'Hookey Alf' of Whitechapel

This photograph was one of 37 taken by John Thomson for the social documentary publication 'Street Life in London'. The image entitled 'Hookey Alf' is described in the book as follows: 'Outside an inn which stands in the centre of Whitechapel Road. Tables and benches enticed customers to drink in the open air. Many of the frequenters were street traders'.

The journalist Adolphe Smith's accompanying text refers to the individuals in the photograph as 'the calm undisturbed face of the skilled artisan, who has spent a life of tranquil, useful labour, and can enjoy his pipe in peace, while under him sits a woman whose painful expression seems to indicate a troubled existence, and a past which even drink cannot obliterate. By her side a brawny, healthy 'woman of the people' is not to be disturbed from her enjoyment of a 'drop of beer'...and early acclimatises her infant to the fumes of tobacco and alcohol. But in the foreground the camera has chronicled the most touching episode. A little girl, not too young, however, to ignore the fatal consequences of drink, has penetrated boldly into the group as if about to reclaim some relation in danger and drag him away from evil companionship'.