Somers Town, London

Encyclopedia : S : SO : SOM : Somers Town, London

Somers Town is an area of London adjacent to the British Library at St Pancras and south of Camden Town.

The area was developed by the landowner Lord Somers. Among the first immigrants to settle in Somers Town were Huguenot refugees. During the construction of the major railways in the 19th Century the area had a large number of Irish immigrants. Over recent years the area has become home for Bangladeshi and Somali communitities. Following the troubles in former Yugoslavia, many people from Kosovo and Albania have made Somers Town their home. Somers Town also contains a sports facility used by University College London Union sports teams for training and home matches.

Somers Town sits between the busy stations of King's Cross and St Pancras, but it feels completely separate from the noise and crowds that surround it, perhaps because there are no major roads that lead through it. Parts of the area are pedestrianised.

Somers Town is bordered by four very busy roads: Crowndale Road to the North, Euston Road to the South, Eversholt Street to the west, and Pancras Way to the East. Facing Somers Town on Pancras Way is St Pancras Old Church, the oldest Church in London, where the young Thomas Hardy had to rearrange the gravestones around a tree to make way for the new railway. In the graveyard there are still many memorials to Victorian dignitaries.

The huge imposing building on the other side of the gardens is St Pancras Hospital, feared by many old Somers Towners as it was once the "workhouse". The hospital also housed a nurses home for UCH nurses. It is now all but defunct. In the far corner sits St Pancras Coroners Court.

Historically Father Basil Jellicoe is Somers Town's most famous Priest, responsible for clearing the slums and creating the "St Pancras Housing Association" in the 1920's. Many of the flats seen today are still part of the legacy. Nowadays all that is left of the original early 19th Century houses is a tiny enclave comprising three or four streets that face the South Camden Community School (formerly William Collins). They are Grade Two listed buildings.

Today Somers Town is a multicultural but deprived area, where many Ethnic minorities live. Due to the Conservative Government policy of "right to buy" in the eighties, many Somers Town residents who were Council tenants took advantage of the huge discounts available and bought their houses and flats. With the substantial profits to be gained, many sold their properties and moved out of the area to more countrified parts of North London. This in turn led to a slow but steady influx of young professionals and people who cannot afford the more salubrious Albert Street, in Camden, or Primrose Hill. This has led to a varied cultural mix within the area,with a decline in the original "Somers Towners". There are three primary schools and one secondary school, South Camden Community School, which is the focus of much trouble and violence in the area at present, with a frequent police presence at the end of the school day .

The area is presently undergoing major construction work at the King's Cross area in time for the Channel Tunnel rail link. There is also a new school being built at the site of St Mary and St Pancras School. New housing is also cropping up regularly.

The Somers Town Festival is held every year on a Saturday in July and showcases the best of the multicultural communities. Somers Town Market is held in Chalton Street every Friday. The residents of Somers Town, regardless of their Ethnic origin, are known for their strong sense of community, rare in an inner London area such as this .

Famous Somers Town Residents

Joe Cole, England footballer, hails from Somers Town

Jimmy McDonald, Boxer, also lived in Somers Town

Nearest Places

Nearest Tube stations

Nearest Railway stations

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.