Plaistow, Newham

Hugh de Balun was a property-owner in the area in the 12th century and belonged to the same family as Hamelin de Balun.[10][11] Known as Balostret in the 1371 Calendar of Inquisitions Miscellaneous, Balaam /ˈbeɪləm/ Street is one of the oldest roads in Plaistow and is probably named after de Balun, though some argue its namesake is in fact a Walter Balame.[8]

In 1353, Sir Richard de Playz gave the manor of Plaistow to the abbot of Stratford-Langthorne.[12] When this abbey was dissolved the manor was appropriated by the Crown, and granted to Sir Roger Cholmeley in 1553.[12]

Daniel Defoe's 1724 work, "Tour of the Eastern Counties" (part of his A Tour Thro’ the Whole Island of Great Britain), mentions Plaistow as a town in which there had been much new building as well as repairs to existing houses since the Glorious Revolution.[13] Plaistow is connected with the legend of notorious highwayman Dick Turpin (born 1705; executed 1739). Several stories state that among Turpin’s first crimes was the theft of two oxen from his employer, a Mr Giles of Plaistow,[14][15][16] in 1730.[17] Turpin is alleged to also have run a smuggling gang which operated between Plaistow and Southend.[14]

Plaistow ward of West Ham Civil Parish in 1867.

In Aaron Hill's time there (1738–1750) Plaistow was a rural village described as a day's coach journey from Westminster,[18] despite it being a distance of only some 8 miles (13 km). The Black Lion public house in the High Street is one of the oldest landmarks in Plaistow and is reputed to date back to at least 1742.[19]

Newly-appointed as pastor to a Congregationalist church in Plaistow, John Curwen opened the Plaistow Public School in 1844.[20][21] That year also saw Plaistow become a chapelry as well as an Anglican parish in its own right, split off from All Saints Church, West Ham; Plaistow's chapel of ease St Mary's became the new parish's church. Curwen also started a printing business in Plaistow in 1863.[22]

In the 1870s, John Marius Wilson described it in his Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales as a village, a chapelry and a ward in the Parish of West Ham in Essex.[23] The population of the chapelry was recorded as 11,214 in 1861.[23] James Thorne, in his 1876 work "Handbook to the Environs of London", mentions Plaistow, Essex, as a village and ecclesiastical district of West Ham parish with a population of 6,699.[24] Thorne recounts the changes to the old village of Plaistow, with the gentry, merchants and others of renown having gone and the occupations of the residents changed from agricultural and pastoral to manufacturing. In 1886 Plaistow became part of the new County Borough of West Ham.

The area gained several new Anglican churches in the second half of the 19th century – St Philip's in 1860, St Andrew's in 1868, St Katherine's in 1891, St Martin's in 1894 and St Thomas's in 1898. Only St Martin's and St Andrew's survive – though now used as offices, St Andrew's is mentioned in Thorne's work and like its adjoining vicarage (1871) is a grade II listed building.[25][26] John Curwen's son, John Spencer Curwen (who founded the Stratford & East London Music Festival – the oldest English music festival – in 1882),[27] published a paper called “Old Plaistow” in 1891[28] describing houses of the area.[29]

It was not until 1905 that Plaistow was connected to the telephone network,[17] though it became its own UK Parliamentary constituency in 1918, consisting of the Plaistow and Hudsons wards of the County Borough of West Ham, plus part of the Canning Town ward. That constituency was subsumed into the West Ham constituency in 1950.

The Memorial Baptist Church was built in 1921 as a monument to the dead of the First World War.[30] Opened in 1922, it is now a grade II listed building.[31] Its ten Memorial Bells bear the names of more than 150 men who died in the fighting (the largest number of names on any set of bells in the world).[32] The bells were cleaned and restored using a National Heritage Lottery grant between February and August 2011[33] as part of a larger restoration project.[34]

Greengate House photographed in 2021

In 1921, the YMCA opened Greengate House on Greengate Street. Now a grade II listed building, it was once used as an Art college by the University of East London and students included Jake and Dinos Chapman.[35] In 2010 the building was demolished but the grand and ornate façade was retained and modernised and a new block of flats built behind it.[36][37]

The area was heavily damaged during the Blitz in the Second World War.[38] The Plaistow North area is largely made up of a local authority housing estate constructed in the 1960s on a bomb-damaged site. The estate used to include five 14-storey 1960s tower blocks but much has changed and the area has undergone a major redevelopment programme. The Black Lion public house was frequented by West Ham United football players especially such as Bobby Moore in the 1960s and '70s[39] with several West Ham footballers spotted in the area since.

