SOHO

Cholera

The cholera outbreaks drove away Soho's more affluent inhabitants. The district went into a steep social decline during the remainder of the mid-19^thC. Workshops and shops were built over the gardens of the former middle-class homes, thus ending the likelihood that the area would again become attractive to the comfortably off as a place in which to live.

See Also: CHOLERA John Snow; DISTRICT CHANGE

Hunting Cries

There is a theory that Soho derives its name from a hunting cry.

See Also: PUBS The Blue Posts

Sedgemoor

The Duke of Monmouth was the eldest illegitimate son of King Charles II. He had a mansion that filled much of the southern side of Soho Square. In 1685 he led a rebellion against his uncle King James II. He used Soho as his battle-cry at the Battle of Sedgemoor.

Location: 27-29 Soho Square, W1D 3ER (purple, orange)

Peoples & Cultures

Soho was developed during the late 17^thC. From its outset the district was home to various cultural groups. The area has had substantial French, Italian, Jewish, Irish, and Chinese populations.

In the 1950s the district smelt of coffee and foreign cheese in a way that nowhere else in London did.

Greek Street

There is a theory that Greek Street may have taken its name from a late 17^thC community of Greek refugees from Melros who, having escaped from Ottoman rule, established themselves in London. A Greek Orthodox Church (1681) was built for them.¹ However, the people whom it was intended to serve lived in the City of London and were disinclined to travel so far west in order to worship. The following year the building was sold to a Huguenot congregation.² ³

(There is an alternative hypothesis that Greek Street took its name from Gregory Grig King who may have been involved in the development the street during in the early 1680s.)

Location: Greek Street, W1D 4DL (purple, white)

¹. The site is now occupied of by Central St Martins.

². The church was demolished in 1684.

³. Charlotte Street in Fitzrovia, to the north of Oxford Street, used to be a Greek quarter.

Poland Street

In 1683 the King John III Sobieksi and the Polish cavalry routed an Ottoman army that had lain siege to Vienna. Their action was commemorated in the name of a (now gone) pub at the northern end of what is now Poland Street. The street took its name from the public house.

In 2006 it was reported that Home Office figures stated that 204,895 Poles had registered to work in the U.K. by the end of 2005. It was estimated that there were probably about 350,000 in the country. Proportionately, this was the largest influx of a single socio-cultural grouping in a short period since the surge of Huguenots that had occurred following the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685).

Location: Poland Street, W1F 8QA (red, purple)

See Also: PUBS Pub Names

Photography

The Soho of the later 20^thC was recorded in photographs by John Deakin (1912-1972) and Harry Diamond (1924-2009).

See Also: PHOTOGRAPHY

Sex Shops

In the late 1970s and early 1980s Covent Garden underwent a renaissance. In the mid-1980s the district's fashionableness spread westwards over the Charing Cross Road into Soho. Westminster City Council made its licensing of sex shops stricter so that the number of such outlets declined; in 1984 there were over 300, by the start of 1992 there were six. As the area grew more fashionable so its rents went up. The businesses that proved to be best able to pay the new higher rents were the sex shops and the trade underwent a resurrection.

Website: www.westminster.gov.uk

'Shifty' Oscar

Hostess bars are ones in which businessmen with cash to burn drank over-priced champagne and whisky with skimpily dressed hostesses who were employed by the club. Shifty Oscar Owide (1931-2017), a former East End hairdresser, ran several in buildings along Swallow Street that he leased from the Crown Estate. The properties included Bentley s. He sought to project a Fifties glamour by dressing well and having a pencil moustache; he insisted that his employees should call him Mr Oscar . Despite amassing wealth and enjoying it, his belief that everything was negotiable even after it had been agreed led him to develop a reputation for things going around him. His attempts at becoming respectable never succeeded in surmounting his sleazy reputation although some people did enjoy his company. For many years he owned the Windmill International club. It lost its licence shortly before his death.

