goodbye, Grandad.

-Bye.

Good luck.

New arrivals had to find work fast.

It was the only way to keep a roof over your head,

and provide for your family.

The money they earn and the money they spend

is based on Victorian wages and prices

converted to modern-day money,

so they can get a feeling for a Victorian cost of living.

As man of the house,

59-year-old Graham would have been expected to provide for his family.

In the 1860s, Britain produced half the world's iron and cotton cloth,

and two thirds of its coal.

The economy had made a seismic shift from rural to urban.

People poured into London, Glasgow, Manchester,

booming industrial hubs,

powered by an army of unskilled workers.

In the East End of London alone,

the 1861 census lists more than 10,000 men as general labourers.

The work paid well, enough to keep a family warm and fed,

but just as it is for some of today's zero-hour workers,

there was no guarantee of work from one day to the next.

I am feeling the pressure.

Without me earning the money,

there'll be no food for the girls, my wife and daughter.

Graham has a day of work at a local bell foundry.

Here, church bells are made as they have been for the last 500 years,

with every part of the process still done by hand.

This is your first job.

Dig these two cores out.

-OK.

-Use the crowbars to dig out the bricks.

Don't break any of the bricks.

Remove all the sand off the surface of the bells,

cos we tune the bells and anything that's left

-will make the tools go blunt.

-OK?

-Yes.

-All right?

-Yes.

-I'll leave you to it.

-OK.

-OK.

In the 21st century, Graham is retired,

from his job in a carpet shop.

But for the Victorian poor,

there was no such thing as retirement.

It is going to be a hard day of labour, but we need money.

Without this wage we can do nothing.

We're going to use it to pay the rent and pay the shop

because we've already got debt, so...

It's hard work. But we'll do it.

In the slums, having an able body was a clear advantage.

-Hello, Andy.

-Hello.

-I've got a few bits and pieces here.

In 2004, Andy, a professional golfer,

had his right leg amputated below the knee.

This is my specialist leg, this is what I use to compete.

And I play all over Europe.

This leg is really hi tech, really comfortable.

Have a feel.

-A thing of beauty.

-It IS a thing of beauty.

-Yeah.

Andy wants to get a better understanding

of what life would have been like for Victorians

with a disability like his.

This really is the Rolls-Royce of artificial legs at that time.

You can certainly see the craftsmanship that has gone into it.

These hi-tech legs would have cost 20 Victorian pounds in 1860,

equivalent to more than two years' rent in the slums.

Somebody in your circumstances

could not remotely have afforded to buy this.

In Victorian times you could have your leg cut off free of charge

but they wouldn't provide you with anything.

Disability was more common

and visible

in Victorian society than it is today.

Poorly regulated factories and docks

were crammed with dangerous machinery,

and injuries accounted for many amputations.

Without X-rays or antibiotics,

there was only a 50-50 chance of surviving surgery.

And afterwards, most poor amputees had to make do with crutches,

or the most basic wooden leg.

What got you interested in this in the first place?

Just to see how somebody in my situation

would have actually coped back then.

What they had available, what they didn't have available.

This is the sort of thing they had available

-if you didn't have a lot of money.

-Yes, indeed.

It doesn't look very comfortable, does it?

Since you expressed an interest in trying one of these authentic ones,

we got something that is as close to authentic as we can make it

but which actually won't be too uncomfortable.

-OK.

-This is a modern version of an old classic.

-Do you want to give it a go?

-I would love to give it a go.

'It's the same shape as a Victorian peg leg,

'but this one's fibreglass,

'and specially designed for Andy's stump.'

What do you reckon, then?

The cup is comfortable.

For a Victorian, obviously, that would have been absolutely hideous.

The fit would have been terrible.

The thing they used to do because it fitted so badly, effectively,

they used to use turpentine to harden the skin.

-OK.

-Have you heard of that?

-No, I haven't heard of that.

-Can you imagine rubbing turpentine in?

-That really doesn't sound pleasant at all.

-No.

I guess if you've got a wooden thing there you want as much protection

and padding and whatever else you can get.

So it's not uncomfortable?

No, not uncomfortable at all.

-Just weird?

