The East End will always be an area with a changing face, which has been shaped and molded by the influx many different ethnic groups and migrants who have made a home there in the course of its fascinating history. Next week, Eastside Community Heritage, in partnership with RAMFEL, will be hosting a reminiscence session on 'The Jewish Community in the East London diaspora'. We will be delving into the background of the diaspora of Jewish migrants in London, and the generations of untold stories there are to uncover.Â
Jewish settlement in the East End can officially be traced back to 1649, when a small colony of Sephardic Jews who had settled in Spitalfields and a mile to the south, were discovered under Oliver Cromwell at the beginning of the Commonwealth period. As a historical figure, Cromwell will always be divisive, but even over 3 centuries after Edward I's edict expelling all Jewish people from the island, it begs the question whether a less radical ruler might have allowed them to remain. But remain they did, and specifically in the area surrounding Goodman's fields and north of Mansell Street, which would be forever changed. The famous Petticoat market would become later become home to more than a thousand tailoring shops after the 1880s. This was after a new wave of Jewish people arrived, the Ashkenazi Jews who came from mostly Russia, Poland and Lithuania, fleeing from the pogroms.Â
It is clear that where Jewish people settled in London they were able to create a thriving community: they built synagogues, specialist shops, free schools. They set up educational, industrial, social, religious, infrastructures that ensured that people were model citizens; they went to school, they went to work, they went to the synagogue; they were able to make not just a living, but a good living. The Jewish communities essentially created the shoe trade, the rag trade and the furniture trade in East London.
For example, one group formed the Loyal United Friends Friendly Society to help new residents set up, find a job and support their living. Another group changed the L'Eglise Neuve (formerly a Huguenot church) into a synagogue.
However, there was a clear divide between the second generation Dutch and Spanish Jews already in the East End, the descendants of the Sephardi Jews known as the Choots [pronounced Hutz]), and the Ashkenazi newcomers from Eastern Europe. Even before the 20th century in London, there was already a diaspora of Jewish ancestry in London. Despite the common religion, there were differences between the Jewish different communities who conflicted with their own languages, customs and beliefs from their respective countries.
However, any implication that the Choots succeeded in becoming true East Enders because they were more anglicized is missing the mark.  The impact of Jewish cultures in areas such as Whitechapel, Spitalfields, Stepney and Mile End are still evident today because it changed the East End (and not the other way around). But  we know that as people's fortunes improved, they moved further on to Hackney, Dalston. Cricklewood, Golder's Green and Hendon. We are interested in talking to descendants from the diaspora about their own personal family histories, and putting these stories into a modern context.
All stories welcome, and please be advised, all refreshments will be kosher!
This event will take place from 4-5pm on the 11th December at Birkbeck College, University of London, 1 Salway Place, Stratford, London E15 1NN
[1] Ralph L.Finn, No Tears in Aldgate (Cedric Chivers, 1963)
[2] Ralph L. Finn, Grief Forgotten: The Tale of an East End Jewish Boyhood (London: Macdonald & Co 1985 [1968])
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