A New Neighbourhood for Bedminster - East Street
- GVHeritage Groups
- Dec 1, 2024
- 2 min read
by the First ResidentsBS3 Heritage Group for Futures Past
The new residents of Bedminster were pioneers, attracted to the area by the prospect of employment. In the nearby countryside agriculture was collapsing and jobs were scarce. Travelling by foot with few belongings, or by horse drawn carriage, the country tracks and by-ways led to Bedminster’s main thoroughfare, East Street, with its Dickensian style dwellings and a major centre of commerce and social interaction.
This 1828 Ashmead map reveals the built up area of East Street. Can you spot a gap in the buildings below the letter “E”? It seems to suggest a track off East Street at a dog leg angle, which still exists today. This will become the birthplace of Little Paradise. By 1854, the street map was complete with facing rows of Little Paradise homes. For incoming residents as more houses were built, this was to be their home and where their new life would begin. East Street provided the basic everyday items for families. Market garden stalls, which refused to abandon Bedminster’s traditional rural background, sold fresh vegetables. Corner shops were included in new developments. For the special one off items, cottage industry products were sold from mixed residence/retail dwellings. Adapting to the changing fortunes facing the area was essential for East Street. An increasing population, from around 3000 in the early 1800’s to nearly 80,000 at the end of the century, brought more demands and more variety. W.D. & H.O. Wills brought their tobacco manufacturing operation to Bedminster, opening their East Street factory in 1886. This was followed in 1887 when E.S. & A. Robinson built their factory at the other end of East Street producing printed packaging for a wide range of products. On the street itself, 17th Century buildings were no longer fit for purpose to meet the greater retail needs of the time. Local gossip was exchanged on the street corners and within around twenty public houses. Behind East Street a number of courtyards gave access, via dingy lanes to hovels, where families lived in abject poverty. Kids wallowed in the waste and rubbish which was often piled up outside. Toilets, if they existed, were shared.
19th Century ‘industrial’
Bedminster was a very
unhealthy place to live.
Only when death rates
accelerated did the authorities
act. It took three Cholera
epidemics to find an answer.