-It's just weird and...

..unstable.

I don't have a foot!

-Obviously, you use your foot to push off.

-Yeah.

So I get no return from...

..a foot.

The whole point of doing this is to really see what it would have

been like for myself in this time,

and this is the way to do it, isn't it?

This is lesson number one.

Lesson number one. It's not easy!

Quite! THEY LAUGH

Next door,

with Graham out at work,

Heather and Alison Potter are learning what they would be doing

in the 1860s to help make ends meet.

Do you put quite a lot of glue on?

I don't think I've enough glue on.

Slum rooms weren't just where people lived.

These were the unofficial workshops of the city.

Everything from buttonholes to billiard balls

were made in people's rooms.

This had its advantages for families like the Potters...

..because though it was frowned upon for married women to go out to work,

they could supplement their income from home.

Which bit are you doing?

The drawer or the box?

I think it's the box.

In 1861, Bryant & May opened a match factory in nearby Bow.

It quickly became the largest employer of casual female labour

in the area.

As well as factory workers,

it also employed women to assemble matchboxes in their own homes.

Called piecework,

often whole families would get involved.

Heather's great-grandmother Annie was a matchbox maker,

and she would have been expected to make up to 1,000 boxes a day.

It overwhelms me a bit at the moment

because half of me sees this

and then in my head I have how I live now.

I'd probably be sat on the settee reading a Kindle,

halfway through the morning.

They must have just been real tough women.

They were fighters.

They had to be, didn't they, to survive?

To survive for themselves and the children and families, really.

For single mothers with children to look after,

and fewer opportunities to earn,

it's estimated that up to one in 12 Victorian women

turned to prostitution.

Piecework would have been one of the only ways

to make an honest living.

Right, that's the lid.

Shazida and the twins are making fancy boxes,

for things like perfume and cosmetics.

We need to start a production line, here.

In their modern lives, Shazida and ten-year-old twins

Sadie and Saudi live in Scunthorpe.

So what do we understand about the revolution?

It created industry.

It was a big change, wasn't it?

Shazida works as an admin assistant,

and home-schools her children.

We literally do everything together.

You could say that I've pretty much dedicated my life to the twins.

It's very difficult being a single mum in the 21st century,

so I want to experience how the Victorian single mothers lived,

how they survived.

It must have been really difficult.

That's not going to stick together, is it?

Try putting a bit more?

In 1860, there were pieceworkers on every street in London's East End.

A box maker would have worked a 16-hour day

and been paid enough to buy a loaf of bread.

It wasn't only women who worked from home.

Although his rent is covered, with no-one in the doss-house,

Andy needs an income to pay for food.

I am making handles for tools.

Furniture making,

cane chair repairing and wood turning

were all common types of piecework done by men.

This is...

one of my first attempts.

I'm quite pleased with that, to be honest.

It's going to take a lot of getting used to using this.

It's hard on the leg, it's very hard on the leg.

Alongside the slum's unskilled workforce,

East London was also a hub for trades,

like tanning, embroidery and tailoring.

Russell and his son James

are off to find out how their Victorian predecessors

made their living.

Hello, Graham Brown?

A bespoke tailor of high-end suits...

-I'm getting smaller.

-Smaller?!

..Russell works in the heart of the City of London.

I love my trade of tailoring.

I really am passionate about it.

We want to find out how hard it was tailoring in the 1800s.

It'll be a great experience.

I can't wait to do it.

The family live in Essex,

where mum Mandy combines a part-time job in human resources

with looking after children James and Rebecca.

I would like to say we spend loads of time together as a family

but when you think about it, we don't.

I'd just love to spend more time together, you know what I mean?

Mandy's from a long line of Jewish tailors,

and her family history is firmly rooted in the East End.

For me it's just about understanding how the Victorians lived,

how our ancestors lived.

I really want to understand their struggles

and spending proper time with Russell and the children,

-and seeing how we cope.

-Yes. Or not, as the case may be.

As the case may be, yes.

-Hello.

-Hi.

-Nice to meet you.

Dr Vivian Richmond is an expert in the Victorian textile trades.

This is Petticoat Lane.