Location: Swallow Street, W1B 4DG (blue, turquoise)

The Soho Local Post

Until the 21^stC mail carriage was a monopoly of the Royal Mail. In early 1971 there was a postal strike that lasted for several weeks. Someone set up the Soho Local Post. The service's two-shilling stamp featured the back of a naked woman who had a beehive hairdo.

Soho Square

Soho Square was built during the 1680s. The development was one of the first London squares to be laid out. Its original inhabitants were aristocrats. After the middle of the 18^thC its social standing declined as addresses in the districts to the west of Swallow Street became more fashionable.

Location: Soho Square, W1D 3QN (red, blue)

William Beckford

The wealthy West Indian merchant William Beckford lived at No. 22 during the 1750s and the 1760s. That a Lord Mayor of the City of London should have chosen to live in the West End, rather than in the City, can be read as an early indicator of how the historic core of London would become depopulated, becoming a business district with very few residents. (In time, this was something that was to befall the West End in its turn, although not to the same degree.)

Location: 22 Soho Square, W1D 4NS (purple, grey)

Striptease

The Doll's House was the first licensed strip club in Soho.

Location: 5 Carlisle Street, W1D 3BL (orange, grey)

Paul Raymond

The Raymond Revuebar was opened in 1958 by Paul Raymond. It was the first establishment in Soho to be licensed for striptease. The entrepreneur utilised the profits of his entertainment and pornographic magazines businesses to acquire property in the district. By the time of his death in 2008 he owned a large proportion of Soho.

In the 1970s the Obscene Publications Squad launched a crack-down on unlicensed sex shops and peep-show premises in Soho. It was then that Raymond started buying property in Soho. The Local Government Act of 1982 gave Westminster Council the powers to move against the pornographers. Soho went upmarket as a result. For some the opening of The Soho Brasserie was the start of the re-emergence of Soho. The media and advertising presence expanded. In the late 1980s there was a property crash. Raymond kept on buying. By the end of the decade, he was reputed to own 60 of the district's 87 acres. The properties were held through Ilona House Securities and Soho Estates Holdings.

In 1997 Mr Raymond sold Raymond's Revuebar. In 2004 it was reported that the establishment had called in the receivers. Lap-dancing establishments had become commonplace and pornography was available over the Internet.

Raymond s daughter Debbie tried to establish herself as a singer. One of the shows in which she appeared was called The Royalty Follies (1974). This involved a large tank rising from underneath the stage. In it women and dolphins swam. The latter had been trained to remove the formers swimming costumes.

Location: Walker s Court, W1F 0ED. The Revuebar. (red, orange)

58 Wardour Street, W1D 4JQ (orange, brown)

See Also: ESTATES

Website: www.sohoestates.co.uk

The Windmill

The Windmill Theatre opened in 1932.

The Windmill Girls appeared in tableaux vivants. A naked woman would stand still at the back; there would be some activity that was performed at the front. It was art as long as the nude person did not move. Some of the Girls appeared fully clothed as stooges to the comedians.

During the Second World War, the theatre boasted We never close . This was because its auditorium was below street level and thus relatively safe, therefore performance continued during air raids. The only time that was any movement during one of the tableaux was when a bomb landed on a nearby building. One of the dust-covered showgirls thumbed her nose at the Luftwaffe.

Strip clubs opened. Technically, these were private members clubs and therefore were not bound by the censorship laws in the same way. A lot of the Windmill s regulars deserted it.

Those who performed in the venue went on to have different careers within the entertainment industry. The comedian Jack Good went on to become a very influential pop music television producer Jack Good. Jackie Trent (n e Yvonne Burgess) (1940-2015) worked in the chorus line. She went on to become a highly successful songwriter.

It closed in 1964.

Vivian van Damm (1889-1960) was known to the comics as V.D.. He encouraged the practice.

We never closed was changed to We never clothed .

The Windmill closed in 1964.

Location: 17-19 Great Windmill Street, W1D 7JZ (purple, grey)

Website: www.thewindmillsoho.com

David Backhouse 2024