In 1965 Plaistow became part of the new London Borough of Newham, formed when West Ham joined with the County Borough of East Ham and small parts of Barking and Woolwich.[40]

Just before the end of the 1990s a £92 million regeneration programme known as the Forest Gate and Plaistow SRB5 got under way, with the aim of renewing and revitalising neighbourhoods, creating jobs, building new homes and improving many existing ones.[41] West Ham and Plaistow New Deal for Communities ("NDC"), part of a government programme designed to tackle social exclusion, community safety, unemployment and low educational attainment in areas of severe need throughout the country, was awarded £54.6 million to bring about improvements to the local area over a 10-year period to 2010,[42] with the intention of improving the quality of life and providing more opportunities for residents in the West Ham and Plaistow area.

In March 2010,[43] the NDC set up Newham New Deal Partnership ("Newham NDP"), a Not-for-Profit organisation, to continue providing community benefit to the NDC area and beyond, and continue the work carried out over the 10 years of the NDC Programme.[44] Newham NDP works in partnership with the East London Business Alliance, East Thames Group, London Borough of Newham and One Housing Group[45] to provide community benefits to the area either directly or in partnership with other stakeholders. In March 2011 the Memorial Community Church was awarded money by the Big Lottery Fund Reaching Communities programme, to improve community facilities there.[46]

On 10 December 2012, Plaistow South was named as one of fifty areas of England to share in a Big Lottery Scheme grant of £200 million.[47]; Plaistow South received £1 million to fund locally-designed projects to improve the area.[48] In January 2013, councillors approved a new housing development of both private and affordable homes on the site of the old Plaistow Hospital. Construction began in March 2013 with completion of Phase 1 in 2015[49] and Phase 2 in 2016.

Aaron Hill, writer and dramatist, lived at Hyde House[18] during his retirement and until his death in 1750.[63] William Holl the Younger, noted portrait and figure engraver, was born in Plaistow in 1807.[64]

Singers David Essex, Ronnie Lane, Sandra Kerr, Jade Ewen, Mumzy Stranger and Alison Hinds were born in Plaistow, as was comedian and folk singer Richard Digance. Singer and entertainer Joe Brown was born in Lincolnshire but lived in Plaistow from the age of two. Record producer Norman Newell was born in Plaistow.

A number of grime MCs and DJs have origins in Plaistow, including Ghetts, Durrty Goodz and Crazy Titch. Rapper 21 Savage was born in Plaistow and moved as a youth to Atlanta in the United States.[65]

Actor Terence Stamp attended Tollgate Primary School and Plaistow Grammar School. Actor Honor Blackman was born in Plaistow, as were actors Jimmy Akingbola, Ron Pember and Roberta Taylor and comedian, actor and playwright Andi Osho.

Multi-times Olympic athlete Fred Alsop was born in Plaistow in 1938.

England international footballers Sol Campbell, Tony Cottee, Rob Lee and Martin Peters were born in Plaistow.

England international speedway rider Reg Fearman was from Plaistow. He managed England and Great Britain national teams, and was also Chairman of the British Speedway Promoters' Association.[66]

Edward Temme, born in Plaistow, was a member of the British Olympic Water Polo teams of 1928 and 1936 and was the first man to swim the English Channel in both directions.[67] He is reputed to have swum non-stop in both directions and to have achieved this feat twice.[68]

Other famous residents have included:

