Authors: Victor Gregg
The boys in Kenton Street weren’t interested in boxing, but, as I was to discover, they had other interests, like the swimming pool in Endell Street, which lay on the south side of New Oxford Street. For just twopence you could spend the whole of Saturday morning at the baths. It was in Endell Street that I became aware that there were men who gained much pleasure from associating with small boys and good-looking youths.
It didn’t take long to suss out these individuals for what they were really after. I remember there used to be a clique of about four of them, always handing out bags of sweets which, naturally, we accepted: ‘Fanks, mister.’ Obviously they must have achieved satisfaction with some of the boys but none that I knew. It was through these gentlemen, as we grew older and into our teens, that we were able to get night-time employment in the clubs and cafés of Soho as washers-up.
The work started any time after seven in the evening and then we set to, washing the crockery and cleaning the glasses until ten in the evening. For this we were paid the huge sum of ten shillings a night, which was equal to the amount we were to earn for a week’s work when it came time to leave school.
19
Bloomsbury, the area we were now living in, was in those days almost a village. People were not born there, they moved there. A person might proudly announce that he ‘came from’ Bermondsey, or Poplar, or any other place, but you never heard people say that they ‘came from’ Bloomsbury; more like: ‘I am at present in rooms in Bloomsbury.’
Bloomsbury and the area on the other side of the Tottenham Court Road, known as Fitzrovia, was the place in which I was to serve my apprenticeship in the art of growing up. The area was the happy hunting ground of the street girls and the gangs from Soho, just across New Oxford Street, who controlled them.
At the top of the pile was the gang run by the Sabini brothers who had the majority of the girls along with the vice dens and gaming houses. Close on their heels were the equally intimidating Hoxton Mob. These two gangs between them not only owned nearly all of Soho and the West End, but it was a well-known fact that they had Savile Row, the main police station, well and truly in their pockets. It was the Hoxton Mob who became one of our main sources of income, unbeknown to our parents, of course. Mother and our grandparents strove in vain to keep my brother and me away from the evils of the area, but if there was money to be earned then we would offer our talents to earn it. As we grew out of our short trousers and began to fill out into young men, the pimps and small-time crooks who had got used to seeing us around day after day began to buy our services as watchers or lookouts so they could carry on their nefarious enterprises in comparative safety.
Mixing with the criminal elements had its dangers. If you started getting handouts from one of the mobs then that was the lot you got stuck with, the only trouble being that at any time you could be attacked by the kids who were getting dropsy – small retainers – from a rival mob. The six of us who roamed the backstreets of Soho, Greek Street, Wardour Street, Frith Street and the like started our life of ‘aiding and abetting’ by doing the simplest of tasks. The gangs hung about in the clubs during the daylight hours, drinking, playing cards and planning their next jobs. They started by asking us to ‘nip darn and get us some fags’. It wasn’t long before we realised that the lot we were doing these favours for was the infamous Hoxton Mob, cutthroats and number one villains to a man. ‘You boys want to steer clear of the Sabinis, if they get to know you’re hanging round us, they’d think nothing of slitting yer throat.’ Timely warnings which, because we were earning cash, went in one ear and out the other.
The Hoxton Mob, as their name implied, originated from Hoxton, in the depths of the East End of London. The Sabinis came from a district much nearer to where our little bunch of tearaways lived, Saffron Hill, an area off the Clerkenwell Road adjacent to Farringdon Road, around the corner so to speak. They were of Italian or, more correctly, Maltese extraction.
All the local ice-cream vendors had to pay their dues to this mob and, of course, all the girls and their pimps had to get permission if they wished to work to the east and north of Cambridge Circus or St Giles Circus. The two gangs didn’t encroach on each other’s territory and that’s how they kept the peace between themselves. It didn’t always work and then battles would rage that the police were powerless to stop. Us small, inconspicuous boys were used to keep an eye on the enemy and occasionally, if a job was planned ‘up West’, it would be let known that a small earner was on for a couple of hours’ lookout.