This is the heart of the rag trade.

Home to a street market since the 17th century,

Petticoat Lane is where generations of tailors

have bought their raw materials.

While West End tailors worked with expensive fabrics,

new clothes would have been alien to the East End poor.

So you are now in the rag trade,

and your job will be to take these clothes away,

and make them into something else, or to mend them.

This stuff here, these waistcoats,

they've been made into cloth caps.

Down here, we have some trousers.

They don't look saveable to me.

You're going for practicality, not aesthetics, here.

LAUGHTER

It's a shock. I thought I'd be doing more technical stuff,

more making stuff or altering stuff.

The difficulty for Jewish tailors was that in their home countries,

they were very often highly trained, highly skilled,

but they arrive in England with nothing,

literally nothing, many of them.

So they're going to be right down the bottom of the pile,

hence doing this kind of translating work and transformatory work

with clothing.

By the 1860s, around 20,000 Jewish people lived in London,

with more arriving from Europe all the time.

Almost half made their living through tailoring.

Shocked!

Really shocked I've been given a bunch of rags

to try and turn into something that someone's going to buy.

I'm horrified.

This is a different end of the scale to what I'm used to working on.

We normally make court dress and tail coats,

and this stuff is just the bottom end.

People have actually finished wearing it

and we've got to make it for people to wear again.

It's going to be a challenge, I think.

Graham has been hard at work in the bell foundry.

He's done four hours without a break.

I never thought it'd be this physical.

It's absolutely shattering.

I think to finish the full day with nothing to eat this morning

on an empty stomach is going to be really, really tough.

I didn't realise how difficult it would be.

What's keeping me going is the family at home.

I've got to do it! Just got to carry on.

-Mand?

-Yeah?

-The last lot,

can we divide up the stuff into what's got to be done?

That was what I was just going to say. It's what I've been doing.

-Trousers.

-I'm already ahead of you.

-Are you?

-OK.

Look, waistcoats all in this pile.

And washing, just throw on the floor.

-What is that?

-Probably sick.

Or they've been in a fight.

-It's blood.

-You're joking!

Just put it in the washing.

-And I've got to wash that?

-Yes.

Russell hasn't hand-stitched anything for years,

but although he won't have modern machines,

he WILL have help.

In the 21st century,

Rebecca and James go to private school.

Here, they'll be put to work.

Do all the caps first,

then we'll start working on the trousers.

And the shoes, give them a polish up and a bit of cardboard at the end.

Yes, boss.

Rather than repaired,

shoes were simply patched up and painted black to hide the holes.

In my shop, I've got all the machinery,

the correct tools for the job, all fit for purpose.

Here in the slum, they're using the bare minimum...

..of stuff. It's all done by hand.

It must have been really tough for them,

as I'm finding out myself, now.

Andy is also finding out just how hard slum work would have been.

One little slip,

and it's... It's ruined.

It's absolutely ruined.

I feel like I've failed.

I feel like I've failed. I don't like failing at anything.

Nothing.

But...this has beaten me.

Back in 1860, if they were disabled and doing something like this,

they couldn't do it.

How these guys did 600 or 1,000 of these every single day...?

I've done seven.

These guys did it. And if they didn't do it, they didn't eat.

If they didn't eat, they died.

Graham is finishing his shift.

He's earned £10, the equivalent of a Victorian labourer's daily wage.

-There's your wages for today.

-Thank you.

Nearly enough for his £13 rent.

-Any work tomorrow?

-Be here at quarter to eight and don't be late.

OK. Thanks.

But after eight hours' hard labour...

..he's on his last legs.

-Hello.

-Hi.

-All right?

-Yes.

So? Did you get any money?

Yes. £10.

Amazing!

How was your day?

Hard work. Very hard.

Yes. I've never worked like that before in my life.

The hardest thing I've ever, ever done.

-Really?

-Yes, the sweat was absolutely pouring off me.

SHE GASPS

Dripping down.

You did well!

THEY CHUCKLE

Yeah.

For everyone else, slum life is in full swing.

Life in a Victorian slum was undoubtedly harsh,

but it wasn't all doom and gloom.

Teeming with people...

Yes!

