Stepney Totally Explained

Everything about Stepney totally explained

Stepney is an inner-city district in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is located 3.6 miles (5.8 km) east north-east of Charing Cross and forms part of the East End of London.
The area consists of mostly post-war high density housing and a few streets of terraced housing that were not demolished during the slum-clearances. Commercial Road, part of the A13, passes through the area east to west. Stepney is served by Stepney Green tube station which takes its name from the open space Stepney Green.
The area hasn't yet experienced the levels of gentrification seen in nearby Bow, Wapping and Limehouse but some redevelopment has taken place, notably with the Roger Black scheme Stepney City.

History

In 1085 Stepney was listed in the Domesday Book survey of England which was recorded in Old French, and whose translation includes:

III. The land of the Bishop of London
In 'Ossulstone' hundred the Bishop of London holds Stepney 32 hides. There is land for 25 ploughs. To the demesne belong 14 hides, and there are 3 ploughs; and 22 ploughs among the villeins. There are 44 villans each on 1 virgate, and 7 villans each on half a hide, and 9 villeins each on half a virgate, and 46 cottars on 1 hide: they pay 30s a year. There are 4 mills rendering £4.16s less 4d, meadow for 25 ploughs, pasture for the livestock of the vill and 15s, woodland for 500 pigs and 40s. In all it's worth £48: and when received, the same: £50. This manor belonged and belongs to the bishopric.
Bishop William held this land in demesne, in the manor of Stepney, on the day on which King Edward was alive and dead.
In the same vill Ranulph Flambard holds 3½ hides of the bishop.

St Dunstan's is Stepney's oldest church, founded in 923, but the present building dates principally from the 1400s. St Dunstan's has a long association with the sea, being responsible for registration of British maritime births, deaths and marriages until the 19th century.
In the early 1900s, Stepney was one of the most Jewish neighborhoods in England; it was eventually replaced by Stamford Hill.
The Siege of Sidney Street took place in Stepney in 1911.

Education

ť For details of education in Stepney see the List of schools in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets

Transport and locale

Nearest places

Nearest stations

Mile End tube station

Stepney Green tube station

Limehouse station (Docklands Light Railway and c2c) Previously known as Stepney East

Notable residents

Des O'Connor was born in Stepney.

Steven Berkoff was born in Vallance Road

Terence Stamp was born in Stepney

Craig Fairbrass was born in Stepney

Roy Shaw was born in Stepney

Ledley King was born in Stepney

Darren Purse was born in Stepney

John Sentamu, formerly Bishop of Stepney, and now the (97th) Archbishop of York as well as the Church of England's first black Archbishop

Kenney Jones drummer with The Small Faces and The Who was born in Stepney 16 September 1948 and attended St. George's In The Green School.

"Bombardier" Billy Wells, the heavyweight boxer was born in Stepney

Father Richard Wilson, a priest from Stepney, campaigned to improve the conditions of his parishioners who lived in hopper huts during the hop picking season in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. He founded the Hoppers' Hospitals at Five Oak Green, Kent.

Notable fictional appearances

The BBC sitcom Goodnight Sweetheart was set in Stepney.
The Rolling Stones' song "Play with Fire" references Stepney: "Now she gets her kicks in Stepney, not in Knightsbridge anymore."
   In Blackadder II Episode 6, Lord Percy explains the disappearance of his Uncle Bertram's old oak table thus: "'twas on the night of the great Stepney fire. And on that same, terrible night, his house and all his other things completely vanished too. So did he, in fact. It was a most perplexing mystery."
   In the film Help!, Alfie Bass has a cameo where he portrays a doorman of an Indian restaurant. When Ringo Starr discovers Alfie Bass isn't an actual Indian, he exclaims "He's from the West!" Bass replies "Nah, east...Stepney."
   The English Nursery Rhyme Oranges and Lemons refers to the "...bells of Stepney."
   In George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, set in England, he writes about rocket bombs killing many people: "One fell on a crowded film theater in Stepney, burying several hundred victims among the ruins." This is in Chapter 5, Part 2.

Further Information

Get more info on 'Stepney'.

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