Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for London County Council]
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Thus, early in the century, there were two distinct colonies. One was in the Soho
district, partly in Holborn and partly in Westminster, and was mainly Italian, French
and German. The other was in Stepney and consisted mainly of persons born in Russia,
or Russian Poland, who formed about 80 per cent. of the foreign.born population in
Stepney. By 1951 the Russians and Poles had overflowed into the neighbouring boroughs
and formed two.thirds of the large foreign-born population in Hackney. Political
refugees from Poland and Germany formed a large proportion of the increase in the
foreign-born population recorded at the 1951 Census. Thus, Germans and Poles form
the largest groups of foreign-born persons in the adjacent boroughs of Hampstead,
Kensington, Paddington, and St. Marylebone. In 1951 the absolute number of foreignborn
persons in these areas taken together was four times the figure of 1901, and formed
34-5 per cent. of the total foreign-born population of London compared with 11-3 per
cent. in 1901. In Hampstead in 1951 one person in six was of non-British birth.
Borough | 1901 | 1911 | 1921 | 1931 | 1951 | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
No. | Per cent. | No. | Per cent. | No. | Per cent. | No. | Per cent. | No. | Per cent. | |