<p>From 'Street Life in London', 1877, by John Thompson and Adolphe Smith
</p><p>…How different is the Covent Garden of to-day, with its bustle and din, its wealth and pauperism, its artifices, its hot-house flowers and forced fruit, its camellias with wire stems, its exotics from far-off climes, to "the fair-spreading pastures," measuring, according to the old chronicle, some seven acres in extent, where the Abbots of Westminster buried those who died in their convent. In those days vegetables were not only sold here but grew on the spot; and the land, now so valuable, was considered to be worth an annual income of £6 6s. 8d., when given by the Crown to John Russell, Earl of Bedford, in 1552…
</p><p>…When death takes one of the group away, a child has generally beenr eared to follow in her parents' footsteps; and the" beat" in front of the church is not merely the property of its present owners, it has been inherited from previous generations of flower-women. Now and then a stranger makes her appearance, probably during the most profitable season, but as a rule the same women may be seen standing on the spot from year' s end to year's end, and the personages of the photograph are well known to nearly all who are connected with the market…
</p><p>For the full story, and other photographs and commentaries, follow this link and click through to the PDF file at the bottom of the description
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<br>Street Life in London, published in 1876-7, consists of a series of articles by the radical journalist Adolphe Smith and the photographer John Thomson. The pieces are short but full of detail, based on interviews with a range of men and women who eked out a precarious and marginal existence working on the streets of London, including flower-sellers, chimney-sweeps, shoe-blacks, chair-caners, musicians, dustmen and locksmiths. The subject matter of Street Life was not new – the second half of the 19th century saw an increasing interest in urban poverty and social conditions – but the unique selling point of Street Life was a series of photographs ‘taken from life’ by Thomson. The authors felt at the time that the images lent authenticity to the text, and their book is now regarded as a key work in the history of documentary photography.
John Thomson (1837-1921)
<p><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/lselibrary/5616085547/">Covent Garden Flower Women</a>
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