Much later on these two arch enemies had a head-on clash somewhere down in south London. According to what I read it was a right bust-up involving knives, shooters and anything that could do mortal damage. One of the Hoxton boys died of shotgun wounds and a couple of the Sabinis finished up with severe knife wounds. I think this took place in New Cross. What it showed was how far and wide these two gangs spread their tentacles. The final clash between the two gangs was a horrendous battle in 1936, at Lewes racecourse, where they were at each other’s throats over who was going to control the bookies and the lucrative off-course betting scams.
Our little gang also earned some dropsy from a gang that came from Somers Town, known as the Tolma Gang, presumably named after Tolma Square which was just around the corner. This small mob specialised in breaking and entering. They got all their information from the society columns in the quality papers. They’d read when Lord and Lady Whatsit were out of town or visiting somewhere abroad, then they would spend a couple of days sussing the house out, which was usually in some expensive part of the city, Belgravia, Knightsbridge or the like.
The first bloke in would be the screws man. He gained entry by shinning up a drainpipe. Once on a balcony out came a small putty knife to cut away the putty from a windowpane. Next a small pair of pliers to draw out the tacks that held the glass in. Then, with the help of a sink plunger, the pane was noiselessly removed. Then into the house, down the stairs, open the front door and that would be the screws man’s job finished. He departed the scene leaving a couple of men to go over the house while the most important member of the team set about cracking the safe. While all this was going on, us boys scoured the streets in the vicinity on the lookout for the law. As I said, a nice little earner. I never heard that the Tolma Gang ever got nobbled by the law. I finally came to my youthful senses when one of my mates mentioned to some of the elders of the Hoxton Mob that his dad worked as a lighterman on a Thames barge. The gang had been planning a heist on one of the many bonded warehouses that lined the river from Blackfriars all the way down to Wapping Creek. To have a contact who had access to one of the barges would have been like owning a goldmine.
We boys knew the risks we were running. We all knew that doing a stint in a Borstal was not a pleasant experience: about half a dozen of the older boys had been inside one and what they told us about those establishments was enough to make anyone’s hair curl. So we all decided to give Soho and the Hoxton Mob and all the other gangs the drop kick. There were other ways to earn money.
20
When I was about twelve John and I were dragged round to the church in Woburn Square. The word had gone out that they were short of choirboys: ‘Put the two of you on the straight and narrow,’ said Grandfather. As an aside he mentioned the news that we would be eligible for the ‘Sunday School Outing’, soon to take place.
Unfortunately, I had acquired a certain reputation in the area. ‘Bit of a scruff, that one.’ The vicar was not at all keen. He said he could only take one of us, but what he really needed was a boy who could sight-read a score. He shoved one under my nose, and without hesitation I gave a true rendering of the music. This must have shaken him to the foundations and from that moment on I was flavour of the month. Not that I was in any way keen on the idea of being a cissy choirboy, but to please Mother and my grandparents I stuck with it for nearly nine months. After that, enough was enough.
Although I was hopeless at singing, I used to help the organist out with the musical arrangements. When he found out I was leaving, he promised me the earth to stay on. ‘Be a good lad and think of your future.’ He even made contact with the headmaster at Cromer Street School. I got a lecture from him as well. I suppose they were both trying their best to help me; after all, it was obvious to them that I did have some talent. For me music was just something I enjoyed but that was all.
Soon after I was press-ganged into the Woburn Square church choir the news went around that there was some Yank who had a big posh car and was going to start up a new Scout Group in Herbrand Street. The vicar expected all of us to turn up at the first meeting; he said it would be like a big party and there would be cakes and ice cream and jellies, followed by games with prizes.
The man responsible for all this had formed a group called ‘the Holborn Rovers’ and these lads were going around putting cards in all the local shop windows, and the whole area was abuzz with the news. The locals considered the enterprise a good thing: ‘About time something was done, keep the little scruffs off the streets.’ Or some such words.
