Port of London

The West India Dock Act of 1799 signalled the construction of the West India Docks, completed in 1802. Financed by the West India Dock Company, the eventual cost of which came to over one million pounds, they were the first of the great docks built in nineteenth-century East London.

Surrounding areas like the Limehouse district were consequently populated by maritime labour. Many of these individuals were lascars, sailors predominantly from South Asia, but also Africa and the Middle-East. Living London, an illustrated book with various chapters recounting the city’s sites, scenes and communities published in 1902, was rooted in racial, class and Nationality stereotypes and prejudices. It provides a glimpse of how many onlookers perceived this area. The author wrote, ‘It is in the crowded thoroughfares leading to the docks, in the lodging houses kept by East Indians, in the shops frequented by Arabs, Indians, and Chinese, and in the spirit houses and opium smoking rooms that one meets the most singular and most picturesque types of Eastern humanity, and the most striking scenes of Oriental life.’

Like the author of Living London, many social reformers, official bodies and religious organisations saw Limehouse as a source of great fascination and concern. A number of religious organisations also observed how lascars that awaited their return passages in London, were ill-treated, impoverished and neglected.

The largest and most famous organisation that responded to these issues was the Stranger’s Home for Asiatics, Africans and South Sea Islanders. Opened by Prince Albert on 31 May 1856, the Home was a product of intersecting but varied interests. The initiative to establish the institution was spearheaded by the secretary to the Church Mission Society, Henry Venn, and it received essential financial backing from Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, who donated £200 and £100, respectively. The greatest donation, however, was provided by the last maharaja of the Sikh Empire, Duleep Singh, a recent convert to Christianity. The Home opened in June 1857, just a year after the laying of the foundation stone, and had dormitories to accommodate 220 people, a depository where the men could store their valuables, a dining hall, bathrooms and laundry rooms. Additionally, the institution contained its own Lascar Shipping Office where records of unemployed sailors were kept, and lascars’ work contracts with shipping companies were organised and negotiated.