BermondseyBoy

Frean Street

Sadly like others I find it very difficult to find old pictures of Bermondsey and only by cutting clips and photographs can one achieve these goals.

Today's clips are from the video of the Hicks family ( Tommy Steele ) moving to Catford in 1957 and the clips give us an insight of what Frean Street was like, with one end facing the railway arches and the other St James Church.

Posted by bermondseygal

love these pics of Frean Street.
Sadly there seems to be no existing pics of Frean Street during the time I lived there (1963-1970) only the ones I have of the back garden of our prefab.
Our prefab (number 9) stood just behind the moving van in the middle pic.
There were four prefabs on our side of the street and three prefabs on the other side of the street.


You can take the girl out of Bermondsey but you can't take Bermondsey out of the girl!

Posted by deegs

Tommy Steele in Frean Street

This is very much like Fosney’s picture above so apologise for posting it but I just think that this picture is so nice it deserves to be on site, hope you agree and it’s OK.

A few comments on the photos:

Tommy Steele signing autographs (fosney & kiwi): the fenced-off area at the end of the RH side was the site of a school destroyed by bombing. The bomb-site was used as a "playground" (of course) and finally it was levelled and covered with cinders(!) - locally known as "The Pitch" - used for football etc.
Opposite: the end of a row of Victorian houses. I spent the first years of my life there (1948-63) - we occupied the semi-basement and first floor. My parents say that there were servant's bells in the basement when they moved in. The rear wall of this end-house didn't have bay-windows, like the others, as the back wall had to be repaired/rebuilt following blast damage from the school. The accommodation was condemned, were were moved out by the council and a hole in the ground was built to replace it. When finally levelled, prefabricated "mobile homes" were set up there (these were not like the earlier white "prefabs").

Photo showing Albin's Funerals by kiwi: the foreground was a biggish bomb-site, which, according to my parents, was left in a dangerous condition, sloping down to cellars under or near the Jamaica Road. Very scary for me as kid. This was finally levelled and turned into a pleasant park. Just beyond the block containing Albin's, I think you can see the rear of "The Rising Sun" - demolished to build the smart apartments?

Does anyone have an idea what the trees in Frean St. were in the first post? At least the ones at the church end had leaves like acacia, but my "I spy" identification book didn't confirm that at the time. This would be the resolution of a 65-year old enquiry!

Hi DaPi.
I am not sure of this, so I could be barking up the wrong tree, but I think the trees are either a Plane or a Mountain Ash, members of the Sycamore family. In the 1920s Bermondsey Borough Council planted a lot of these trees as part of their scheme to beautify the Borough.
Be tree-mendous if I’m right.