..it was noisy...

..filthy...

..and smelly.

Humans and animals lived cheek by jowl.

Every room and yard was used for work.

The Birds are making a cheap East End classic,

smoked kippers.

These were often made in privies,

an ideal makeshift smokehouse,

with the added bonus of disguising the smell of human waste.

I was thinking £1.20 a portion.

I know. But we don't want to put anything more on tick, you see.

-OK, then.

-Till after market.

-And I don't like kippers.

-And he doesn't like kippers!

KNOCKING

-Hello, Shaz. How's it going? All right?

-Yeah.

We were going to do...

a kipper if you wanted one.

All right. Yeah, you can put me down. Thank you.

Okey dokey, no problem.

See you later.

Shaz wants to put £1.20 on the tick for one dinner?

Yeah.

And she's sure she wants that?

Yep.

You want to take the risk?

OK, if that's what you want to do.

-Mandy, first one finished.

-Yay!

It's really good.

Brilliant.

With no way of earning anything until the weekend market,

the Howarths are keeping their debts to a minimum.

I'm really hungry right now.

This morning the bread we had left from the night before we gave to the

kids, so Russell and I haven't actually eaten anything

since yesterday evening,

when we had a quarter of a slice of bread.

I actually feel exhausted but we've got so much to do ready for market

that I'm not even sure if Russell and I

are going to have time to get to bed

at a decent hour because we've got to get all this stuff done.

You've no idea how good an egg sandwich can taste.

I've got a half slice of bread with butter.

It's good to eat, cos I'm hungry.

It's early,

but the Howarths have already been up and working for an hour.

Halfway through. That's it.

And tailor Russell has turned teacher.

That's it. Lovely, perfect.

-Like that?

-That's it.

-Too much?

-That's fine.

We've pulled together.

He's taught me how to sew.

He's taken the patience and the time.

LAUGHTER

Whereas in our real life we're so busy,

that we're like ships in the night,

and now we've come together again,

and actually we've realised we still do love each other

and we still do like each other, which is great.

It's actually quite nice the two of us just sitting here,

-just sewing.

-Yeah.

I've got to stand up, I'm sorry.

-Why are you standing up?

-I've got to.

Upstairs, things aren't going so well for the Potters.

Graham's back has seized up,

and there's no way he'll be able to go back to work

at the bell foundry.

Their only other potential income is from the matchboxes,

which is unlikely to pay the rent.

I've made one, two, three, four, five, six.

They take a whole day to dry.

No, it's just not going to happen.

In the 1860s,

the loss of the main breadwinner

accounted for nearly two-thirds of families forced to seek help

from the Victorian authorities.

What is enlightening is how quickly your situation can change.

Dad can't work today cos he's injured.

And the matchboxes were a bit of a failure.

We've got to start thinking

how we're going to find the next few pennies.

The family is in dire straits.

They've no option left but to send the children out to work.

I'm confident that we'll get the rest of the rent today.

Yeah, I'm confident you will as well.

Oh, she's amazing.

Good girl.

Heather and Olivia are going to bunch and sell watercress.

Now we know how much we have to earn,

I'm just determined to get that much money and I think we will.

Children were considered economically viable

by the age of seven or eight,

and were as important to the East End workforce as their parents.

Places like Covent Garden, Victorian London's main fruit and veg market,

were filled with street sellers, many of them children.

Watercress was a popular street food that could be bought for pennies

and sold for a slim profit.

Excuse me, would you like to buy any watercress?

Their working day would have begun as early as 4am,

and gone on for up to 16 hours.

Watercress.

Ninepence a bunch.

-There you go.

-Thank you so much.

-Thank you.

-Bye-bye!

So good.

I'm doing this at uni, the 1800s.

Are you?

Hi. Excuse me?

Would you like to buy any watercress?

-Thank you.

-Cheers.

It must have been hard seeing your children go out

and knowing they've got to do this.

-Is that all right?

-Perfect.

'It makes me feel angry,'

because if it was snowing and there weren't many people out,

you just had to do it anyway.

We've done really well. We've got a little bit of money to take back.

Whoa. Look at that.

I know, you've done really well!

