Old Houses In Drury Lane

Old houses in Drury Lane, 1876. This street, which runs north from Aldwych (formerly Wych Street) to High Holborn, contained old houses which had survived the Great Fire of London in 1666. By the end of the 18th century, however, it had the reputation of being one of the worst slums in London and the area was eventually cleared by the London County Council in 1901 to make way for the Aldwych and Kingsway redevelopment. This photograph was commissioned by the Society for Photographing Relics of Old London to form part of a permanent visual record of historic buildings threatened with alteration or possible demolition in the 1870s and 1880s.