The first event was mightily oversubscribed. There was to be a meeting every week and, once they had been accepted, boys were expected to turn up with their uniforms clean and pressed. For any boy whose parents couldn’t afford the uniform it would be issued free of charge. The local mums loved it and they loved the man who was organising it all. He was called Ralph Reader and, as well as having an American accent, he was very handsome. He moved and talked like a film star. To top it all, the posh car he owned was an enormous American open-top touring Chrysler which he parked outside the hall where we met. Even though he had all the women swooning and starry-eyed, he used to spend a lot of his spare time in the company of his friend, a gentleman who lived in a block of flats on the edge of Russell Square.
The uniform we had to buy consisted of a pair of blue short trousers, a khaki shirt, a red scarf with grey trimming around the edge and a length of coloured string with a whistle on the end. There was also a belt which, when we could afford to buy one, was meant to carry a vicious looking sheath knife. Finally, there was the hat, wide-brimmed with a pointed top. You could also earn badges by passing various tests and these were sewn on to your shirt.
Ralph Reader himself was actually born in Somerset. He had emigrated to America and become a successful choreographer and stage producer but had for some unknown reason returned to the land of his birth and became a personality in the theatre scene. One evening he was chatting to a small group of us and told us that he had never realised how bad it was for us London kids. He said it was bad in New York but just as grim over here. Reader was sincere in what he was attempting to do. ‘The Skipper’, as he wanted us to call him, stuck to his task, finally producing his famous
Gang Show
at the Scala Theatre. The event became a centrepiece of the world Scout Movement – and it all started at the 10th Holborn Scout Group.
As my gran had forked out the cash for the uniform I was morally bound to turn up for the weekly parades. Afterwards I would make my way to my mates in Wakefield Street who scoffed at the whole idea. ‘Load of cissy boys, that’s what they are, let’s go round and bash ’em up.’ They never did, but I have to admit I felt the same way. I thought that, somehow, the boys were being used, but I couldn’t put my finger on how. I knew where I was with the lads in Wakefield, Sidmouth and Cromer Streets: there was no double talk, a spade was a spade, nothing hidden. I was happy with that and after a while I left the Holborn Rovers; some of them even started calling each other ‘Dear’ – not my cup of tea at all!
Once I was free from the responsibility of being a well-behaved choirboy, I was soon back with my old Wakefield Street mates. While I had been away a couple of Irish families had moved into the street.
For all the time that I had known them, the leader of the gang was a hard nut by the name of Tommy Spires. Tommy and I had it out together a couple of times over the leadership of the gang and on both occasions I came off second best. But we respected each other and the rest of the gang understood the score. Tommy was top dog and that was that.
Unfortunately for Tommy, around the time that I arrived back in the fold a couple of the new arrivals, Irish boys, began to challenge his authority. ‘Well, if you carn’t sort ’im out, Tommy, what you expect me to do?’ ‘Well, I was finkin’ that we could sort the two of ’em out together, run ’em off the turf, give ’em a good bashing.’ The thought that they might be about to witness a real good bundle was irresistible to the rest of the gang. ‘Let’s go and sort ’em out then.’ When I finally got home that evening I had two split lips and my eye was cut above the lid. I was put through the mangle by my mum and gran: ‘Ain’t you ever going to grow up? I thought you was told to keep clear of that lot in Wakefield Street.’ With my sore head I wasn’t feeling in the best of spirits but the two Irish lads were stopped, never to challenge again. Tommy and me were now the best of mates and the gang carried on stronger than ever. Our little leadership struggle had been noted by no less a man than the Bear himself. The lads who had caused all the trouble didn’t go to Cromer Street School; they went to the Roman Catholic school a few streets away. In our school the word went around that Tommy and me had seen them off and we stalked around the playground like a couple of gods. That is until we were called in to see the headmaster.