Back at the slum...

..Shaz and the twins have been making fancy boxes all day.

She'll be paid at the end of the week

for each box which meets the required standard.

-How are you?

-I'm good, thank you.

-I've come for some soup.

-Right.

How did your boxes sell?

I haven't sold any yet.

-We've been making them.

-Oh, it's hard work, isn't it?

-Yes, it is. Yes.

-What I'm trying to do is get a grip, as you can see,

with how much we've put on the tick so far.

-All right, OK.

-And how much we can really lay out again

until everybody starts getting paid.

I'm hoping that we'll be able to sell all the boxes

-so we should be able to pay off the debt.

-Right.

-Hi. How are you?

-Good evening.

-I'm fine, thank you.

-We can do one cup of broth on top of this,

but I really can't go much further than that.

We're really going to need to be careful from now on.

Right, OK. Yes.

With their own rent due at the end of the week,

the Birds are wrestling with their responsibilities.

You know, we'll have to keep our eye on them

and see what they make today,

and hopefully they can move those goods.

Yeah, but this is the sort of thing that would have happened a lot.

-Yes.

-A single mum with two children.

They have to eat and they have to have the wherewithal to make money.

How do you... What if they can't pay at the end?

What do you do?

Don't know.

-Hello?

-Come on.

The Potter girls are back from Covent Garden.

We got £10.

-No!

-Good work.

-We can pay our rent now.

-I think you've done really well.

To get £10, that's made me feel...

..a little bit easier.

Much better, much better.

You've done good, missus.

Good evening, Potters, how are you?

The family celebrate with their first hot food in days.

We've got some soup on today,

which hopefully you would like to purchase.

We made £10 selling cress.

£10? That's nice to know.

So would you like to pay up tonight what you already owe?

We haven't brought any money down with us.

You're more than welcome to go and get it.

Paying off their tick has cost the Potters £7.96,

putting them short of their rent once more.

I think that's a circle you can't get out of

because these things just happen,

and that's the ongoing misery,

because at the end of the day,

you know you've got to wake up into it again the next morning

and it's another fight, then, to survive.

It's market day.

There we go.

We went to bed quite late last night

and then we were up early again this morning

because time is money, and I'm shattered.

So unbelievably tired.

What we've got finished is what we can sell

and we have to make rent and we have to pay the grocer.

Got quite a bit to get done.

Mandy's working on the shoes.

I'm working on the caps.

I've got some alterations to do afterwards.

Hopefully we'll sell it.

We haven't eaten yet. Actually, it's non-negotiable.

You just give the children the food

and I'm sure my ancestors would have been more concerned

for my grandparents.

To be fair, they were successful in that,

because my mum had a very nice life and I've got a very nice life,

so what they sacrificed there, to work so hard and install all that,

has paid off. It's just a shame they're not here to see it.

Sorry!

SHE LAUGHS

Sorry.

SHE SOBS

Sorry. That came all of a sudden.

Sorry.

SHE CHUCKLES

I wish they could be here to see me do this.

At least they know that I understood what they go through.

I just need a tissue.

We haven't got a tissue. Some old lining.

Some old lining.

SHE LAUGHS

This'll do.

You're not going to use that, are you? Not going to shout at me.

No, you can use that piece.

This time!

OK, I need to get on.

Andy's preparing the doss-house

in the hope he'll soon have paying customers.

So far he's earned nothing, and it's taking its toll.

I'm starving. I've got some lunch.

What I saved...

..from yesterday.

From my sandwich last night.

Little bit of fluff.

But I don't want to get into too much debt,

and that's what's worrying me.

It's making me a bit emotional, to be honest.

HE SNIFFS

Sorry.

I really don't know how they survived.

This whole experience is massively humbling.

When you think you've got it hard, and you haven't.

It's payday for the pieceworkers,

who would have hand-delivered finished goods to the factories.

See you later, guys.

-Bye.

-See you later.

Wages were low and standards high.

Any products that didn't make the grade would be rejected.

Most of Shaz's boxes weren't up to scratch.

She's only made £2.

I don't think it will cover my rent

and I don't think I'll be able to pay off my food debt.

