London’s Alleys: Helen’s Place, E2

This is a cobbled passage in Bethnal Green that runs around the back of a Victorian block of flats and at first glance doesn’t seem that interesting, but read on.The area was still fields in 1800, but by the 1820s, the first hints of urbanisation had appeared, with a row of buildings fronting onto Roman Road, marked on an 1828 map as Chester Place.
Those buildings don’t seem to have lasted long though, as the current block of flats with shops on the ground floor was built in 1888 by