• William Clowes,[69] one of England's early surgeons whose books were the leading surgical writings of the Elizabethan age, who spent his retirement in Plaistow until his death in 1604.
• Sir Thomas Foot, Lord Mayor of London, who used Hyde House in High Street as his seat in the 17th century.[70]
• Edmund Burke PC, Irish statesman and author who moved to England and became a Whig Member of Parliament (MP), who lived in Plaistow c. 1759–1761[69] on Balaam Street.[14]
• William Dodd, clergyman who was hanged for forgery, lived on Balaam Street.[71]
• George Edwards, sometimes referred to as the father of British ornithology,[72] who retired to Plaistow in 1763[73] until his death in 1773.
• Luke Howard, who in 1802 devised the naming and classification of clouds and cloud formations still in popular use today, and who operated a business in pharmaceuticals in Plaistow from 1796 until 1803 when he moved the business to nearby Stratford. He continued to reside in Plaistow until 1812, when he moved to Tottenham.[74] The family's pharmaceutical business was instrumental in the development of quinine and both Howard and his son, quinologist John Eliot Howard[75] (who was born in Plaistow), were elected Fellows of the Royal Society.[76]
• Roderic Gregory, biologist and professor of physiology who isolated gastrin[77] (the stimulator of gastric acid), born in Plaistow in 1913[78] and awarded the CBE in 1971.
• Sir David Amess, who was born in Plaistow, was a Conservative MP, representing Basildon from 1983 to 1997 and Southend West from 1997 until he was murdered in 2021. Amess was knighted in the 2015 New Year Honours.[79]

Plaistow and Upton Park tube stations are in the district. Both are served by the London Underground District and Hammersmith & City lines, which link the area directly to destinations in Central London, including the City, King's Cross, St. Pancras International, Westminster, and Paddington. Both stations are in London fare zone 3. Eastbound trains run towards Barking, Dagenham, and Upminster.

West Ham station is less than one mile from High Street Plaistow, in London fare zones 2 and 3. The station is on the Jubilee line and Docklands Light Railway (DLR), which links the area directly to several key destinations and interchanges, including Stratford International, London City Airport (), London Bridge, and Waterloo.

Stratford station is also nearby, to the north of the district, which is served by the Central and Jubilee lines, DLR, and National Rail trains. This links the area to destinations across North East London, Essex, and East Anglia. Canning Town station is to Plaistow's south-west on the Jubilee line and the DLR.[80]

Since 2022, the area has also been linked directly to London Heathrow Airport and Reading via the Elizabeth line from the nearby Custom House station.[81]

Plaistow is on the London Buses network, served by routes: 5, 69, 115, 147, 241, 262, 276, 300, 325, 330, 473, 678, N15. Routes 69 and night bus N15 run overnight through Plaistow.[82][83]

The Greenway, a shared-use path, runs through Plastow. The route runs unbroken from Hackney Wick to Plaistow via the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, Stratford, and West Ham. Eastbound, the route runs towards Newham University Hospital, East Ham, Beckton, and Cycle Superhighway 3 towards Barking. The Greenway runs atop Joseph Bazalgette's Northern Outfall Sewer. It is a part of Transport for London (TfL)'s cycle network, numbered Cycleway 22.

Cycle Superhighway 2 (CS2) runs along the northern edge of Plaistow, through Stratford. The route runs non-stop and mostly traffic-free westbound towards the City, via Bow, Mile End, and Whitechapel.

Cycle Superhighway 3 (CS3) runs along the southern edge of Plaistow. The route runs non-stop and mostly traffic-free towards the City, via Canning Town, Poplar, and Limehouse. The route continues beyond the City traffic-free to Lancaster Gate (Hyde Park), via Westminster and Buckingham Palace, providing Plaistow with a direct, continuous cycle link to destinations in the West End. Eastbound, CS3 runs to Barking.[84]

Plaistow is linked to other areas of London and South East England by road. Roads which run through Plaistow include:

•  A112  High Street | Greengate Street | Prince Regent Lane - Southbound to the  A13 , London City Airport (), and North Woolwich | Northbound to Stratford, Leyton, and Waltham Abbey.
•  A114  Stopford Road – Northbound to Upton, Leytonstone, and Whipps Cross.
•  A124  Barking Road – South-west to Canning Town and the  A13  | North-east towards East Ham, Barking, and Upminster.

The  A13  runs along the southernmost edge of Plaistow. The road runs westbound towards the City of London, passing Canning Town, Poplar, and Canary Wharf en route. Eastbound, the road carries traffic towards Barking, Dagenham, the  M25 , Tilbury, and Southend-on-Sea.

• Canning Town
• Custom House
• East Ham
• Forest Gate
• Stratford
• Upton Park, which, like Plaistow, forms part of the E13 postcode district
• West Ham