I feel really low.

It's really grinding me down, now.

-I couldn't imagine living like this forever.

-No.

It's unliveable.

The Potters, too, have been paid the going rate

for the 25 matchboxes they did manage to make.

You'll never guess how much we got.

SHE LAUGHS

-We got one pence!

-LAUGHTER

So we've got market day today.

We've got kippers.

We've got kippers, we've got two lots of soap.

With their customers hard up,

even the shopkeepers are feeling the pinch.

It looks like the market is becoming more and more important for us

to be able to earn enough to pay our rent.

Everybody's being very conservative with what they're buying from us.

We haven't sold very much so that is going to make or break us, I think,

at this point.

The weekend market was crucial,

before rent day came round on Monday.

It's 9p for a bunch, or we're selling four bunches for 34p.

From leftover food to second-hand shoes...

..these markets were a way to turn any meagre assets into cash.

What are we on? One or two?

-Two, two cabbages.

-That's...

The Birds are trying to shift their surplus stock.

This has got tallow in it.

Yes, this has got tallow in it.

The Potters are hoping to scrape together the rest of their rent

from the last of the watercress.

It's looking a little bit dry, now.

-These are handmade.

-How much?

£3.40, thank you.

And after a week of hard work,

it's been the Howarths' first chance to earn.

I actually ironed this with a proper old hot iron.

Thank you so much. That's really kind of you. Thank you.

These are all hand-stitched, handmade from waistcoats.

Lovely. I think cos, like, East London

you forget it was a working-class area.

Obviously a lot of people have moved in now

and it's all up-and-coming and like trendy,

which is all we know of it.

You forget that actually this was how it started.

It's just really interesting how they lived

and the struggles they had day-to-day. What amazed me...

They've got to think of their rent first before they can eat.

Come on, miss, I've got to eat tonight!

£3.40.

I felt a little bit...sad.

It made me think how lucky we are, and we take so much for granted.

Five, yes. Thank you very much.

-I hope it helps you.

-I'm not going to haggle you for the price.

Cheers, mate. Cheers, thanks.

Nice!

As the market draws to a close,

everyone is counting up,

ready for tomorrow's reckoning with the rent man.

-15, 16...

-ALL: Yes!

Rent's paid!

I've never been so happy.

No, I know. As a family together achieving something like that

-is just amazing.

-It's been immense.

It's been absolutely immense.

So we've got £33.13.

-Rent covered.

-Just!

-Just!

Well done.

THEY CHUCKLE

-That is close, though.

-It is, isn't it?

Yeah.

It looks quite a bit there.

Yeah, we did really well.

60, 70, 80, 90.

£1.56, we've got.

That's brilliant!

Well done. Well done.

That's excellent.

-We've had a really good day, haven't we?

-We have.

I feel triumphant.

What does that mean?

-Victorious.

-Oh.

Between them, the five members of the Potter family

have covered their rent.

But they're not sure everyone's doing so well.

80p, £2, £2.40.

Shaz next door, we're not sure about her rent.

I'm worried about Shaz, yeah.

I really felt for her, I thought she looked really tired and worn out.

This morning she looked, yeah.

I think it's been really hard for her.

In the East End,

rent day was known as Black Monday.

Keeping a roof over your head depended entirely on

whether you could settle up.

If the slum-dwellers fail to pay rent collector Andy,

he could evict them from their rooms.

It's a horrible feeling to have to say to someone,

I'm going to have to take this off you.

It is going to be really, really hard.

Andy can also earn money by running the doss-house,

if there's anyone in it.

These are just narrow mattresses

that I've got to fill with straw to use as padding.

And then that goes into the coffin beds that I've made.

And then people can come and sleep in that

if they want, for the princely sum of 4p.

But I'm hoping they do cos...

that's where I'm going to make my money.

I'm absolutely starving.

How we doing, guys?

-You all right? Possibly your least favourite day of the week.

-Yes!

As the Howarths have shown,

some could succeed in the slums.

They've paid their bill at the shop and their rent.

They'll eat something other than bread tonight,

and they'll have money left over for the week ahead.

Really well done. You deserve it.

-So there you go.

-You deserve it.

Relief, relief, relief.

-Cheerio.

-See you later.

-First rent paid.

-First rent paid.

How was the day at market for you?

It was OK.

With some customers having paid off their tick, and modest sales,

the Birds scrape together their rent.

-Perfect.

-Thank you very much!

You counted it all out by your fair hands yourself, have you?

-Yeah.

-Perfect.

The Potters, too,

end their first week JUST free of debt.

-All right, take care, guys.

-See you next week.

-Take care. Bye-bye.

In the 1860s,

anyone who failed to pay their rent faced either the doss-house,

the workhouse,

or the street.

Shaz's below-par piecework has left her with almost nothing.

-Hi.

-Hello.

OK, so we were looking for £8.16 today.

Is that going to be OK for you?

No, I can pay £2.

-£2?

-Yeah.

OK.

This puts me in a horrible...

..horrible position.

So one way I can resolve this...

..is to ask you guys to leave.

Mm-hm.

And to put you up in the doss-house.

Now, I don't want to do that.

I really don't.

I mean, obviously, you're nowhere near the rent.

And you've got tick in the shop.

If you have money in two days,

I would like a proportion of that to come back off your rent.

If you're happy to do that, then that's what we'll do.

-Mm-hm. OK.

-OK?

-OK.

-All right, then, thank you.

No problems.

When I first found out I was going to be the rent collector,

it was, aha, what fun!

I get to go round and take money off these people

and if they ain't got the money I'm going to kick them out!

And I'm running the doss-house.

Yeah, it's not like that in real life.

That was...tough, with Shaz.

I thought I'd be able to accomplish something but obviously I've been...

..I've been defeated, I think that's the word, by society,

or the era that I'm living in.

It's just, I'm just in a vicious circle, here.

I'm not giving up just yet. There's still a bit of fight in me left.

It's the end of the residents' first week of 19th-century slum life.

Living here during Victorian times

would have been tough and unpredictable.

Work was harsh, wages often appallingly low.

And yet, as our slum-dwellers have shown,

somehow, people found a way to survive.

Being at the top of the pecking order within the slum,

I do feel torn between wanting to help people,

and not help them.

Shaz worries me a little bit because we'll probably lose money on her.

So all I can say from that is,

next time I'll try and be a bit more astute.

And, I don't know, not give her so much.

People in the Victorian East End, you know,

they didn't make the choices they did because they wanted to.

It was because they had to.

You know? And they were faced with life and death choices

that we don't get faced with today.

HE SIGHS DEEPLY

Day after day, week after week, generation after generation,

this is pretty much what their life was like.

This cycle of poverty that they lived in.

I think life is on a knife-edge all the time

in this sort of environment,

because you can't earn enough money

to be able to put things away for next week

because you've got to survive.

You've got to buy stuff. We need to start building up the strength again

to be able to carry on next week,

and again, start to get the rent.

I'm just really happy that we managed to do it

and we won't be going into the doss-house. Not today!

THEY LAUGH

Not today!

That's what happens when you work hard.

You get pies!

Before your ancestors, they were just names.

But now actually living what they went through, it's insane.

Like, this is relentless.

You have to have... You have to be so resilient to do this,

and they must have been the strongest people out there.

The slum, it looks miserable, it stinks, it's everything you could...

Everything you imagine is the slum.

What you can't see

is the sense of happiness and community that's here.

We're just together, all of us together.

It's great.

The first hot food we've really had.

It's really nice.

I thought we had a bad time.

I grew up in the 1950s, and we didn't have any money.

But this is a whole different situation.

I will never say that I lived in poverty again, ever.

Because I didn't.

Because this is poverty.

Next time...

..it's the 1870s.

Nice, isn't it? Look.

And a new decade...

22 pairs of trousers.

-Oh, my God.

-When's it due?

..demands a whole new workforce...

He treats us like employees, not family.

..until an economic nosedive...

I have nothing.

I'm not taking the food out of their mouths to feed her children.

In you come.

..and new arrivals...

-Got any work today?

-The young fellow, I can take him.

..push some to the edge.

Nothing to eat, terrible.

It's great. The Irish are moving up.